A former Bethel police officer has been convicted of misdemeanor assault, providing false information, and tampering with records.
The convictions stem from a December 2023 incident in which then-Bethel Police Officer Jonathan Murphy punched Bernard Mael repeatedly in the head and then attempted to cover up the incident.
On Feb. 12, a Bethel jury found Murphy guilty of all three counts, which each carry a maximum sentence of one year in jail.
State assistant attorney general Erin McCarthy, who prosecuted the case, said in closing arguments that Murphy intended to inflict harm on Mael from the outset.
"Jonathan Murphy was not looking for ways to avoid using force. He was looking for a reason. When can I use force? Not, when do I have to?" McCarthy said.
According to charging documents, on Dec. 23, 2023, Murphy responded to a traffic stop for a vehicle reported to be stolen that 44-year-old Mael was driving. Body cam footage obtained by KYUK shows Murphy attempt to pull Mael from the vehicle and strike him with a closed fist. Murphy lets go of Mael, who drives away and leads officers in a pursuit through Bethel.
At the time, Murphy radioed to say that Mael had hit him with the vehicle, an assertion he made multiple times in the events that followed.
"There is no way around the fact that he lied about getting hit with a vehicle to his fellow officers on the scene, at the hospital, later when reviewing the charging documents, and when writing his report. He ignored the videos, he ignored the truth, and he continued to lie," McCarthy said.
While he was being chased, Mael drove the car off the road and became wedged against a snowbank. During this second stop, body cam footage shows Murphy tase, pepper spray, and beat Mael in the head as the man struggles to shield himself. Mael did not testify or appear in court during the six-day trial.
In his closing argument, defense attorney Joseph Miller argued that the charges against Murphy failed to consider the situation as a whole, including the claim that Mael did not comply with officers at any point during the incident.
"You got to look at the totality of the circumstances. You can't cherry pick, look for little mistakes. Has to be the totality," Miller said.
Miller argued both that Murphy’s use of force was justified, and that he didn’t have a motive to lie about the circumstances of Mael’s arrest.
"What the state is asking you to believe here with Officer Murphy is that in the middle of a split-second, adrenaline-soaked, rapidly evolving situation with a moving vehicle, that he calmly calculated his false testimony, his false felony allegation, that in the middle of this he thought, ‘Oh, I'm going to nail this guy,'" Miller said.
In a corresponding civil suit against the City of Bethel, Mael claimed that the beating left him with permanent brain damage. In December 2025, the city reached a combined $10 million settlement in that suit and another police brutality suit involving Murphy.
Murphy is scheduled to be sentenced on Feb. 19 in Bethel court. The court has allowed Murphy to attend the hearing remotely from his home state of Arkansas.
