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Woman annoyed at drivers on flooded street arrested after threatening tirade with bat, gun

3 years 8 months 3 weeks ago Monday, July 06 2020 Jul 6, 2020 July 06, 2020 4:19 PM July 06, 2020 in News
Source: WBRZ

BATON ROUGE – Emotions swelled as swollen streets turned to streams Monday amid torrential rainfall, leading to the arrest of a woman who appeared to be caught on video attacking a vehicle driving through rising water.

Sheriff’s deputies responded to complaints of the woman hitting a family’s pickup truck with a bat and threatening them with a gun Monday.

“As our truck approached her, she came to the car with the bat and started yelling and screaming, telling us to ‘turn our f***ing truck around because her house is going to flood," Demetra Turner-Louis said.

Turner-Louis was in the truck with her husband and teenager daughter when the incident happened at the corner of Confederate Ave. and Chattanooga Drive in Shenandoah.

She says that she has lived in the neighborhood for over 10 years and is aware of the flooding issues, saying other neighbors lined the roadway asking nicely for people to mind their speed as they drove through the high water.

The neighborhood experienced street flooding amid 3-4 inches of rain before lunchtime Monday.

Nerves have been on edge in the four years following the August 2016 flood and people across the area were worried as they watched ditches fill and flood streets and yards Monday morning.

A block away from where the incident happened, a WBRZ viewer shared images of water up to the bumper of a garbage truck on its Monday morning run.

The sheriff’s office said it arrested the woman seen on the video yielding the bat and gun.

Bridgette Digerolamo, 38, was charged with criminal damage to property and aggravated assault with a firearm.

"She had a gun and she stood at the end of the street pointing the gun at us. So that’s when my daughter started yelling and screaming for me to get back in the car," Turner-Louis said.

Sheriff's deputies said Digerolamo yelled to the family of three in the truck to "Turn the f*** around, you're causing my house to flood" before going inside and returning to the yard with the gun and yelled: "You better move."

When questioned, the deputy said Digerolamo responded, "I was in fear of my life, and my child's life, I want an attorney."

"We didn't have any weapons. She had a bat, she had a gun. We didn't have anything. So her life wasn't threatened," Turner-Louis said.

As of Tuesday morning, Digerolamo was released from Parish Prison on a $2,500 bond. 

Digerolamo is an employee with the East Baton Rouge Parish School System.  The district released a statement Wednesday about the incident: "The East Baton Rouge Parish School System is aware of an incident that occurred Monday, July 6, involving an employee. Per district policy, we are conducting an investigation of this incident and, following completion of the investigation, will make a final determination pursuant to district policies and procedures."

Chris Nakamoto has more new information about the situation.  Watch News 2 at 5:00 and 6:00 Tuesday. 

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