A 49-year-old grandmother in the state of Colorado, United States, has been awarded $2.4 million by a court after the police entered her house while she was naked and about to take a bath, restrained her and tasered her in jail. For four hours she was kept in jail while being treated in an inhumane and unnecessary manner.
The incident occurred in 2014 but the lawsuit has only now been concluded. Carolyn O'Neal , was staying in a sober-living facility and police arrived after reports that she was acting in a distraught manner due to her mother being terminally ill.
The police had made their way into her apartment when she shouted at them not to enter the bathroom because she was naked while being in a perfectly fine mental-state. The police however barged through the door, pinned her down on a bed and handcuffed her. She was then escorted out of the building to the police station. At the police station, she was tackled to the ground and tied with restraints to a chair and tasered twice.
Fremont County pays $2.4 million in unlawful arrest case https://t.co/S4xvvkxL4H
— FOX31 Denver KDVR (@KDVR) December 21, 2020
The lawsuit against Fremont County Sheriff's Office said that they had failed to properly deal with someone who may have been mentally ill. O'Neal herself claims that she was targeted because she had previously complained about being wrongfully arrested.
The judge in the case stated that the treatment was unnecessary and that there was absolutely no reason for O'Neal's arrest in the first-place. The lawsuit stated that both police and jail staff:
"Created, fostered, maintained and tolerated an environment and culture of law enforcement brutality and deliberate indifference to the constitutional rights of its citizens and residents."
The jury that voted in O'Neal's favour, said that they believed she deserved $3.6 million but the case was eventually settled for $2.4 million.
O'Neal's lawyer, David Lane, said of their victory:
"This was an outrageous case. Law enforcement officers who believed they were above the law got smacked down hard by a jury. And unfortunately, this costs the taxpayers of Fremont County a lot of money. But I hope it inspires the citizenry to demand accountability from law enforcement — otherwise, it's coming out of their pockets."
This is not the first time that the Fremont County Sheriff's Office has been sued for misconduct, and the ruling comes after a long-year in which the actions of law-enforcement officers across the United States have come under extreme scrutiny. The actions of police officers in Minneapolis that caused the death of George Floyd resulted in the largest civil disturbances the United States had seen in decades.
The O'Neal case highlights the mistreatment of people who are suspected to be suffering mentally by the police. This is also seen in the case Mr. Zapantis in New York, a bipolar patient who was tasered to death by police officers from the NYPD outside his own home.
COMMENTS