Colorado Springs law enforcement officials took a 17-year-old highschool pupil to the bottom earlier than pepper-spraying her at the back of a police cruiser — regardless of the teenager being unarmed and having dedicated no crime, a lately filed lawsuit alleges.
Amara Keens-Dumas, in a grievance filed Friday in El Paso County District Court docket, accuses Sgt. Gregory Wilhelmi, Officer Ryan Yoshimiya and Officer Brianna Ragsdale of “unreasonable and extreme bodily pressure” after they pepper-sprayed her twice two years in the past.
“If there was ever going to be actual accountability, these cops can be prosecuted for assault and fired from their jobs,” the now-19-year-old’s lawyer, David Lane, stated Monday.
A Colorado Springs police spokesman declined to remark, citing pending litigation.
Police arrived on the Parc Residences round 3 a.m. on Oct. 17, 2020, after a bystander reported seeing Keens-Dumas and her then-boyfriend arguing exterior the constructing, the lawsuit states.
The teenager, in body-camera footage and video taken by a bystander, was emotionally distraught and had been ingesting that night time. Her brother informed police that she had lately been raped and was nonetheless traumatized from the assault, in accordance with the grievance.
When officers couldn’t get Keens-Dumas to go away the median, they pushed her into the aspect of the police cruiser, video exhibits. One of many officers touched her thigh, the lawsuit alleges, an act that despatched her spiraling.
As she yelled “don’t contact my leg” and have become extra distraught, two officers took Keens-Dumas to the bottom, inflicting the teenager “painful cuts, scrapes and bruising to her arms, knees and legs,” the grievance says.
She begged the officers to let her name her mom. She then began hyperventilating, video exhibits, telling police she was having a panic assault.
“I’m a minor,” Keens-Dumas repeated to officers. “I get a telephone name.”
After handcuffing Keens-Dumas and inserting her within the again seat of a patrol automobile, police then pepper-sprayed the teenager twice, as soon as within the brow and the following time in her eyes and nostril, the grievance alleges.
“She was primarily imprisoned in a gasoline chamber with no escape from the excruciatingly painful pepper spray,” the lawsuit claims.
Police let her sit within the again seat of the automobile for 10 minutes with out medical help, in accordance with the grievance.
She was booked on obstruction and took a deferred judgment, Lane stated. That night time, she was taken to the police station and launched into her mom’s custody.
“Even now, two years later, she has a PTSD response to this incident,” the lawyer stated.
He referred to as for the officers to pay damages out of their very own pockets.
“However, in fact, that can by no means occur,” Lane stated. “This will probably be white-washed.”