White OH Cops Unlawfully Stopped a Black Man, Handcuffed him, Searched His Car, Repeatedly Hit His Face and Detained Him w/o Charges in a Jail Storage Room for 4 Days w/no Toilet; $50M Verdict Upheld

From [HERE] and [HERE] An Ohio appeals court on Thursday upheld a $50 million jury verdict in favor of a Black man who was stopped, searched and arrested without probable cause and then beaten and unlawfully detained in a filthy storage closet for four days by East Cleveland police.

The verdict had come in Arnold Black's second jury trial against East Cleveland over its police department's treatment of him in 2012 after he was pulled over for baseless reasons. In Thursday's multipart ruling, the appeals court in Cuyahoga County kept the jury's eight-figure award to Black.

Among other things, the appellate panel found that the trial court didn't abuse its discretion in various decisions made during the August 2019 trial, including a decision to bar the city from presenting evidence that hadn't been handed over when requested in discovery in 2014.

The court stated,

On April 28, 2012, at approximately 10:00 p.m., Black was driving home from his mother’s house when he was pulled over by East Cleveland Patrolman Jonathan O’Leary. (Trial tr. 166-167; 218; 227.) Sergeant Randy Hicks had ordered O’Leary to stop Black’s green truck because it resembled a green truck belonging to a suspected drug dealer. Hicks was a narcotics detective in East Cleveland and was also a member of a joint narcotics task force with the Cuyahoga County Sheriff’s Department. (O’Leary trial depo. tr. 54.)

O’Leary told Black to get out of his vehicle, handcuffed him, and escorted him to the back of his truck. (O’Leary trial depo. tr. 8.)

O’Leary’s patrol car was parked behind Black’s vehicle with the lights activated. Black was sitting on his back bumper in front of O’Leary’s patrol car when Hicks arrived on the scene.

Black testified that Hicks immediately began searching his car and removed the side panels from his truck. Hicks did not find any narcotics in the truck and, after brandishing his badge, began questioning Black about who sells drugs in East Cleveland. (Trial tr. 86.)

Black replied that he did not know who sold drugs in the city. Thereafter, Hicks became violent and repeatedly struck Black’s face and head without provocation or justification. (Trial tr. 93.) Hicks admitted at trial that he struck Black several times until O’Leary came between them and stopped him. (Trial tr. 93-94.) Hicks described Black as appearing “dazed” after the beating. (Trial tr. 94; 232-234.)

O’Leary testified that he believed his dash camera was operating throughout the duration of the incident and captured the incident on film. (O’Leary trial depo. 18.) Black and O’Leary both testified that Hicks may have been under the influence of alcohol at the time of the incident because he smelled of alcohol. (Trial tr. 291-292; O’Leary trial depo. 73-74.)

Hicks admitted that he called another officer to transport Black to the East Cleveland jail even though he did not have probable cause to arrest him. (Trial tr. 98.)

Upon arriving at the jail, Black was placed in a storage room that the police officers referred to as a “holding cell,” even though there was no bed and no toilet in the room. (Trial tr. 238-239.) The room contained a wooden bench, some storage lockers, and cleaning supplies and was infested with cock roaches. (Trial tr. 240- 241.)

Black remained in the storage room for four days. At some point, an unknown officer entered the room, gave Black a carton of milk, and allowed him to use his cell phone to make a call. (Trial tr. 244-245.) Black called his former fiancée, Eryka Bey and told her, in a whisper, that he had been arrested and beaten and was being held in the East Cleveland jail. (Trial tr. 190.)

Bey went immediately to the jail and asked to see Black. An officer told her she could not see him because he was “under investigation.” Black testified that on the fourth day following his arrest, a councilwoman came to the jail to inquire about him because she had heard he had been beaten while he was handcuffed and was being detained without probable cause in the city jail.

Chief Spotts accompanied the councilwoman during her visit with Black in the storage room. (Trial tr. 272.) In Black’s presence, the councilwoman told the chief that she wanted to know what happened to Black and how “at this time and age * * * he got beat up and put in a closet.” (Trial tr. 274.) Thereafter, Black was placed in a line of inmates, who were awaiting transport to the county jail. (Trial tr. 271-274.) Later that day, Bey picked Black up at the county jail and drove him home. (Trial tr. 196-197.)

According to Bey, Black’s head was swollen like a “helmet” and he was acting fearful. (Trial tr. 196-197.) In the weeks following the incident, Black complained of headaches and developed vision problems. His mother and Bey also observed changes in his personality. They described him as withdrawn and unwilling to leave the house due to fear of the police. (Trial tr. 199-200, 201, 209, 253-254.)

Black eventually sought medical attention and required surgery to remove blood from his brain. (Trial tr. 204-206, 257-260.) Following the incident, O’Leary reported Hicks to his superiors, including Spotts. (Trial depo. tr. 29-30.) O’Leary told Spotts that the dash camera video would show Hicks beating Black while he was handcuffed. O’Leary also completed a “Form-M,” a report in which O’Leary detailed Hicks’s actions with respect to Black. (O’Leary trial depo. tr. 66.)

Yet, nobody from the East Cleveland Police Department ever followed up with O’Leary to investigate the incident, and the dash-camera video went missing. (Trial tr. 31; 33-34; 49.) O’Leary testified that the department’s failure to take action in response to the incident suggested that the department intended to cover it up. (Trial tr. 33-34.)

O’Leary stated: Q: Now, based on your experience, based on your reference to notify supervisors, based on the actual notifications that you gave to supervisors about what happened, does the missing video and the inaction by the city and chief --- * * * lead you to believe * * * that the chief ignored your information so they could put the matter to rest without prosecuting Detective Hicks? * * *

A: I don’t know what his intentions were, but the appearance to me was that he probably wanted to put [it] to rest.

Q: So the missing video and inaction by the city and chief leads you to believe, and do you in fact, truly believe that the chief participated in a passive, do nothing cover up in this case? * * *

A: So you’re saying that because nothing was ultimately done and – by anybody, basically, that there was no prosecution, was that a covert way to basically, hide this? It has that appearance to me. (O’Leary trial depo. tr. 33-34.)

Hicks similarly testified that he propounded discovery to appellants, requesting any police reports, O’Leary’s Form-M complaint, the dash-camera video, booking documents, jail records, and his own personnel file, and the city informed him that “[t]hey didn’t have [them] anymore” and that “they were gone.” (Trial tr. 102-103.) Hicks testified that there was a culture of violence in the East Cleveland Police Department. He explained that as part of his on-the-job training, he was taught to use violence against citizens in order to obtain information from them and to instill fear. (Trial tr. 83-84, 87.)

Hicks explained that when he was a patrol officer, he and Spotts were part of group known as the “jump-out boys.” (Trial tr. 90.) Whenever they encountered citizens gathered on a sidewalk, they would jump out of their cars, throw the citizens on the ground, and beat or “boot” them. (Trial tr. 90.) Hicks was also taught to “clear the corners” by slamming people against police cars, searching them for drugs without probable cause, and if they did not find any drugs, making it “inconvenient for them.” (Trial tr. 91.) The officers “made it inconvenient” for citizens by “strip[ping] them down in the middle of winter” and making them stand naked in the cold. (Trial tr. 91.) They stripped people naked on a “daily” basis. (Trial tr. 91.) Hicks testified that he would not have been promoted if he had refused to engage in these violent tactics. (Trial tr. 95.)

Spotts was the chief of police in the East Cleveland Police Department at the time of Black’s arrest. (O’Leary trial depo. tr. 22; trial tr. 109.) Hicks testified that as the “top law enforcement officer” in East Cleveland, Spotts was responsible for establishing policies and procedures for the jail, criminal investigations, and “every aspect” of the police department. (Trial tr. 106, 110.) Under Spotts’s supervision, it was well known that there was a “right way, a wrong way, and the East Cleveland way.” (O’Leary trial depo tr. 34, Trial tr. 106.) The “East Cleveland way” included a lack of meaningful oversight by supervisors, routine failures to report violations of police procedures, and the use of violence against citizens and other officers. (O’Leary trial depo tr. 36-39, Trial tr. 87-93.) As a result, violence was a custom and practice within the city when arresting people at traffic stops or when citizens were not compliant. (Trial tr. 103-104, 146-147.) According to Hicks, individuals, who posed a threat the city’s civil liability, were also routinely treated with violence, arrested without probable cause, and placed in the jail. (Trial tr. 105.) [MORE]