- Just one
Springfield police officer remains of 10 initially named in a federal civil
rights violation lawsuit filed by a man who alleges he was stripped and beaten
before police planted drugs on him during a 2007 arrest.
When an ongoing trial began this week in U.S. District Court
in Springfield, four officers were named in the complaint after six were
dismissed prior to the trial; one more was shed on the first day of trial and
two more officers were dismissed after plaintiff Terrence Thomas testified that just one, officer John
Wadlegger, mistreated him during the encounter.
Thomas, 38, of Springfield, alleges that Wadlegger yanked
Thomas' pants down in broad daylight at the intersection of Congress and Dwight
streets on May 18, 2007, and later beat him with a closed fist and grabbed him
in a “choke hold” in an interrogation room at the police station on Pearl
Street. The plaintiff has sued for unspecified monetary damages and attorney’s
fees, alleging civil rights violations, assault and battery and negligence on
the part of the city. Sgt. Steven Kent and officers Robert Patruno and Gregg A.
Bigda were dismissed from the complaint by U.S. District Judge Michael A.
Ponsor this week.
Lawyers for the city have argued Thomas suffered a
concussion and lacerations to his face through a scuffle prompted by resistance
from Thomas during the arrest.
Plaintiff's lawyer Alan J. Black rested his case on Thursday
after several hours of testimony from his client and brief testimony from two
of the officers. The city opened its defense with testimony from Patruno, a
veteran narcotics detective who told jurors that a confidential informant
called in a tip around 4:30 p.m. on the day in question.
The tipster, who was not named in court, told Patruno that
Thomas and a friend, Tracy Anderson, were selling drugs at the Blue Eagle
restaurant and bar on Worthington Street. Patruno testified that the tip
prompted the narcotics team to go to the bar and stage a “rip stop” after the
couple left the bar that evening. The term refers to a large team of officers
swarming a car on all sides abruptly, Patruno said.
“In narcotics arrests … the person inside the car is often
thinking fight or flight,” Patruno told jurors during direct examination,
explaining the tactic, but testified that this arrest was reasonably routine.
Thomas testified that he was beaten by Wadlegger at the intersection and in a windowless
interrogation room as Thomas insisted he had no knowledge of the drugs for
which police were searching. Patruno testified they recovered a golf ball-sized
wad of cocaine and marijuana in baggies from Thomas’ car and more drugs after
police returned his clothes to him in the interrogation room. Patruno admitted
that police missed the drugs during the first search of the car and that he was
not present for the actual seizures of either.
“All of this was missed at the (traffic) stop?” Black asked
Patruno during cross-examination, which Patruno conceded it was.
The trial is expected to continue into early next week.