Greedy Trial Lawyer
Another Day, Another Slap On The Wrist Of A Wayward Cop
Category: Ho Hum
There it is, in Overlawyered - Red meat for a plaintiff's lawyer. A police sergeant who uses excessive force and lies under oath gets only a five-day suspension.
Actually, it is closer to stale grits for most of us who spend our lives investigating jail deaths, hot pursuit collisions, shooting deaths of unarmed drunks, police brutality, false arrests and other wayward conduct of the men in blue. It is almost axiomatic that one or more officers will lie under oath and that the "investigation" of the incident will result in exoneration or a pathetically mild penalty.
In August 2004, a security guard at a Pittsburgh restaurant roughed up Deven Werling, a patron who had insulted him. So Mr. Werling sued the restaurant, the security guard, and, of course... the city of Pittsburgh. It turns out that the security guard was actually a Pittsburgh police officer -- an off-duty police officer -- which made this assault a federal case. Now the city is paying $200,000 as part of a settlement the defendants reached with Werling just before trial (Post-Gazette; WTAE). Apparently,even though the officer was off-duty, he was working security in his official police uniform, and that may have been sufficient to put taxpayers on the hook.Before you start feeling too much sympathy for the innocent city that was dragged into this suit, though, check out this nugget:
The city's Office of Municipal Investigations found that Sgt. Eggleton contradicted himself under oath, and he was fired.
In October, the dismissal was reduced to a five-day suspension by then-Operations Director Dennis Regan. Mr. Eggleton continues to work as a sergeant.
So excessive force and lying under oath = five-day suspension. That will be red meat for the next plaintiff's lawyer who sues the city over police brutality.
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