A Hawthorne man is suing the city in connection with the fatal shooting of his pet Rottweiler by police last year in an incident that was caught on video and viewed nearly 3 million times online.
Leon Rosby filed the lawsuit Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court, naming Hawthorne police Officers Christopher Hoffman, Michael Matson and Jeffrey Salmon as defendants. Rosby alleges violations of civil rights, negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress, and is asking for unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.
“We plan to hold them accountable,” said Rosby’s attorney Mark Geragos. “What they’ve done here is outrageous.”
Hawthorne City Attorney Russ Miyahira declined comment via email, citing the pending litigation.
The dog was killed by police about 5:45 p.m. June 30 at 137th Street and Jefferson Avenue, where officers were on the scene of a barricade situation.
According to police, Rosby pulled up to the scene, started taking pictures and left music playing loudly from his vehicle. Determining he was interfering with officers, police decided to arrest him.
The dog, Max, was in the back seat of Rosby’s car but jumped out and started lunging at officers, police said. Hoffman shot Max multiple times, according to the lawsuit.
“Officer Hoffman’s conduct was directed at Mr. Rosby and was intended to humiliate and harm him and to cause psychological trauma to Mr. Rosby by forcing him to watch the brutal and inhumane execution of his beloved dog,” the suit states.
The video of the incident, shot by a bystander, “was downloaded millions of times and became the source of national and global attention and utter embarrassment for the Hawthorne Police Department,” the suit states.
The public hostility against the officers and the city prompted officials to remove most department telephone numbers from the Hawthorne website.
In retaliation for the video, Hawthorne police “fabricated police reports that claimed Mr. Rosby was the aggressor during the arrest,” according to the lawsuit. “The police reports also claimed that Mr. Rosby threatened and intimidated other witnesses from releasing other videos of the incident.”
Geragos called the criminal charges a “classic bait and switch” in an effort to deflect attention from the dog’s killing.
“First, they execute his dog, then they get the district attorney to file specious criminal charges,” he said. “We’re confident they will end up being dismissed and seen for what they are, which is nothing more than a cover-up by Hawthorne.”
Geragos accused the Police Department of trying to intimidate his client. At Rosby’s arraignment on the criminal charges, Hawthorne police attempted to take him into custody again, he said.
“If I’m a citizen of Hawthorne, I’ve got to wonder why eight officers showed up to an arraignment,” Geragos said. “In 31 years (of practicing law), I’ve never seen that.”
A preliminary hearing on the charges is set for next month.
Rosby was targeted for harassment by Hawthorne police after he filed a complaint against the department in July 2011 alleging “corrupt practices,” the suit alleges.
It’s the second lawsuit this week filed against the Hawthorne Police Department. A deaf man alleged he was brutally assaulted by four officers while moving items he had stored in the backyard of a friend’s home in February 2013./dailynews.com/
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