A federal judge in Alabama denied a family’s motion to have footage released showing a police dog mauling their loved one until he died from those injuries. The officer believes making the footage public could “jeopardize police safety” and prompt “civil unrest.”
On Wednesday, May 18, Chief U.S. District Judge Emily C. Marks denied Joseph Pettaway’s family a motion asking her to remove the confidentiality designation from police bodycam videos of the deceased being bitten to death by a Montgomery Police Department canine.
While the family and their attorney believe releasing the footage will promote transparency surrounding the four-year-old case, the judge is standing with the city’s lawyers, who claim releasing the video will cause chaos.
Atlanta Black Star obtained the civil lawsuit filed by the Pettaway family in 2019 against the city and the police department for violating Pettaway’s Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights.
The claim alleges on Sunday, July 8, 2018, police engaged in excessive force when they allowed Niko, a dog on the force, to sink his teeth so deeply into the thigh of the man (even before verifying if he was a criminal) causing his wrongful death.
At the time, police believed Pettaway might have been a burglar breaking into a mostly empty house at 3809 Cresta Circle. They were alerted by “an anonymous report that there appeared to be an unknown person inside the house,” the lawsuit alleges.
When they arrived at the residence, they shouted out to Pettaway to come out, but “either did not hear these shouts or if he did hear them, did not respond to them in any manner audible to” the officer.
This is when they released Niko on Pettaway and captured the fatal attack on the bodycams in question. The suit also claims the police failed to provide medical aid to the man during critical moments after the dog bite, allowing him to bleed to death.
In an exclusive statement via email to Atlanta Black Star, the family attorney, Chip Nix, said Pettaway “was in a house that was being remodeled,” but unlike previously reported, “he was not in his mother’s house.”
While he was in the house, there was another person in there with him. Both men (at some point) believed they were alone in the house.
Nix states, “There was a person in the house when Mr. Pettaway entered who did call 911 because he could not [recognize] JLP’s face. This person had been working with Joseph Lee remodeling the house. He has later acknowledged that he knows JLP but did not know it was JLP at the time. The time of entry was about 2:40am.”
The Montgomery police say the homeowner also approved them to come into their home with the dogs in an effort to protect their property, the Montgomery Advertiser states.
Still, the lawsuit says there was “at no time” a reasonable threat to the MPD, and no reason for the animal to be released, and once released, they had a responsibility to save Pettaway’s life.
The lawsuit read, “From the screams and/or pleas of Mr. Pettaway heard by MPD police during the attack … They knew that the police dog was attacking Joseph Lee Pettaway and knew that he was being violently injured by the dog, i.e., he was being mauled and his flesh was being torn and ripped by the police dog .”
“After the police dog began attacking Mr. Pettaway inside the house, [MPD police] allowed the police dog to continue this violent attack on Mr. Pettaway, during which time no MPD policeman entered the house and intervened or took any actions that effectively restrained or ceased the police dog’s attack on Mr. Pettaway.”
Nix told ABS that the city doesn’t believe the officers were in error during any part of the incident, saying, “The City and its officers are claiming that excessive force was not used and that the release of the dog was proper. They also claim that the department policy was to not render aid to a suspect injured by them and that , therefore, they are not liable to Mr. Pettaway’s estate for the fact that he bled to death.”
“The police on the scene, about 6 or 7 of them, did not even try to stop his bleeding with direct pressure,” the lawyer continued.
The family filed a motion to have the footage showing the grisly killing released but has been blocked at every turn.
“Our claim is that medical aid is a requirement of the constitution in this circumstance and that it was the policy enacted and enforced by the city that caused the violation of the constitution and JLP’s death, therefore, creating a cause of action called a Monell claim. We argue that medical aid should have been rendered to stop the bleeding,” Nix maintains.
The city’s attorneys were first to object to their distribution. They argued the release of the video could put officers in danger. They further argued the footage is so disturbing it possibly could wind up “facilitating civil unrest” and would impact law enforcement privacy, causing “annoyance, embarrassment” for those on duty believing they were doing their jobs in good faith.
A judge has filed the videos under a protective order, stopping it from being released to the public.
The lawyer reveals the family has heard the 911 call and seen the police bodycam video. They lawyers also rendered to the court a timeline of events based on the video. It was subsequently suppressed from the public record.
On Wednesday, May 18, Griffin Sikes, another attorney on the case, said these claims are not valid and the people have a right to see the footage, which is crucial evidence in the civil suit. “The United States courts are the people’s courts,” he reminded the city.
It was also important for Sikes to let the public know the city did not share the footage with the family or his office until two years after the incident. The lawyer describes the videos of the two-minute mauling in detail in the lawsuit documents, highlighting how his screams were ignored and how officers allowed the “police dog into the house unaccompanied by a handler and without any effective means of controlling the dog or the violent attack.”
Nix’s email pointed out “The dog gained entry through an open front door that the other person inside left open when he vacated the premises after the 911 call.”
In a deposition, the handler testified he had to put the dog into a chokehold until the dog almost passed out before he could get him to release from Pettaway’s groin area. The lawsuit states Pettaway never stopped bleeding, even as he was transported to the hospital in an ambulance. Upon arrival, he was declared dead.
The dog’s handler, Nicholas Barber, who is also being sued for his part in the 51-year-old’s death, joked about the mauling no more than five minutes after he got his dog off of the dying man, according to the since-suppressed timeline of incident.
“Did ya’ get a bite?” one officer asked him. Barber responded, “Sure did, heh, heh (chuckling).”
The cop questioned, “Are you serious?” to which Barber replied, “F**k yeah.”
At the May 18 court hearing, Judge Marks denied the family’s motion without prejudice, meaning the Pettaways will still be able to refile in the future, likely after both parties in the lawsuit complete depositions and later in the year, file final motions for summary judgment.
