Worcester, MA. A woman filed a lawsuit against a police officer claiming she was falsley arrested and beaten.

A Chicago woman has filed a civil rights suit in U.S. District Court alleging that a city police officer beat and arrested her without justification.

Wakeelah A. Cocroft said that the action of Patrolman Jeremy Smith on Dec. 29, 2008, was in retaliation for her objecting to the way he addressed her and her sister and for asserting her rights. The American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts announced the suit, which was filed Dec. 28 by Beverly B. Chorbajian and Marina R. Matuzek, two Worcester ACLU cooperating lawyers.

Ms. Cocroft was a passenger in the car of her sister, Clytheia Mwangi, when she pulled the 2006 Saturn Ion into the Mobil station at Park Avenue and Institute Road. The suit alleges that Patrolman Smith stopped his cruiser behind the Saturn at the gas pumps “and began screaming at her” that she had been speeding.

The officer pulled Ms. Cocroft away from the car and threw her “face-first onto the pavement, causing her face to scrape against the cement.” He yanked her arms behind her back and pushed his knee into her back, remaining there for several minutes, with Ms. Cocroft telling him she could not breathe.

Ms. Mwangi called 911 on her cell phone but was ordered by the officer to end the call and place the phone on the roof of her car so that she could not seek assistance. When another Worcester officer arrived, Patrolman Smith told him he arrested Ms. Cocroft “when she started ‘yapping about her rights.’”


Link:http://www.telegram.com/article/20110110/NEWS/110119958/1116