Leon Rosby has filed a civil suit against the city of Hawthorne,
California and three police officers, alleging that they intentionally sought
to “intimidate” and cause him “psychological trauma” when they shot and killed
his 2-year-old Rottweiler, Max, during a confrontation last summer, reports the
L.A. Times.
As previously reported by NewsOne, Hawthorne police officers were
responding to an armed robbery call when Rosby, who claims that the department
has a “pattern of harassing conduct,” arrived on the scene and got out of his
car to film the activity on his cellphone.
Rosby’s music was blaring from his car’s speakers, which officers
claim was interfering with their ability to do their job.
“It’s distracting the officers,” said Hawthorne police spokesman
Lt. Scott Swain. “It’s interfering with what they are able to hear. It’s not
just a party call. It’s an armed robbery call. The officers need to hear what’s
going on with the people being called out of the residence. That music in his
car is bleeding over and it’s distracting them.”
“I do apologize if I didn’t immediately comply. The music may have
been a little loud but I was complying,” Rosby said at the time. “I said, ‘Sir,
I want to make sure nobody’s civil rights were being violated.’”
Unfortunately, things took a turn for the worse.
Police officers handcuffed Rosby which agitated Max, who was
sitting in the idling car with the windows down. The dog jumped out of the
window, barking and lunging at a police officer who then shot him four times.
He died at the scene.
The video of Max’s death went viral and currently has over
5,800,000 views.
“There was no way Max should have died like that,” Rosby said.
“Max was only protecting his master. He was trying to stop them from beating on
me.”
Read more about Rosby’s civil suit from the L.A. Times:
According to the suit, the officers’ conduct was “directed at Mr.
Rosby and was intended to intimidate and harm him and to cause psychological
trauma” by forcing him to watch his dog being killed.
The suit calls the officer’s conduct “extreme and outrageous, and
beyond the bounds of decency,” adding that Rosby suffered “severe emotional
distress.”
“It was devastating,” Rosby told The Times after the shooting.
“His love for me was so extraordinary that he actually died for me.”
According to the lawsuit, officers then filed false police
reports, alleging that Rosby had been the aggressor in the confrontation and
had intimidated witnesses on scene.
Prosecutors and police also alleged Rosby went to the home of the
witness who provided the second video, verbally confronting her and her son.
The Los Angeles County district attorney’s office subsequently
charged Rosby with six felony counts, including intimidating a witness,
dissuading a witness from prosecuting a crime and making criminal threats, as
well as a misdemeanor count of resisting arrest.
Mark Geragos, an attorney for Rosby, called the shooting and
subsequent charges the “height of police misconduct.”
