A deaf man, Brady Mistic, is suing Idaho Springs Police Officers over his 2019 arrest. It happened in September 2019 as Mistic was driving into the parking lot of a Colorado laundromat, thinking he was about to run a routine errand.
However, Mistic was approached by a police cruiser moments after exiting his car. Two Idaho Springs police officers, Nicholas Hanning and Ellie Summers, came out of the cruiser and began shouting commands at Mistic, who was 24 at the time. According to a new federal lawsuit, one of the two officers threw Mistic to the ground, and the other stunned him with Taser.
The officers claim Mistic resisted arrest when he was being confronted. However, the Coloradan says confused Mistic couldn’t hear the officers when they confronted him. Poor Mistic is deaf in both ears, can’t lip-read. However, he can communicate using American Sign Language.
Mistic is now suing the two officers for violating his civil rights when they violently arrested him without warning.
“They went to force unreasonably fast, unreasonably rashly, without any legitimate justification for using force, which is particularly problematic for a person who’s disabled like Mr. Mistic was,” Mistic’s attorney, Raymond Bryant, told NPR.
According to the suit, Mistic spent close to five months in jail, only to have the charges against him dropped eventually. The Idaho Springs Police Department, in a statement, defended the two officers, saying they didn’t know Mistic was deaf during the initial encounter. Moreover, the statement maintained that Mistic resisted arrest, which led to one of the officers breaking his leg.
Christian Malanka, a former Idaho Springs Police Chief, said the officers’ actions were appropriate after reviewing the matter. The department added.
