two years ago yesterday a young black man was shot by the West Virginia State Police SWAT team inside his home while he was sleeping in his bed he was completely innocent wasn't suspected of having committed any crime and yet you haven't even heard about it have you you didn't see it on the national news you didn't see anybody marching you didn't see any civil rights leaders upset about this you didn't see any politicians upset about this you didn't see any press conferences from the governor or the West Virginia State Police or anybody about why this innocent young man was shot literally in his bed and now 2 years later no report has been released instead they for 2 years have been trying to cover up the truth and to conceal the facts because they're worried about a civil lawsuit this video is about my client Darius Lester who fortunately survived being shot but who has been gaslit now for over two years and who just yesterday has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit seeking to vindicate his constitutional rights and hold that guy accountable for what would be a crime anywhere else outside of a corrupt small County in West Virginia now maybe I shouldn't say corrupt County maybe I should say notorious County where this occurred is is McDow County West Virginia if you search for that on YouTube you'll find some fascinating videos of people just driving around McDow County and showing how the economy there was completely devastated how it was a once thriving boom County due to Coal but when the coal jobs left it sort of left Devastation in its wake and in my almost 20 years of handling police misconduct allegations in West Virginia that is probably the most notorious place that I've ever dealt with it can be a really shady place so this actually went down in a very tiny Community there in that county called Big Sandy Darius Lester is somebody who I would still refer to as a kid but he's working full-time for a Coal Company driving a coal truck from what I've heard nobody has anything but good things to say about him he had no criminal history at this time he wasn't suspected of having committed any crime he just happened to be staying at his uncle's house unbeknownst to him his uncle was being investigated for allegations regarding his computer the cops wanted to seize his his uncle's computer hard drive this had nothing to do with Darius except the location the evening before Darius was working the night shift driving the C truck he didn't get home from work until about 400 a.m. he gets home and he goes to sleep where he likes to sleep in his uncle's house and this this is on a couch that is sort of like a futon and it's in a common area of that home I visited the home after this occurred and you have to understand the context of the layout of the house because it's important here when you come in the front door of the house you would walk through the main room the largest room of the house which is the living room then you come into the kitchen and from the kitchen you then have to make a 90° rightand turn towards the bedrooms on that side of the house on the other side of the kitchen is sort of a common area it could be a family room whatever I'll call it the common area this is where this futon slouch was that Darius like to sleep on now that room was sort of under renovation so there were tools lying around so he gets home 4:00 a.m. he conks out he goes to sleep on that bed on that couch by the time he would wake up the West Virginia state police's SWAT team would already be in the house aiming weapons at him aiming flashlights at him inside to pitch dark house so the West Virginia state police's SWAT team which they call the SRT the Special Response Team shows up at the front door of this house I reviewed the warrant that was left at the residence there was nothing in the warrant affidavit that was given to the judge that specifically made any allegations that somebody inside the house was believed to be armed or dangerous and thus requiring a SWAT team to treat it in this manner it was by all accounts a routine search for for execution that pertained to wanting to get somebody's hard drive there was nothing saying that there were firearms in the house or that anybody inside had a criminal history or was believed to be dangerous they did not have a no knock entry warrant it was just a regular search warrant so they show up with a swap team I don't know how many guys but a bunch presumably in body armor with rifles perhaps Machine Guns Etc one thing they don't have is body cams because although the West Virginia State Police by this time has made every traffic officer wear a body cam because you know traffic incidents are important when they think it's important enough to send a SWAT team in they think it's important enough to wear extra body armor and have extra special weapons and backup they don't want that on camera because if something happens the courts and the public and the media will just have to take their word for it there won't be any proof one way or the other and that's the situation we ended up in so no body camps SWAT team they show up at approximately 5:30 in the morning the same time of year as right now I got up at 6:00 this morning and it was still pitch dark outside so 5:30 in the morning it's pitch black outside Darius is asleep inside his uncle is also asleep in the master bedroom pitch black inside the house of course they know this that's why they're there at 5:30 in the morning no emergency lights on outside to alert anyone to a law enforcement presence before breaking in the door and storming in the house they claim to have knocked an announced they claimed to have said police search warrant or something like that they claimed to have said that likely because there's a constitutional requirement for them to do so but the evidence indicates that they did not want the occupants of the home to know that they were there which is why they didn't have any emergency lights on outside why they showed up at 5:30 in the morning when they thought everyone would be asleep but we know that nobody inside neither of the occupants inside heard their knock and announce everyone's still sleeping even after they break in the door then this SWAT team streams inside to clear the house the point officer is the one who would end up confronting Darius he goes straight through the house as I explained previously where you have to go across the living room into the kitchen then make a 90° right-hand turn to that common area where the couch was that darus was sleeping on at that point senior Trooper ji Jones shot Darius two times once in his upper torso and once in his left arm we know that this either occurred on or in the immediate vicinity of the couch on which Darius had been sleeping is indicated by the bullet holes and blood all over as well as under that couch and as he laid on the couch bleeding after being shot Darius recalled hearing one of the officers say did he have a gun we believe that the SRT officers initially believed that Darius was actually his uncle maybe it wasn't that big of a deal to shoot the target of their investigation and their minds when one of the SRT officers found the uncle on the other side of the house asleep in the master bedroom the officers then likely realized that they had shot someone else an unknown young black male who was entirely unrelated to their investigation and it was at that point that we believe they cooked up a story because they have to have a story about why he was shot two times he was not armed with any sort of firearm or knife or anything like that he was in his bed we believe one of the officers located a hammer in that room because there were Tools around and that's when they fabricated false justification for having shot Darius claiming that Darius intended to attack this SWAT team with a hammer now mind you he has no criminal history no pending charges in other words he has no reason to attack a SWAT team much less with a hammer now you see the deer head on the wall nearby was actually a hunting rifle so if he thought that his home was being burglarized and he wanted to defend the house he could have grabbed a rifle had he been awake why would he grab a hammer all of that is completely irrational so after he shot the officers tended to him on that very couch that Darius had been sleeping on just minutes earlier they applied a tourniquet they called for EMS Darius asked what was going on and they told him to shut up the officers also told him to quit looking at them and the cover up began attempting to justify the shooting as Darius is in the hospital undergoing emergency medical treatment the West Virginia state police apparently directed another Trooper senior Trooper km Sadler to file a criminal complaint these are criminal charges against Darius charging him with one felony count of attempt to commit malicious wounding and this is important The Narrative alleged this upon arrival SRT knocked and announced their presence twice before breaching the door to the Target residence upon entry SRT members encountered a male subject later identified as Darius Lester Lester had a hammer in his hand and rushed towards members of the SRT with the hammer up in a striking position despite being given verbal commands to drop the weapon Lester continued towards the SRT members with a deadly weapon still in hand in a raised position a SRT member reacting to the threat presented by Lester discharged his firearm twice to stop the threat striking Lester now for some reason they had a police officer write that and swear to that who was not there when it happened who was not the shooter so when that actually went to court the judge found that there was no probable cause for the charge and it was dismissed on July 6th of 2023 today a hearing was held to see if the court would officially charge him with this crime here we have a very unique situation in that Trooper Sadler who has been called here to testify on behalf of the state has no absolutely no knowledge whatsoever he is basing everything that he knows about this based on a trooper Jagger and Trooper Jagger as Trooper Sadler testified to wasn't involved in what happened on that day so about 20 two witnesses were presented to bolster the state's case neither witness was on the premises let alone inside the home at the time of the incident after magistrate van djk heard from all parties he announced that not enough evidence was presented to officially press charges against him so the only witness that the police that the state brought was this guy who wasn't there who just wrote this up so it appears that this other Trooper Trooper Saddler was utilized basically to conceal the identity of the shooter which then enabled the state police to deny foyer request that I was sending to get information there's an open criminal case that's an exception to Foya we can't give you any information even though they clearly had no intention of even trying to prosecute or prove that criminal charge sounds like obstruction doesn't it they were they were obstructing the victim so the criminal charge was then dismissed but thereafter the West Virginia State Police still denied my foyer request they claimed to still be investigating the shooting even though no charges were pending anymore and it and it had been over 5 months since the shooting in West Virginia there's a one-year statute of limitations for criminal cases for misdemeanors just several days before that would bar them from charging Darius with a misdemeanor Forever on March 6th 2024 they filed yet another criminal complaint against him this time charging him with misdemeanor assault and these charges were brought by Sergeant Jerry Davis who just happened to be the state trooper who was supposed to be investigating the shooting who was communicating with the family who was trying to visit and interview Darius when he was still in the hospital he was supposed to be investigating and writing the report about the shooting which still 2 years later we don't have he's the one who files more charges against Darius for allegedly attacking the SWAT team with a hammer what was the effect of that well they didn't have to give us the report and guess what that charge is still pending they can't prove it it's bogus but they're leaving it out there why we had two years to file a lawsuit about the shooting a civil lawsuit they kept that charge pending without it going to court for two years without providing Discovery without even providing a copy of their report about what happened at the shooting they never provided it to me they never provided it to Darius or his criminal defense attorney we believe they purposely did that in an attempt to toll the two-year statute of limitations to file a lawsuit forcing the lawsuit to be filed without the benefit of being able to obtain and review the investigation report but of course we did file a lawsuit so ultimately now because we don't have any body cam footage it's going to be up to a jury who can listen to both sides and resolve the factual dispute did Darius attempt to attack this heavily armored heavily armed SWAT team with a hammer for no reason at all that's why we have juries that's why we have cour houses and honestly I can't wait to make that argument isn't it a little more likely that the SWAT team just didn't get all dressed up for nothing and they did something that's actually very likely to happen when your government sends an armed SWAT team into your home that's why it shouldn't happen unless it's absolutely necessary all of these tragic stories occur when this happens at the wrong address or with the wrong person mistakes are always made by the government because government is almost always incompetent they're going to make mistakes or maybe this wasn't a mistake at all but something far more Sinister so I can't wait to get this before a jury and if you want to follow along in this case you can follow subscribe here and at the blog at the Civil Rights lawyer.com because now there's no way they can stop me from getting all of the discovery the investigation report not that I'm holding my breath for it to be advantageous to us but at least I can see what angle they're going for here remember our rights don't end where your fear begins freedom is scary deal with it