sheriff's office you think anything about this is okay right now imagine as a parent that you call 911 asking for an ambulance because your son needs help um I'm trying to call an ambulance um do I have to call the hospital uh no sir we dispatch an ambulance what do you got um it's my son but instead of an ambulance cops arrive instead without an ambulance why because the cops have a warrant for the son it's this one right huh that one i don't know sheriff's office hello hello is this the And as soon as the cops get there instead of medical treatment the son gets immediately tased oh hey i didn't even know this at the time but apparently just days after I posted the video two years ago they completely got rid of this guy whether he resigned or he was fired I don't know scratch that one down as yet another example of YouTube taking down one of the bad apples did he pop up somewhere else i'll tell you what I know a civil lawsuit was filed and just recently it was settled let me know in a comment what you think how much do you think this case actually settled for at the end of the day this happened back on June 18th of 2021 this was in Union County Illinois involving the Union County Sheriff's Department on June 18th of that year Jacob's father called 911 seeking an ambulance for his son he was suffering a mental illness emergency due to the unfortunate meth addiction that he had at the time and at that time he was a very small perhaps slight 27year-old man who had suffered from long-term drug use and mental illness he was at his home in Jonesboro Illinois this is only one block away from the Union County Sheriff's Department building and one block away from where ambulances are dispatched to citizens in need even though Jacob's father called for an ambulance an ambulance never arrived here's the actual 911 call where Jacob's father was told that an ambulance would be dispatched 911 what's interesting emergency um I'm trying to call an ambulance uh do I have to call the hospital uh no sir we dispatch an ambulance what do you got um it's my son um he's um psychotic right now he's in a psychotic state okay had a relapse about a couple weeks ago and he's just uh he's in he's going nuts but instead several law enforcement officers arrived including Sheriff Harville Chief Wilkins and Deputy Shield Neck still two years later no idea if I pronounced that correctly all three of those cops knew that Jacob was reported to be having a mental health breakdown basically the call was that he needed emergency medical assistance the deputy admits in his report that Jacob was having a mental health crisis that's why he was there he noted that he received a report that Jacob was having a mental health crisis described as psychotic and that an ambulance was needed he then wrote "I also knew that Jacob had a felony warrant as well as a history of running away naked from help when we arrived." All the cops present knew or should have known that the felony warrant that existed was not for a dangerous or serious criminal offense in fact they were the police department that requested the issuance of the warrant and for similar reasons these cops also knew that Jacob was not even aware of the fact that a warrant had been issued so Jacob had no idea the cops would be coming to arrest him for any warrant upon arriving on the property the deputy contacted the individuals who were at the residence and they indicated that Jacob was in the backyard of the home i just knew it's this one right huh right here shut up Todd that one i don't know hello hello sheriff's office it's all around when Deputy Schulted approached Jacob he just instantaneously fired his taser at Jacob yep please stop one shot he wrote in his report that he allowed the taser to run for the 5-second cycle until Sheriff Harville could get there to assist jacob's friends and neighbors looked on as he writhed on the ground in pain after being tased while he's screaming out in just excruciating pain deputy Shield Next report admits that he tased Jacob in the back as Jacob turned to run away the deputy mentions no immediate safety threat as being the basis for this use of force as I walked through the residence and came to the side door Jacob saw me turned and began to run away from me at this point I raised and fired my taser at him as he ran away i was unable to issue a warning to him because the situation evolved so quickly none of the law enforcement officers had announced their presence nor their reason for their presence they had not identified themselves or mentioned why they were there or that they had a warrant after they tased him the cops discuss whether or not they're going to allow Jacob to ride in the ambulance or whether they're going to take him in the police car which is ultimately what happened we'll take it no if it's Jacobs it's going into evidence did you grab that taser Scott yeah it's a taser we're grabbing it it's not okay you think anything about this is okay right now no let's go all right the next situation all right are we going to uh we can't because he's going they're going to have to I know let's get the ambulance service up to the office we ought to just take him to the hospital Scott we don't want to pay him in the back of an ambulance that's true i'm trying to be a dick but I say we just I agree but we're going to get smart county K91 when the deputy asked "Do you think anything about this is okay right now?" That actually aged pretty well because nothing about it was okay but before I posted this footage on the internet nothing had been done about it according to the lawyer who handled the civil lawsuit he wrote "The deputy resigned shortly after the incident was exposed on the popular website The Civil Rights Lawyer." The post generated hundreds of online comments many expressing outrage over the deputy's tas first ask questions later approach nevertheless the defendants denied any connection between the deputy's resignation and the website post according to the deputy he was not disciplined for the incident so he resigned after I posted the video in fact looking at government payroll records I can't see where this particular deputy has been given any sort of a government salary while working as a police officer and I found no record of him working anywhere else so I'll scratch that one down as yet another example of YouTube taking down one of the bad apples when none of the supervisors or elected sheriffs or county commissioners or anyone else would actually do anything prior to the public becoming outraged rather the environment around there was apparently so bad that the deputy who did this complained about and apparently received compensation for his broken Oakley sunglasses that unfortunately were broken when he violently attacked this man in violation of the Fourth Amendment you may ask what about this incident violates the Fourth Amendment when I see taser videos all over the place that don't look a whole lot different illinois is in the seventh federal circuit so we look there to the case law which similar to other circuits it says tasers are considered a significant level of force officers may not use significant force such as the deployment of a taser on non-resisting or passively resisting suspects the seventh circuit has also made clear that police officers can't just use tasers as a tool of convenience to just seize somebody rather than physically attempting to seize them first where there's no danger or immediate safety threat to the officers in Lewis versus Downey the Seven Circuit said that the tasing of a jail inmate with no warning who was not threatening the officer is excessive force here the deputy even wrote in his report that he didn't give a warning prior to tasing this individual who had no way of knowing he was under arrest who was not told he was under arrest just saw him and tased him and that was actually in violation of their apparent department policies according to the Union County Sheriff's Department policy handbook which presumably this deputy was given a copy of and and at least reviewed in his years on the force there said that explicit verbal announcement of the intended use of a taser shall precede the application of the taser so you have to give a warning first this officer violated his own department policy the policy further provided that the fact that a person is fleeing should not be the sole justification for the use of a taser and that was the only justification given by the deputy in this case also the Union County Sheriff's Department policy handbook further provided that even if otherwise authorized the use of a taser should not be used against individuals who are known to be or obviously are medically fragile indeed the Seventh Circuit has cited the I believe the Ninth Circuit in stating that people who are known to have mental illness should not be treated like they are violent criminals and significant force such as tasers should not be used when there are multiple officers around and no immediate safety reason to use a taser so this is as they would call it a bad tape it violated their own department policy there's not much of an argument there in my opinion that this violated the Fourth Amendment all right let's get to the settlement as citizens our only recourse for the government violating our constitutional rights that we can prosecute ourselves is to file a section 1983 lawsuit in federal court the only thing we can get there is money we can't just directly get anybody fired or disciplined or anything like that hopefully those things happen as a byproduct but all we can do the remedy that Congress gave us is a monetary award in an amount ultimately determined by a jury this case settled before getting to jury trial with both parties anticipating what a jury might do that means these cases are always fact dependent including on the estimation of whether or not a jury is going to be sympathetic with somebody with a long um history of meth addiction because a lot of jurors out there are just going to say "Well f around find out." This was litigated in the Southern District of Illinois no idea what the jury pool is like there but the amount that both parties agreed on was $58,000 so let me know in a comment what you think is that too much is that not enough these cases are very difficult we have to take the wins where we can get them here the officer is no longer policing that community he's not going to do this again in that community hopefully an example was made out of him and the only reason that that occurred that there was any accountability any justice whatsoever was because of a YouTube video the public was outraged and then there were consequences but that's only possible so long as you participate so it's very important that you subscribe and even though sometimes these videos are hard to watch if you don't watch them and you don't share them then perhaps there's no accountability at all the government's only going to care if they know that someone is watching so continue watching so please subscribe both here and at the blog at the civil rightsawyer.com you can also follow me on Twitter JohnBrian ESQ and yes I'm a little bit sunburned i just got back from a week in Florida where I got to go fishing for red fish big shout out to my guide down there Captain Tracy Collins if you want to do some of the most fun fishing ever Cedar Key Florida Tracy Collins super great guy super affordable highly recommend i can't wait to do it again remember our rights don't end where your fear begins freedom is scary deal with it