The lawyers of the family of environmental and social justice activists Manuel Paez Terán, known as Tortuguitita, submitted a federal action against three officers almost two years ago, which are involved in the murder of the demonstration “Stop City” in a forested public park southeast of Atlanta.
The complaint claims that the rights of Paez Terán's fourth amendment during the early morning were injured on January 18, 2023 when civil servants threatened to arrest two agencies when they campaigned for a controversial police training center, which was known as “Cop City”.
In addition, a violation of the rights of the first change of the activist is claimed as retaliation for the expression of the training center.
The lawsuit announced by the Spears & Filipovitz law firm in Atlanta is under many legal submissions that associated the protest movement against COP City in terms of an important fact of the protest movement: Dozens of officers in the intreenchment Creek Park on this day were under command.
However, the park in question, however, was a public country without a publicly responsible schedule, the initial lock or ban on camping and is about a mile from the future police training center, against which activists protested. Dekalb County has the park while Atlanta has the COP City site.
These facts form the basis for the “wrong arrest” of the complaint.
The three officers named in the lawsuit from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and State Patrol had participated in a pattern escalating raids in the forest and in Atlanta, which aimed at a broad movement against the training center.
In her fourth year, the movement against COP City bought national and global headlines, especially after the Paez Terán police killed – the first such incident of this kind in the history of US history.
The opposition to the project comes from a wide range of local and national supporters of causes such as unchecked police militarization and the clearing of forests in an era of the climate crisis. The Atlanta police say that the center is needed for the “world class” training.
The second change in the fourth change mentioned in the lawsuit claims to use two of the three officers of excessive violence when they shot pepper balls into the tent in which Paez Terán slept.
“Every person who is trapped in a tent with whom he is filled [pepper balls] Would reasonably believe that they would die, “the complaint said.” At the time … [the officer] Manuel had pepper balls in Manuel tent and no crime. “
Finally, in the complaint “Remanders under violation of the first change” claims. It is said that participation of the activist in the activities in the Intrenchment Creek Park, including camping […] Constituted core policy speech “and that” the operation of clarifying the Intrenchment Creek Park followed from a month -long efforts by state and local law enforcement authorities to provide those who were rejected against the construction of the police training center as domestic terrorists “.
The purpose of the robbery and “[defendant and GBI officer Ryan Long’s] In order to arrest everyone in the Intrenchment Creek Park, the complaint was “to end the continued protest against the training center”.
One of the state's claims in the decision after nine months of investigation that the actions of the officials were justified was that Paez Terán had a gun and wounded one of them. But none of the officers wore body cameras, and the state refused to release the investigative acts that underpinned its conclusions, led a separate persecution of 61 activists.
Nevertheless, members of a handful of other agencies were nearby during the incident. The Atlanta police published some body cam videos that were recorded by these officials. They seemed to show the officials that they talked about listening to friendly fire.
Within a few weeks, the GBI asked the police not to publish them anymore and quote the examination of the shootout.
Asked about the alleged exchange of shots, lawyer Brian Filipovits replied: “We don't know” and referred to the lack of information about the incident.
“This is our goal with this lawsuit: to receive information for the family and, if someone is liable, blame you.”
