A retired Ohio firefighter living in Surprise, Arizona is suing the Surprise Police Department for $500,000 after being charged with driving under the influence (DUI), even though Breathalyzer and toxicology tests showed that he was perfectly sober. 64-year-old Jessie Thornton, who is African-American, says that racial profiling led to his arrest. In his notice of claim points to 10 separate occasions on which he was stopped by police and four other times when he was ticketed for violations he did not commit. Thornton and his attorney hope to show a four-year pattern of police harassment in a suit over emotional distress and violation of civil rights.
"It's driving while black," Thornton told ABC 15 as to the cause of his repeated stops. "I just don't want any of this to happen to somebody else."
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Police say that the night Thornton was arrested, he had crossed a white lane marker in the road, had bloodshot eyes, acknowledged taking a prescription blood pressure medication and had trouble keeping his balance during a sobriety test. Thornton says he explained to Officer J.J. Otterman, who pulled him over, that his eyes were irritated because he was swimming at a health club, and adds that he told police before his field sobriety test that hip and knee problems might hamper his movements - he was scheduled to have hip surgery two days later.
The retired firefighter, who lives with his wife in a retirement community in Surprise, told Phoenix station KNXV that he sleeps during the day and runs errands and works out at night. "My wife, she's an ER nurse and works three 12-hour shifts, so I adjusted my schedule to be like her schedule," he said.
"[The officer] walked up and he said, 'I can tell you're driving DUI by looking in your eyes'." Thornton says when he responded that he had been swimming at his health club, the officer told him he was going to have to undergo a sobriety test.
"At one point, one of the officers shined the light in my eye and said, 'Oh, sorry,' and asked the other officer if he was doing it right,'" Thornton told Arizona's WPTV, adding that he was then put in handcuffs and ordered to sit on the curb.
"I couldn't even sit on the ground like that and they knew it and I was like laying on the ground, then they put me in the back of an SUV and when I asked the officer to move her seat up 'cause my hip hurt she told me to stop whining," said Thornton.
The 64-year-old's car was impounded and his license suspended even after all tests came back negative while in custody. But charges weren't dismissed until nearly two months later, when a blood test finally indicated that he had no mind-altering drugs in his body when pulled over. He was notified by the DMV later that he had to take a class for drunk driving. Thornton contends that his reputation has suffered permanent damage because of the arrest and charges on his record.
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