Woman, 62, sues BPD over injury

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An East Baltimore woman has filed suit against three police officers, alleging they caused her severe leg injury earlier this year and then tried to cover up what happened in an incident report.

Patricia Jones, 62, claims an officer threw her son-in-law into her as police attempted to arrest her daughter for disorderly conduct, according to the lawsuit, filed Monday in Baltimore City Circuit Court. The officers tried to downplay the causation and severity of Jones’ injury, describing it as a “strain” and saying it was “somewhat contested how grandma broke her leg,” according to the lawsuit.

“The report minimizes the injury to Patricia Jones,” said Dominic R. Iamele, Jones’ lawyer.

Det. Jeremy Silbert, a spokesman for the Baltimore Police Department, said the agency does not comment on pending litigation.

The incident began just after midnight on March 23, when Officers Dean Rogers, Stephen Sistek and Steven Dorn were called back to the 700 block of North Port Street after a second report of a disorderly crowd and two women who “looked as though they were going to fight,” according to the lawsuit.

The officers told Chelsea Copman and Jones’ daughter, Arjoli Wright, that they were under arrest, according to the lawsuit.

Police pursued Wright and Copman into Wright’s house, where Jones was visiting, the complaint says.

Wright’s husband, Dwight Campbell, approached to find out what was going on, at which point an unidentified officer “grabbed and tossed Campbell… with great force and without any probable cause,” the lawsuit states.

Campbell fell into the left leg and knee of Jones, who was standing nearby, according to the complaint. Jones suffered a fracture of the tibia plateau, the top of the leg bone closest to the knee.

Such an injury is usually the result of being struck by a car, according to Iamele, of Iamele & Iamele LLP in Baltimore.

“To break that, you need to use a heck of a lot of force,” he said.

Jones’ grandson eventually called the paramedics and Jones was taken to the Johns Hopkins Hospital, according to the complaint. But Officer Sistek, who documented the incident in an injured-person’s report, wrote that Jones only suffered a “strain to the left knee,” according to the complaint.

Conversations between the officers about the incident were captured on dispatch recordings, the lawsuit states. In addition to describing Jones’ injury as contested, the recordings quote an unidentified officer as saying “just explain…how [Campbell] knocked into her or whatever and just put that into the report,” the lawsuit states.

Iamele said his client was “still on the mend” from her injury, which required surgery and rehab.

Jones is seeking unspecified damages from each officer for assault, battery, civil conspiracy and violation of the Maryland Declaration of Rights.

The case is Patricia Jones v. Officer Dean Rogers, et al., 24C14006410.

Wright, Jones’ daughter, was charged with disorderly conduct and failure to obey a police officer, but prosecutors dropped the charges in April, according to online court records. Copman was charged with obstruction and interference and resisting arrest; she prayed for a jury trial and the case was placed on the stet docket in June, according to online court records.