Justin Cosma, the police officer involved in
the incident at the Ferguson McDonald's in which two reporters were briefly arrested, faces a lawsuit claiming that he tied the hands and feet of a 12-year-old boy in his own driveway,
The Huffington Post reported.
In the episode, which took place in June 2010, the shirtless boy had been checking the mail while his mother was inside the house. Cosma and Deputy Richard Carter, then with the nearby Jefferson County, Missouri, police, approached the child and became involved in an altercation, according to the lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in 2012, the Post reported.
The cops wrote up the incident as an "assault of a law enforcement officer third degree" and "resisting/interfering with arrest, detention or stop." County prosecutors dropped the case, the Post reported.
A statement released by the plaintiff's attorney, Richard Lozano, said his client was checking the mail when the cops approached him. "The encounter quickly escalated. My client was restrained, choked, thrown to the ground and hogtied by the two deputies. He suffered scrapes and choke marks to his neck. No charges were ever brought against my client. It is my understanding that Justin Cosma is currently an officer with the City of Ferguson."
Besides Cosma, other police involved in the Ferguson protests have also drawn scrutiny, starting with the officer who shot 18-year-old Michael Brown, Darren Wilson. He came to the Ferguson police after the troubled force in Jennings where he worked was disbanded,
The Washington Post reported.
Another cop, Eddie Boyd was accused of striking children when he worked for the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, the Post reported. He later joined the Ferguson force.
St. Louis County officer Dan Page was suspended after he publicly made prejudicial statements of a racial and sexual nature and referred to President Barack Obama an "illegal alien," the Post reported. Page was involved in a squabble with CNN's Don Lemon.
And Lt. Ray Albers of the St. Louis County police was suspended after he threatened reporters and passersby with his gun. "I can't believe that that happened in America," said journalist Joe Biggs who has covered Iraq and Afghanistan. "In our country? Mind-blowing," he told the Post.
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