Correction officer who says Boston police beat him files suit
A Boston officer who was at the center of the notorious, near-deadly police beating of another patrolman nearly 15 years ago faces new allegations of police abuse, in a federal lawsuit that alleges the department allowed him to work despite his past “overly aggressive’’ behavior.
Officer David Williams and his partner, Diep Nguyen, were named in the lawsuit filed yesterday in federal court in Boston seeking unspecified damages in the March beating of Michael O’Brien, 29, of Boston.
O’Brien asserts he was attacked by Nguyen and Williams when he tried to record them with his cellphone after a minor car accident. Nguyen allegedly grabbed the phone, and O’Brien tackled him, choked him from behind, nearly strangling him, and hit him in the head.
The lawsuit says other, unidentified officers arrived but did nothing to prevent the attack.
O’Brien suffered a concussion, contusions, and bleeding of the brain. He still has headaches, dizziness, and difficulty concentrating, preventing him from continuing work as a correction officer, he said in the lawsuit. He also has not returned to his assignment with the Massachusetts Army National Guard, under doctor’s orders.
“The truth is, we don’t know the extent of his injuries at the moment,’’ said his attorney, Howard Friedman of Boston. Friedman said in the lawsuit that the officers “nearly killed’’ his client.
A Boston police spokesman said the department would not comment on the lawsuit.
Williams, who was involved in another beating in 1995, could not be reached for comment, and the head of the union representing police officers did not respond to requests for comment.
But O’Brien’s lawsuit centers just as much on the March incident as it does on the Boston Police Department’s alleged tolerance of excessive force, its failure to address false police reports, and its permitting of a “code of silence to persist.’’
“These policies or customs permitted [Williams] to continue working as a police officer on the street, even though the city identified him as an overly aggressive police officer and found that he had filed false police reports,’’ the suit said.
Williams, who joined the force in 1991, was one of the officers found liable in the 1995 beating of Michael Cox, who was at the time a patrol officer. He was in plainclothes and chasing a homicide suspect in Mattapan when the officers mistook him for a suspect, beat him, and left him near death on the street.
No one was ever charged in the beating, one of the ugliest times in Boston police history. Williams and two other officers were fired, but Williams was reinstated six years later after an arbitrator found the department did not have just cause to terminate him.
Cox, who released Williams from an $817,000 lawsuit he won against the city, later sued Williams after he was reinstated. They reached an out-of-court settlement in 2006, and Williams remained on the force. Cox is now deputy superintendent.
Dick Lehr, who wrote a book on the Cox beating called “The Fence’’ and is a journalism professor at Boston University and a former Globe reporter, said, “As far as the Cox beating case, David Williams was in the thick of this.
“The Cox beating, the beating of one of their own, was one of the worst cases of police brutality in the city’s history, with the twist being that the victim was a cop mistaken for a shooting suspect. You’re talking about one of the marquee players in one of the worst brutality scandals in the department, who had been found liable by a federal jury, had been fired, and it’s kind of astonishing he has found his way back to the force after all that.’’
O’Brien’s lawsuit alleges the department allowed Williams to work on the street, even though he had “earned a reputation as an overly aggressive police officer.’’ He had at least seven internal affairs complaints, according to the lawsuit, and had been identified in an “early intervention system.’’ Also, the suit alleges, Williams had been found in the past to have falsified police reports.
Friedman said that in this case Williams had concocted a story to charge O’Brien with disorderly conduct, assault on a police officer (Nguyen), and resisting arrest. The charges were dismissed in April after O’Brien performed community service.
Friedman said his client initially filed a complaint with the department’s Internal Affairs Division, but continued with the lawsuit after he lost faith in the investigation process. No witnesses were questioned, he said.
Friedman said his client “wants people to know he filed this because he doesn’t want anybody to go through this again.’’
Milton Valencia can be reached at mvalencia@globe.com. 