Robert Bryant

Crime scene photo of Robert Bryant at Huntsville Hospital following arrest on Aug. 22, 2012. (Photo by Madison County Sheriff's Department)

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama -- Robert Bryant, a Tennessee mechanic arrested in 2012, has sued eight Madison County deputies and Sheriff Blake Dorning for false arrest and conspiracy to cover up a "revenge beatdown."

The suit accuses seven deputies of beating Bryant or watching him be punched and kicked while unconscious and handcuffed at the side of the road. The eighth deputy is accused of helping falsify investigative reports.

Bryant was charged with assaulting an officer.

The suit argues the deputies concocted a false account to hide the attack on Bryant and that Sheriff Dorning later learned of the events and did nothing to discipline the officers nor drop the charges.

"Dorning has established a custom and policy of tolerating misconduct by his officers, and, therefore, he is responsible as well," argues the lawsuit filed in federal court on March 10 by Bryant's civil attorney, Hank Sherrod in Florence. The suit requests a jury trial.

"Dorning's refusal to take action despite clear evidence of serious misconduct by his officers is part of a longstanding practice of Dorning," reads the suit.

Dorning and his deputies were served last week. Contacted this morning, Dorning did not reply. Nor did Jeff Rich, attorney for Madison County.

Dorning had commented on the case last November, saying, in part, of Sherrod: "The attorney makes money by creating speculation." That was his last public comment on the matter, coming shortly after deputies began investigating the shooting death of Jason Klonowski.

Klonowski had paid for Bryant's criminal lawyers. Klonowski also held a rally to protest the "brutality" of sheriff's deputies. That was a month before Klonowski was found on Nov. 3 shot in the head, propped up in a chair against his barn along Highway 53. He'd been dead for four days. (Click here for more on Klonowski.)

Sherrod in November publicly pushed for an outside investigation into the killing, contending deputies had cause to harm Klonowski because he had taken up Bryant's cause. Klonowski's friends say he had received a death threat related to the rally against the sheriff's department. During that rally, Klonowski announced he intended to keep going until deputies were imprisoned.

The Alabama Bureau of Investigation took over the shooting investigation last fall. Last month, the FBI confirmed they were now assisting the ABI. There is no reference to Klonowski in the lawsuit.

While the suit names several deputies, Sherrod places special emphasis on Deputy Justin Watson and Deputy Jake Church.

"All defendants except Dorning agreed and conspired to cover-up the beating of plaintiff by pursuing false charges against plaintiff," reads the suit.

Crime scene photos of Deputy Justin Watson at Huntsville Hospital following arrest of Robert Bryant on Aug. 22, 2012. For more photos, click here. (Photo by Madison County Sheriff's Department)

However, the suit alleges Deputy Church initiated the beating, and did so on behalf of Deputy Watson. Bryant had said the same when recounting events to The Huntsville Times.

The suit centers on a traffic stop in August 2012, although the story began weeks earlier with a bar fight in Hazel Green. Bryant said he got the better of Watson, who was in plain clothes, during a scuffle in a pool hall.

The suit asserts Church in August of 2012 stopped Bryant "in order to assist defendant Watson in getting revenge against plaintiff." Madison County paperwork from the night of the arrest says Bryant made an illegal lane change.

"During the incident, Church, without provocation, among other things, punched plaintiff in the mouth, struck him with a baton, rendered him unconscious using a choke hold, and then, after cuffing plaintiff, beat him, mostly in the face," reads the federal suit.

"Other deputies arrived and participated in beating plaintiff or watched as other officers beat the unconscious plaintiff, doing nothing."

The suit accuses four other deputies, along with Church and Watson, in participating or watching. The suit also argues Deputy Drew Lane discharged a Taser into Bryant.

The arrest reports from that night say something different. Police accounts show Watson, not Church, had stopped Bryant. One account says Bryant lunged from his truck at Watson. A second account says Bryant attacked Watson during a field sobriety test. The arrest reports say backup arrived to find Watson still struggling to subdue Bryant.

The results of the beating are visible in law enforcement photos of Bryant taken at Huntsville Hospital. Watson appears unmarked in the photos. Deputies charged Bryant with assaulting an officer.

Madison County dropped the charges more than a year later, shortly after Klonowski was found dead. District Attorney Rob Broussard has said evidence of a previous altercation between Watson and Bryant made it "an uphill climb" to win the criminal case.

The other deputies named in the lawsuit are: Drew Lane, Stan Bice, Chad Brooks and Mike Salamonski. The suit also names Ryan Countess, who was being trained as a deputy by Church that night, and investigator Jermaine Nettles, who took statements at Huntsville Hospital.

"All of the individual deputy defendants, in order to cover up the revenge beatdown of plaintiff and their participation in it or in the cover-up, conspired and agreed to support the false narrative in which Watson stopped plaintiff and was the victim, and each made oral statements supporting the false narrative."

The Madison County Sheriff's Department and Madison County attorney had declined past invitations to share their version of events, citing the pending lawsuit.

The suit argues that Dorning later learned that Watson perjured himself in court when asked about the incident during Bryant's preliminary criminal hearing. "Nevertheless, Dorning has taken no action against any of the involved deputies."

Sherrod argues deputies, through an unsubstantiated traffic stop and subsequent false arrest, deprived Bryant of constitutional rights preventing excessive force and unlawful search and seizure.

"Dorning has established a custom and policy of tolerating misconduct by his officers, and, therefore, he is responsible as well," wrote Sherrod.