Suit claims disabled teen was punched by Seattle officers

Family members of a mentally-disabled teen have filed a lawsuit against the Seattle Police Department claiming the boy was punched several times by an officer after a jaywalking stop a little over a year ago, and they say a video recording proves their case.

The civil rights lawsuit filed Tuesday in King County Superior Court seeks unspecified damages for the incident that occurred on July 21, 2009.

Joey Wilson, 17 at the time, was walking home and talking on a cell phone in Seattle's Queen Anne neighborhood when he was stopped by an officer for jaywalking, the suit claims. The officer asked for identification, but Joey said he didn't have a driver's license. The suit claims the officer told Joey there was a warrant out for his arrest, which Joey denied and told the officer he just lived in the neighborhood.

When Joey tried to call a neighbor who lived down the street to tell him he was in trouble, he claims he was grabbed by the officer.

According to the boy's attorneys, a neighbor says he witnessed the event and tried to reason with the officer to simply write Joey a jaywalking ticket, but when that didn't work, he went back and grabbed his camera as additional police officers responded to the scene.

The tape shows one officer throwing an upper-cut while two others restrain Joey's arms. Other officers join in and the teen is driven to the ground.

Joey was arrested following the incident, but was eventually released to his mother Mary. She took him to a local hospital for treatment of a broken nose concussion, the suit claims.

Mary Wilson said her son doesn't process situations the way most people do, but he shouldn't have been beaten because he didn't understand and didn't have identification when the officer stopped him for jaywalking.

"I can't believe the police would do this to me," Joey read from a prepared statement during a news conference Wednesday morning. "I did not do anything wrong. Before this, I trusted the police. Now I'm afraid they will hurt me again."

Asked why a they waited a year to file the suit, family members said they tried to seek answers through other means, but kept getting stonewalled.

Seattle police are in the process of drafting a response to the suit, but officials emphasized that officers walk into unknown situations every day. They called this "an unfortunate incident."

Police say no disciplinary action was taken against any of the officers involved.