Parole officers suing Ramapo over police stop drop some claims

Four black state parole officers stopped and detained by Ramapo police officers in April 2014 have dropped some of their legal claims about what happened during the highly-charged incident.

The police stop was triggered by a resident's 911 call describing people wearing bullet-proof vests in an unmarked car. The parole officers later filed a federal lawsuit against the town, its police department and others alleging racial profiling and civil rights violations.

The officers recently updated their federal civil rights lawsuit to remove a claim that a police officer dragged Parole Officer Mario Alexandre from the vehicle and slammed him against the driver's side door during the car stop on April 21, 2014. It still maintains Ramapo Lt. Robert Lancia approached the parole officers' car during the stop with his gun drawn and punched Alexandre in the chest.

The original complaint said Suffern Sgt. Edward Dolan pointed his gun at Parole Officer Sheila Penister, ordering her to exit the car. The amended complaint describes him only as having his hand on the butt of his gun. Both versions accuse Dolan of being so belligerent and menacing that Lancia ordered him to leave.

Dennis Lynch, Ramapo's special counsel on civil rights, said the town is asking U.S. District Court Judge Cathy Seibel to dismiss the lawsuit as "meritless." He noted the parole officers never were arrested or frisked and said the amended lawsuit toned down other claims, including that the police continued to point guns at the parole officers after the initial stop.

"After reviewing the videos and 911 recording we handed over, the parole officers updated their claims," said Lynch. "What remains for the most part in the first amended complaint is the police detained them for a short period of time to confirm their identity. Thank God we had the video."

Lynch contended Bonita Zelman, the attorney for the parole officers, made unsupported boiler-plate charges in bringing the lawsuit. The lawsuit also names police brass who were not involved in the stop and raises general issues of training and supervision by the police and the Rockland Police Academy.

Lynch maintained the parole officers have provided no evidence to support their claims of racial profiling and made no claims of physical injuries.

Zelman, who represents Alexandre, Penister, Annette Thomas-Prince and Samuel Washington, didn't return a telephone call seeking comment Tuesday.

She has argued in court papers against dismissing the case, contending that the police violated the parole officers' rights and acted in a threatening manner even after it became clear her clients were law enforcement. She said one Ramapo police detective knew Alexandre worked as a parole officer and that alone should have ended their detainment.

"The logical inferences from the facts is that plaintiffs were subjected to a warrantless stop and arrest at gunpoint, under circumstances indicating the complete absence of criminality and a high probability that the plaintiffs were parole offices ... " Zelman wrote to the judge.

The parole officers were in Ramapo seeking to execute a parole warrant for a young man on Lackawanna Trail in Airmont but had not told the local department of their plans.

The resident who called 911 told the police about seeing four people she was "pretty sure" were wearing bullet-proof vests and shields at a house on Lackawanna Trail. She said she didn't notice any identifying police jackets, according to a transcript of the 911 call included in Zelman's legal papers.

The caller told the dispatcher that the foursome was at the house for at least 10 minutes.

"They went into the house and they like banged on the door, went around the back; and old people live there ... so my next-door-neighbor said maybe there is something wrong with that picture; and they are in there now. We have the license plate of the car if you want it," the caller tells the dispatcher.

Zelman wrote that the response of the police "answering the 911 call was: 'OK ma'am we'll get officers right out there'. "

"At this point there was nothing to indicate that a massive police response with drawn guns was needed," she wrote, "but rather a reasonable investigation at 52 Lackawanna Trail."

The parole officers first gave their account at a news conference in front of the federal courthouse in White Plains in May 2014.

Alexandre, at the time, called the car stop "an attack on my life and integrity."

"I believed my life was going to end," Penister said.

Twitter: @lohudlegal