De’Shaun Johnson, in the image to the left in the red shirt, was awarded $185,000 for the intentional infliction of emotional distress by St. Tammany Parish Sheriff’s Office Deputy Ryan Moring, in the uniform in the left and middle photo, when the boy tried to film the arrest of his mother, Teliah Perkins, in the photo on the right, in Louisiana in May 2020. (Photos from court documents.)
A jury in Louisiana awarded a verdict to a 14-year-old boy who tried to record the violent arrest of his mother after someone reported a woman riding a dirt bike without a helmet in the neighborhood.
A jury on Wednesday awarded De’Shaun Johnson $185,000 for intentional infliction of emotional distress by St. Tammany Parish Sheriff’s Office Deputy Ryan Moring as the then-14-year-old boy tried to film the arrest of his mother, Teliah Perkins, at their home in Slidell, Louisiana, in May 2020, according to court documents.
“This win means so much to me. After all these years, to finally see justice served brings me peace and joy,” Johnson said in a statement through his lawyer, Keith Cohan. “I was in eighth grade when this happened to me. Now I’m about to attend college. I’m proud of myself and my mom for refusing to accept what happened to us and for fighting for the justice we are owed.”
Cohan, a partner at Reid Collins & Tsai LLP, said in a statement his firm was proud to represent him and to have worked with the ACLU of Louisiana’s Justice Lab, which challenges racially discriminatory policing practices.
“There should be accountability for law enforcement officers who seek to intimidate those observing them in the line of duty,” Cohan said. “With this victory, that’s exactly what happened today.”
Nora Ahmed, the legal director of the ACLU of Louisiana, was thrilled.
“As we face imminent threats to our rights to record police in Louisiana, the Justice Lab — and our pro bono partners and colleagues like the Reid Collins team with whom we prosecuted this case — will continue to fight for brave individuals like Ms. Perkins and her son and fight for a world of justice and safety for all people,” Ahmed said in a statement.
St. Tammany Parish Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Suzanne Carboni told The New Orleans Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate that the agency will appeal the verdict, calling the case “a meritless claim for emotional harm.” The deputies’ actions were found to be “constitutionally appropriate,” the paper reported.
According to the lawsuit, Perkins was arrested on May 5, 2020, for two alleged traffic offenses that could have been resolved through a traffic citation.
“Instead, Ms. Perkins was manhandled, jailed, and left with a criminal record and long-term injuries,” court documents said. “To make matters worse, Ms. Perkins’ minor son, who was just 14 years old, sustained psychological trauma after he was pushed and threatened with a Taser by law enforcement as they tried to block him from recording his mother’s violent arrest.”
The drama unfolded after someone reported seeing a dirt bike rider without a helmet. When deputies pulled up to her home, she had no idea what they were talking about, court documents said.
She didn’t own a dirt bike, but other residents in the neighborhood did, court documents said. Dirt bikes are illegal to operate on roads there, but others had ridden recklessly through the street without helmets and hadn’t been stopped or arrested, court documents noted.
The deputies asked her about her street motorcycle parked in the driveway that she hadn’t ridden that day before demanding her driver’s license, registration, and proof of insurance, documents said.
She cooperated, told the deputies about prior police visits concerning reports of someone riding without a helmet and asked whether these repeated and false reports were racially motivated, court documents said.
“Ms. Perkins’ concern about being the target of her neighbors’ racial prejudice appeared to inflame defendants’ tempers, and the interaction took a sharp, hostile turn,” the complaint said.
“Shut the f— up!” Deputy Kyle Hart told her. “This call ain’t f—— about race!”
At one point, when Perkins asked to speak with the deputies’ supervisor, and they refused, she called 911 to request a supervising officer be sent.
“Defendants were visibly upset by this, and so Ms. Perkins called for D.J. and her nephew, who were inside the house, to come out to the driveway and start recording video with their cell phones,” court documents said.
When the deputies told the boys to walk back to the porch, Perkins responded that it was their driveway and they didn’t need to go to the porch.
This “enraged the deputies,” the lawsuit said.
“That’s it, right now you’re being placed under arrest,” Hart said, according to the lawsuit.
The deputies “violently seized Ms. Perkins by her arms, and told her to give them her hands so they could place her in handcuffs,” the lawsuit alleges.
At one point, they “leaned on her back and neck with their knees and elbows, pulled her hair, and forced her face against the driveway pavement while wrenching her arms behind her back,” the lawsuit alleges.
When her son, watching in horror, tried filming it, Moring tried to block him. At one point, the deputy drew his Taser and pointed it at the 14-year-old while Perkins’ nephew recorded the incident from a different angle, the documents said.
When Johnson told the deputy, “You can’t tase a child,” Moring responded, “Watch me,” court documents said.
At one point, Moring’s partner, Hart, pinned Perkins face-first into the pavement, jammed his knees into her thighs and pushed her hands — still handcuffed — into her lower back. At one point, she gasped, “You’re choking me!” the lawsuit said before she was put into the back of a patrol car and booked into the St. Tammany Parish Jail.
Her motorcycle was seized, towed and impounded at her expense. After she was released, she had to go to the emergency room for treatment for injuries to her neck, back, knees, and hands, the documents said. She was initially charged with resisting a police officer with force or violence, a felony, and three misdemeanors.
All charges, except for a misdemeanor resisting charge, were dropped, her lawyer said. She was found guilty of that charge and had to pay a $50 fine, he added.
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