Following a weeklong trial in U.S. District Court, a jury said the District must pay Elijah Jackson $1 million in compensatory damages and that four officers involved in his 2015 arrest must pay $41,000 in punitive damages. The city will pick up the tab for the officers, according to Jackson’s attorney William Sulton, and the verdict brings an end to a nearly eight-year-long lawsuit for excessive use of force.

In the verdict delivered on Dec. 14 , the jury determined that Cpl. Matthew Fogle, Lt. John Merzig, and officers Kanika Bolton and Carol Scott used excessive force against Jackson while arresting him in violation of his Fourth Amendment rights.

The jury ruled in Jackson’s favor on some of his claims, but they also determined that he was actively resisting officers at the outset of the arrest. The jury ruled that Merzig and Fogle used unlawful force to get him to comply; Fogle committed assault and battery, and Merzig committed battery, the jury decided.

The jury also concluded that Smith and Bolton witnessed the force used by the other officers and failed to intervene. In 2021, MPD began implementing the Active Bystandership for Law Enforcement framework into its training to teach officers to intervene when they see fellow officers engaging in misconduct.

“MPD officers are among the best trained officers in the country and they still have these problems,” Sulton says. “We’re not saying that this occurred because the District failed to adequately train the officers. What we’re saying is that this occurred because they disregarded their training.”

A spokesperson for the Office of Attorney General for the District of Columbia says the city plans to appeal the verdict by Jan. 11, 2024, though they have not yet decided what the filing will include.

Early in the morning of May 5, 2015, seven police officers arrested Jackson, then 39, causing him to sustain severe injuries that required emergency medical attention.

At about 1:30 a.m., Jackson struck the rear bumper of a scooter as he slowed down at a red light at the intersection of 5th Street and Florida Avenue NE. Jackson said that the owner of the scooter walked over to him to exchange information and asked him for money to fix the damage.

The scooter owner became angry when Jackson explained that he did not have the money to pay for the repairs. According to Jackson’s testimony in court, he then fled the scene to find police assistance.

Merzig and Fogle, riding together in an MPD cruiser, stopped Jackson in his vehicle a few minutes later. Courtroom testimony suggests that Jackson continued driving for two blocks before he pulled over on the 1500 block of Eckington Place NE.

Jackson got out of his vehicle immediately after he pulled over and put his hands over his head. In his testimony, Jackson explained that he wanted to demonstrate to the officers that he was unarmed and in compliance with their orders. The officers, who had also exited their vehicle, ordered Jackson to return to his car.

Fogle testified that Jackson did not comply with his order to get back in his vehicle or to turn and place his hands on his vehicle, and instead walked closer to the officers until he met them at the rear driver’s side of his car. At that point, Fogle said that he grabbed Jackson’s right arm and turned him around.

By contrast, Jackson said in court that he turned around at the officers’ initial request, at which point they ran up behind him, grabbed him, and slammed his face against the top of the car before tugging him away to cuff him.

“Hey, what are you guys doing to him?” Jackson recalled Smith asking Merzig and Fogle when she and Bolton arrived on the scene. Jackson claimed in court that despite calling out the apparent use of excessive force, Bolton and Smith took no action to prevent further harm.

In their testimonies, the officers said that Jackson was hostile and resisted arrest when the secondary officers arrived, necessitating the use of force, including pepper spray from Fogle. Bolton said that all six arresting officers were involved in a takedown maneuver to subdue Jackson. 

However, a 2018 opinion drafted by U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Kelly stated that the court “is unclear whether the convictions conclusively establish that Jackson was resisting the officers at the time the takedown occurred.”

Jackson stated that during the takedown, Fogle punched him in the face, and the arresting officers slammed his head into the ground. The officers were then able to restrain Jackson in handcuffs and sat him upright so they could photograph him, before calling an ambulance.

MPD’s body camera program did not begin until October 2015, so there is no video documentation of the arrest—just the photos taken by the arresting officers at the scene.

The officers secured Jackson in leg and arm restraints when the ambulance arrived, and he was taken to MedStar Washington Hospital Center for evaluation. While in the hospital, Jackson was diagnosed with a broken nose and a herniated disc in his neck.

Emergency care physician Dr. Heather Devore told the court that Jackson was unable to breathe on his own so she had to put him on a ventilator. Jackson was then taken to the hospital’s intensive care unit, where he was treated by Dr. Edward Aulisi.

Aulisi, the chair of neurosurgery at WHC, told the court that Jackson’s injuries were not life-threatening, but they could have potentially caused paralysis. Aulisi ultimately decided to perform surgery to replace Jackson’s herniated disc with an implant.

In a written statement based on her June 2016 evaluation of Jackson, forensic psychologist Dr. Carole Guinta said that he also developed post-traumatic stress disorder caused directly by the arrest. Guinta found that Jackson experienced a perpetual state of feeling unsafe, constantly scanning his surrounding environment for potential threats and preparing to protect himself. Guinta testified in court that Jackson said that he often struggled with his memory and ability to focus on simple tasks.

“It’s been terrible for me,” Jackson says of his experience. “Because it changed who I am. It changed me as a person.”

Jackson was discharged by the hospital eight days after being admitted, and he was taken directly to the Central Cell Block, where he stayed until his arraignment the following morning.

Jackson was charged with two counts of misdemeanor assault on a police officer and separate counts of failure to obey, operating after revocation, fleeing a law enforcement officer, reckless driving, and fleeing the scene.

Jackson was found guilty at trial in D.C. Superior Court in December 2015. He was sentenced to 70 days in jail for the two charges of assault on a police officer (Merzig and Fogle), and one misdemeanor charge of fleeing arrest.

The D.C. Council amended the law for assault on a police officer in 2016 following longstanding criticism that the statute was overly broad. Former MPD Chief Cathy Lanier said as much in her 2006 testimony to the Council’s Committee on the Judiciary & Public Safety. Lanier said the law was routinely being used to overcharge people who resist arrests, and believed the law needed a “legislative fix.” The fix created a new statute that changed the classification of activity considered to be resisting arrest without injuring an arresting officer.

Jackson and his attorneys filed his lawsuit against MPD and the arresting officers two weeks after his sentencing, alleging excessive force and violations of his Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights. Jury selection and trial proceedings did not begin until early Dec. 2023.

After a week of jury trial and deliberation, the jury determined that Fogle, Merzig, Bolton, and Scott used excessive force during Jackson’s arrest. They also cleared secondary arresting officers Sgt. Antoine Brathwaite and Officer Lorelai Hillgren of wrongdoing.

Brathwaite, who was promoted to the rank of sergeant in the years since Jackson’s arrest, faced a wrongful death lawsuit in 2018 alongside his partner, Officer Patrick Bacon, for the fatal shooting of Timothy Williams.

Williams’ family filed the suit, which was eventually dismissed by the court. A subsequent investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. determined that there was not enough evidence to warrant criminal civil rights charges against the officers.

“It’s a relief for me right now because I’ve been waiting to get to this point,” Jackson says of the jury’s verdict in his case. “So that people will know that just because a person carries a badge, they can’t abuse their authority.”