Judge tosses lawsuit, says police acted reasonably in shooting of kneeling Pineville man

A federal judge has thrown out the lawsuit of a Pineville man who claimed he was shot multiple times by police as he was kneeling and following orders to drop his gun.

In all, police fired 12 shots at Timothy Caraway while he was near or on the ground, striking him four times, court records show.

“I just did what I was told to do. Y’all said to drop it,” Caraway said to the officers, according to Pineville police video of the February 2020 incident. “I went on the ground. Why did y’all shoot me?”

In a 38-page opinion last Thursday, which came less than a week before Caraway’s case was to go to trial, U.S. District Court Judge Frank Whitney provided an answer.

Caraway, according to the judge, had posed a reasonably lethal threat to the officers and the public — even if, as Caraway claimed, he had removed his gun from his pocket only after police had ordered him to drop his weapon.

“Here the facts show the threat was real,” Whitney wrote. “(Caraway) abruptly placed his hand in his pocket and pulled out his firearm as the officers approached. A reasonable jury could find the officers were justified in interpreting this sudden act as a threat.”

Even if Caraway’s contention that he never pointed the gun directly at the officers was true, the police “were not required to wait to see whether (Caraway) ever did,” Whitney wrote.

The violent confrontation on Feb. 1, 2020, unfolded on North Polk Street in Pineville after a driver called 911 to report that she had seen a Black man with long dreadlocks pointing a gun as he walked along one of the town’s main drags.

According to his lawsuit, Caraway, then 23, was on his way to visit his grandmother, unaware that police were now streaming toward him.

The video from Officer Adam Roberts’ body camera shows the armed Roberts walking up behind Caraway as other officers flank him. A series of shouted police orders ring out over a few seconds. Caraway briefly comes into view either kneeling on the ground or close to it. What he’s doing with his hands is unclear. Then police start their shooting.

Two officers — Roberts and Jamon Griffin — fired the 12 shots at Caraway during a 3.5-second span. Caraway’s attorneys argued that the barrage was excessive, in part because for most of it, their client was lying helpless and wounded on the sidewalk.

Two more senior officers at the scene, Nicholas French and Leslie Gladden, never pulled their triggers. According to Caraway’s lawsuit, French later told state investigators that he had not fired his weapon because Caraway never raised or extended his handgun in a threatening way.

Whitney, however, found that the number of shots fired was reasonable, concluding that Roberts and Griffin had not seen Caraway drop his gun and kept shooting “based on their perception that (Caraway) was still moving, armed and dangerous.”

The judge also said the law does not require police to be mind-readers.

“... Even if (Caraway) merely intended to comply with the commands to drop his weapon, it does not follow that this unspoken intention must have been clear to the officers,” the judge wrote.

Because Caraway’s attorneys had not shown that Roberts and Griffin had violated “any clearly established law,” the judge approved the officers’ request for “qualified immunity.” That’s a controversial legal doctrine which protects police and other government officials from individual liability in lawsuits.

Whitney also threw out Caraway’s other claims, including malicious prosecution, fabrication of evidence, failure to train and supervise, and assault and battery under N.C. law.

All four officers were named in the lawsuit. Caraway is Black. So is Griffin, who fired nine of the shots. The other three officers are white.

The gun Caraway was carrying had been reported stolen. After Caraway was released from the hospital, Pineville police charged him with eight crimes. The Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s Office eventually dismissed all the charges, citing a lack of evidence.

A reasonable fear

Based largely on a Supreme Court ruling in the Charlotte-based case of Graham v. Connor, police are legally justified to use lethal force if they have an “objectively reasonable” fear of death or serious injury to themselves or others.

The ruling offers broad protection to police in both civil and criminal cases given the court’s deference to the unpredictable, life-and-death nature of law enforcement work.

In fact, the Caraway decision marks the third time in little more than a year that a federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit stemming from a controversial police shooting in or near Charlotte.

On Sept. 30, 2021, U.S. District Judge Robert Conrad dismissed the complaint filed by the family of Ruben Galindo, who was fatally shot in 2017 while attempting to drunkenly hand over an unloaded gun to Charlotte-Mecklenburg police.

Gallindo’s excessive drinking, his insistence on handing over a semi-automatic handgun to police along with his “complete inability or unwillingness” to follow safety suggestions or police commands “(all) combined to create ‘the tense, uncertain and rapidly evolving’ circumstances which required split second officer decision-making of a kind that case law ... instructs district courts not to second guess,” Conrad wrote.

Less than two months later, Senior U.S. District Judge Graham Mullen likewise tossed the lawsuit filed by the mother of Danquirs Franklin of Charlotte, who was shot and killed by Charlotte-Mecklenburg police Officer Wende Kerl during a 2019 stand-off outside a west-side Burger King.

As with Caraway, Franklin was shot as he appeared to be following police commands to put his weapon on the ground.

“Given the gift of hindsight, it seems likely that Officer Kerl made a mistake in shooting Danquirs Franklin,” Mullen wrote.

“... But because a court must not judge with the ‘20/20 vision of hindsight,’ the question is whether Officer Kerl’s mistake in shooting Franklin was reasonable. The answer is yes.”

Both the Galindo and Franklin rulings have been appealed.

Oral arguments before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., are scheduled for Franklin on Dec. 6 and Galindo a day later.

It remains unclear whether the Caraway lawsuit also will receive a second day in court.

Micheal Littlejohn, one of Caraway’s attorneys, declined to comment to The Charlotte Observer about the case, including whether he plans to file an appeal.

Defense attorney Scott MacLatchie did not respond to an Observer email seeking comment.