West Virginia State Student Spends 4 Days in Jail Over Mistaken Identity
I sense an impending lawsuit.
CBS Baltimore reports.
College Student Spends 4 Days In Jail After Being Mistakenly Arrested
An 18-year-old college student says he is traumatized after Havre de Grace Police mistakenly throw him in jail. They claim he was wanted on a federal warrant.
As the U.S. Marshal’s Office found out, they had the wrong guy.
Rochelle Ritchie explains how the mix-up happened.
It’s an unfortunate incident that cost the young man his confidence in the police and almost his freedom.
Jawon Johnson, 18, is a freshman at West Virginia State University. He even plays on the football team as a wide receiver.
“I never thought I would be sitting in jail, especially for something I knew for sure I didn’t do,” Johnson said.
But on Saturday night, he put on a different uniform after he says he was pulled over by a Havre de Grace police officer for making an illegal U-turn. He expected to be handed a ticket, but after an hour he was handcuffed and taken to the Harford County Detention Center on a federal warrant.
“I told them the picture wasn’t me. They continued and insisted on, in fact, it was me,” said Johnson.
awon, with an “o”, was accused of being another Jawan Johnson involved in a burglary case in D.C. The man wanted by the federal government spells his name with an “a”. It took police four days to realize their mistake. All the while, Johnson sat behind bars innocent.
“I was in the cell 23 hours a day,” he said.
Johnson was brought to federal court in Baltimore. His fingerprints were finally ran and his picture was sent to prosecutors in D.C. and, of course, they found he was not the Jawan Johnson they were looking for.
Jawon’s mother wants disciplinary action taken against the arresting officer.
“I just felt like he was thrown in shark infested waters,” Juanita Johnson said.
College Student Spends 4 Days In Jail After Being Mistakenly Arrested (CBS Baltimore)
Comments
Well, as I see it, he was held 4 days on what is basically an extradition warrant, without either turning him over to the Feds, or specifically checking to see if he was the person wanted.
I am not so sure it is the arresting officer, but certainly the jail either dropped the ball, or is missing some of the tracks for said ball. It even sounds like he wasn’t allowed a phone call, that could have gotten somebody on the outside to get legal representation (no public defender either)
So the police seem to be acting as if they can arrest a person for another government entity and hold them absolutely incommunicado, as long as they intend to put them in front of a judge, eventually.
Fry the jail administration and the lawyers who wrote the jail holding procedures supposedly followed.