An Army officer is asking for a new trial in a civil trial where he claims his human rights were violated by officers in Virginia who pepper sprayed him during a traffic stop. Though a federal jury sided with him, they granted him a substantially smaller award than he and his attorneys requested.
Tom Roberts, the lawyer for Second Lt. Caron Nazario, filed a motion for a new trial, stating that the verdict his client received from a federal jury on Tuesday, Jan. 16., was a “miscarriage of justice,” 13 News Now reports. His client received an award of less than $4,000 in their civil rights case victory, a little over .25 percent of their original request of a $1.5 million award.
Roberts contends not only is this an “insult” to the suffering Nazario experienced but it also sends a message to law enforcement about the court being easy on penalizing police when they behave poorly.
In August 2022, a federal judge ruled officer Daniel Crocker was liable for an illegal search of Nazario’s car that violated the soldier’s Fourth Amendment rights during that stop in late 2020. Crocker pulled Nazario over for having a permanent license plate on his vehicle. For the violation, the lieutenant was only awarded $1,000 in punitive damages.
The jury, however, only found Crocker’s then-fellow officer Joe Gutierrez liable for assault, requiring him to pay just $2,685 in damages, no malice, clearing him of all false imprisonment, illegal search and battery charges. Gutierrez was fired from the force in April 2021, the same month Nazario’s federal complaint was filed.
Nazario alleged in his lawsuit that on the night of the incident, he was driving on a dark but major road, but did not stop until he could see a well-lit spot, across from a gas station. When asked why he took the extra measure, he said he was “honestly afraid to get out.”
Gutierrez said in the body-camera video of the incident, “Yeah, you should be.”
Gutierrez then…
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