A California woman filed a lawsuit against the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department and several deputies who beat her as she awaited a CT scan in the emergency room in San Leandro, California. The lawsuit was filed on Feb. 1.
According to the lawsuit, Malia Ashad was in attendance at a court hearing at the Alameda County Superior Court on Aug. 9, 2022, when a woman Ashad had a restraining order against attacked her and “repeatedly hit Ashad in the head and face with a cellphone” and her fist. Ashad grabbed the woman’s hair in an attempt to defend herself and stop the assault before sheriff’s deputies intervened.
Ashad was initially relieved that two deputies, Ryan Connolly and Collin Lenahan, stepped in to “rescue” her, but they handcuffed her instead and caused her to hit her head on a table and “temporarily lose consciousness” as she “lay lifeless on the floor, bleeding from her head and wrists,” he complaint reads.
One of her attorneys, Angel Alexander, told the Sacramento Bee that Ashad’s “relief quickly turned into confusion and panic” when she was treated as an assailant instead of the victim. One of the deputies is heard yelling on his bodycam video, “I swear to f—king God” as he detained Ashad.
“During their initial contact with Ms. Ashad, Sheriff’s Deputies hit her twice in the head
causing Ms. Ashad to fall and strike her head on a table, seize and temporarily lose consciousness,” her attorneys wrote.
Deputy Matthew Simon reportedly made no attempt to help Ashad and performed a pat down search as she lay bleeding on the floor, she says. The claim further alleges that another deputy, Sgt. Ruth Jones, later told Ashad she was under arrest for assault despite the woman who attacked Ashad admitting that she beat her. However, after the paramedics arrived on the scene, they said Ashad needed to go to the ER.
Ashad was taken to the emergency room at the Kaiser Permanente San Leandro Medical…
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