Jenny Gathright / DCist/WAMU
A group of Prince George’s County residents is suing the county police department for $16 million in damages over a 2021 incident where police allegedly entered their apartment without a warrant and shot their dog.
The plaintiffs in the suit — Erica Umana, Erika Erazo Sanchez, Dayri Amaya Benitez, and Brandon Cuevas, who were all roommates at the time of the shooting — allege that police officers got a key to their apartment from a maintenance worker at their Landover Hills apartment complex. The officers then illegally entered the apartment, assaulted and falsely detained them, and shot their dog, Hennessy, leaving her paralyzed and leading to her euthanization, according to the lawsuit.
The plaintiffs are represented by the prominent civil rights law firm Murphy, Falcon, and Murphy, who represented the family of Freddie Gray after he was killed by police in Baltimore.– The firm has also worked on a number of lawsuits in Prince George’s County: Earlier this year, it won a $7.5 million settlement for the family of Demonte Ward-Blake, who was paralyzed during a police traffic stop in 2019.
“I held Henny’s bloody body while she was dying in my arms, while the rest of her family was wrongfully detained and denied the ability to check on her,” Sanchez said at a press conference Monday afternoon. “I no longer feel safe in the presence of police officers, and I will never trust them ever again.”
The Prince George’s County police department did not...
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