HALL COUNTY, Ga. — A man injured in a metro Atlanta jail is filing a federal lawsuit against the sheriff’s office.
Last year, a video captured Hall County deputies dropping Dewon Greer on his head while he was handcuffed, leaving him permanently scarred.
On Tuesday, Channel 2′s Tyisha Fernandes was at the federal courthouse in downtown Atlanta as Greer and his attorneys filed a lawsuit against the Hall County Sheriff’s Office.
A Georgia State Patrol trooper pulled Greer over for an issue with his tail light as he and his wife were headed to Lake Lanier to take their boat out.
To Greer’s surprise, his license was suspended.
“I’m like, ‘Why is my license suspended?’, and they said, ‘child support,’” Greer told Channel 2 Action News in November 2022. “And I know that was already paid and I had my child support papers with me. I am not doing anything. I am not a threat.”
Greer said troopers wouldn’t look at the paperwork, even though he offered to retrieve it, and took him to the Hall County Jail.
That is where Greer says things escalated. Body camera video shows Hall County Sheriff’s deputies processing Greer, forcing him to his knees, and then dropping him to the ground on his head.
The investigation determined that Greer’s license had been mistakenly suspended and he was up to date on all child support payments.
“I just don’t want this to happen to anybody else, so that’s why I’m here today to try to prevent this same thing from happening because it could come out a whole different way than it came out for me,” Greer said Tuesday outside the federal courthouse.