Sacramento pays settlement to man who was arrested, released once body cam footage seen
The city of Sacramento is paying a $99,900 settlement to a man who was arrested despite an officer acknowledging on camera that he was unsure if he was taking the right person into custody.
Sacramento police arrested Anthony Hernandez in 2018, saying they saw him throw a gun in a North Sacramento backyard during a party.
Hernandez spent more than six weeks in jail before the officer turned the body camera footage into authorities, according to a lawsuit filed in federal court in 2019. Once the recording was filed, charges against the man were dropped.
“Based on all the facts, the City believes it reached a fair and just resolution to this case,” city spokesman Tim Swanson said in a statement.
In September 2018, officers saw a social media post showing a juvenile on probation at a gathering at a North Sacramento home, next to people holding guns, the lawsuit alleged. On body camera footage, officers can be heard saying they were at the house to search the juvenile who was on probation.
When they arrived, an officer is heard on his body camera saying he saw a man in a white shirt take off running and throw a gun in the yard. After they found a gun near the fence where they saw the man running, officers walked to a group of people they had handcuffed who were sitting in the yard. One officer can be heard saying to another officer, “(The person who threw the gun and ran) was somebody in white, I can’t tell you who it was, though.”
An officer then points his flashlight at Hernandez, who was sitting in a white button-down shirt in a group of people.
“Probably this guy,” the officer said.
Officers then arrested Hernandez. He was arraigned on a one-count felony complaint of gun possession by a prohibited person. He was a prohibited person because he was previously convicted of a felony.
The complaint named the city, and officers Michael Bradley, Maxwell Anderson and Christopher Jensen as defendants. The lawsuit claimed civil rights violations, unlawful detention, arrest without probable cause, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution.
