Lawsuit: Man says Raccoon Township cop terrorized him with gun during false arrest

A Beaver County man claims in a federal lawsuit that a Raccoon Township officer pulled a gun on him, punched him repeatedly, used racial epithets and then discharged his gun inches from the man’s body. The lawsuit contends that the state police then helped to try to cover it up.

Emmitt Willis, 23, of Aliquippa, was never charged with anything following the incident on Jan. 3.

His lawsuit, filed Monday, includes claims for excessive force, false arrest, false imprisonment and civil conspiracy.

It names as defendants state police troopers Jonnie W. Schooley III, who enlisted in July 2018, Michael Miller, who enlisted in January 2007, and Michael Greiner, who enlisted in August 2014. Schooley and Miller are assigned to the Beaver barracks, while Greiner is assigned to the bureau of criminal investigation, said PSP spokesman Ryan Tarkowski.

The complaint refers to the Raccoon Township officer, whose name Willis still does not know, as John Doe Police Officer.

Messages left with Raccoon Township were not immediately returned.

Willis was delivering groceries in his girlfriend’s car between 2 and 3 p.m. on Jan. 3 in Aliquippa when he said a speeding black SUV pulled within inches of his rear bumper, according to the lawsuit.

The vehicle, the complaint said, then passed Willis in the wrong lane and pulled beside him. There, the driver, who was wearing a black winter hat that said “Police,” pointed a handgun directly at him, according to the lawsuit.

“It was like a surreal movie scene,” Willis told the Tribune-Review on Tuesday.

Shocked by the gun, Willis swerved his car onto the shoulder, and the SUV forced him farther off until he crashed into a parked truck in someone’s front lawn, he said.

After he crashed, the complaint said, Willis unlatched his seatbelt and put his hands on the ceiling.

The person driving the SUV, now known to be from the Raccoon Township police, the lawsuit said, ran toward Willis with his service weapon drawn and aimed at him “violently screaming.”

The officer opened Willis’ door and punched him in the face, then pulled him out of the car, the lawsuit said.

“Mr. Willis was neither resistive nor combative,” the complaint said.

Willis was lying on his chest with his hands behind his back, and the officer punched him at least one more time, it continued.

The officer also “was pressing his service weapon into the small of Mr. Willis’ back until the gun was lifted off his back and discharged directly into the ground beside him” — only inches away, the lawsuit stated.

Willis said he could feel the heat from the gun and, at first, didn’t know if he’d been shot.

As that was happening, the lawsuit said, the officer had failed to put his vehicle in park when he got out, and it had rolled backwards across the street into the lawn of the Raccoon Township Volunteer Fire Department.

A person nearby heard the shot and “attempted to intercede in the assault, but John Doe Police Officer told him something like ‘police officers do not kill innocent Black men,’ to distract his attention.”

The officer then holstered his weapon and asked the bystander to watch Willis, who by that point was handcuffed, while he got his car.

During the interaction, the officer used a racial epithet multiple times and referred to Willis as “you people,” the lawsuit said.

It also alleges that the officer picked up his spent shell casing “attempting to destroy any evidence of the officer-involved shooting.”

The officer said Willis had committed an alleged minor traffic offense about five miles prior to where they stopped, according to the lawsuit.

But Willis said in the lawsuit that the SUV had no visible police markings and the officer never signaled him to pull over using either lights or sirens.

A short time later, a Center Township police officer arrived, and immediately took the Raccoon Creek officer into his police vehicle to speak to him privately.

That officer then told Willis that state police were on their way, the lawsuit said.

Willis said that Greener, Schooley and Miller arrived about a half hour later.

Miller told the Raccoon Township officer not to talk to anyone else and then ordered another officer to search Willis, who did not have any weapons or other illegal contraband on him, the suit said.

They left Willis in the back of a state police car for more than an hour, he said in the lawsuit. When he asked the troopers whether he was under arrest or being charged, “they all responded that ‘they were working on that.’ ”

“Mr. Willis then overheard Schooley, Miller, and/or Greener state to each other, ‘what about a DUI?’ as though they were attempting to create a criminal narrative to justify the officer-involved shooting, as well as the unjustified use of force, involving John Doe Police Officer,” the lawsuit stated.

Willis was taken to the state police barracks in Beaver and questioned, the lawsuit said, where he explained what happened.

Nearly three hours after the incident, the troopers gave Willis a field sobriety test, which they said he failed because “he was shaky and had an increased heart rate.”

The troopers then took Willis to the hospital and forced him to consent to a blood draw or lose his driver’s license, the complaint said. After that — four hours after the incident — he was allowed to leave.

He later learned that his girlfriend’s car was totaled.

No charges have been filed.

Willis has not reported what happened to any other law enforcement agency, but his attorney, Alec Wright, said he expects there to be an investigation by the state police and Beaver County District Attorney.

“Emmitt Willis is a victim in this case,” Wright said.

Willis said he has not been contacted by anyone from any police agency since his release.

“The Pennsylvania State Police is currently investigating both the suspected DUI and the municipal officer’s use of force (the shot fired) described in the lawsuit,” Tarkowski said. “We cannot release information relative to these ongoing investigations. Upon completion, the findings of each investigation will be forwarded to the Beaver County District Attorney for a prosecutorial determination.”

Willis said he filed the lawsuit because he wanted to help bring change and awareness.

“Things of this nature happen a lot,” Willis said. “They happen right in your backyard. They happen to people you went to school with, and they happen to people who literally broke no laws and shouldn’t have had any interaction with police in the first place.”