Lawsuit Filed By Fayetteville Woman Who Says Cops Wrongly Detained Her

Shortly after a Cumberland County judge ruled Tuesday that body cam­era footage be released in a case involv­ing a woman who claims she was wrong­ly detained by police last month, the woman announced she has filed a law­suit against the city, Fayetteville Police depart­ment, offi­cers and police chief.

Ja’Lana Dunlap-Banks, 22, a prop­er­ty man­ag­er for AVA Real Estate, says she was uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly detained and hand­cuffed by two Fayetteville police offi­cers Sept. 6 while check­ing on a prop­er­ty in north Fayetteville.

Named as defen­dants in the law­suit are the city of Fayetteville, the Fayetteville Police Department, Fayetteville Police Chief Gina Hawkins, Officer Ryan Haddock, Detective Amanda Bell and “John and Jane Doe’s 1 – 100,” Harry Daniels, one of Dunlap-Banks’ lawyers and a promi­nent civ­il rights attor­ney, said dur­ing a news con­fer­ence out­side of the Federal Courthouse in Fayetteville on Tuesday. Daniels said the John and Jane Doe defen­dants are stand-ins for the police offi­cers who were at the scene but have yet to be iden­ti­fied by Dunlap-Banks’ legal team.

“We are here seek­ing jus­tice on behalf of Ms. Dunlap,” Daniels said. “What hap­pened to her should not happen.”

The law­suit alleges Dunlap-Banks’ First, Fourth and 14^th amend­ment rights were vio­lat­ed and claims the offi­cers’ actions that day con­sti­tut­ed false impris­on­ment and assault and bat­tery. Additionally, the suit alleges neg­li­gence on the offi­cers’ parts and says Dunlap-Banks faced “severe emo­tion­al dis­tress” as a result.

“Ms. Dunlap has suf­fered sig­nif­i­cant­ly in this mat­ter,” Daniels said. “I firm­ly believe that if she was a dif­fer­ent col­or, this would nev­er have happened.”

According to the law­suit, Dunlap-Banks, who has sick­le cell ane­mia, began to hyper­ven­ti­late dur­ing her inter­ac­tion with the offi­cers and vom­it­ed on her­self. Daniels said Dunlap-Banks has not been able to work since the inci­dent, as her job as a prop­er­ty man­ag­er requires her to go to pri­vate prop­er­ties and she fears a sim­i­lar inci­dent would occur.

The news con­fer­ence came short­ly after a Cumberland County Judge Jim Ammons ruled that video tak­en by police body cam­eras be released.

The Fayetteville Police Department and Dunlap-Banks filed motions peti­tion­ing the court for the release of the footage. In North Carolina, body cam­era footage can only be released by order of the court.

“I think the inter­est for both of us is to pub­licly release,” Michael Rose Whyte, an attor­ney for the Fayetteville Police Department, said dur­ing the brief hearing.

Daniels said he expects Dunlap-Banks and her team would be able to view the footage lat­er Tuesday.

During the news con­fer­ence, Daniels called for Hawkins and the Fayetteville Police Department to fur­ther pub­licly address the matter.

In an Oct. 11 news release, issued by the Fayetteville Police Department after cell­phone video Dunlap Banks filmed of the inci­dent was shared on social media, Hawkins said that the depart­men­t’s Internal Affairs Unit was expe­dit­ing an inves­ti­ga­tion into the mat­ter and that she would be fil­ing a motion with the courts for release of the body cam­era footage. Hawkins said the encounter with Dunlap-Banks occurred half a mile from a loca­tion where a poten­tial­ly vio­lent per­son had fled police.

“What is she going to do to these offi­cers?” Daniels said. “Is she going to slap them on the wrist and put them back on the wrist until some­thing else hap­pens? If you don’t address it now, the next press con­fer­ence we’re going to have, it’s going to be a press con­fer­ence for some­thing these offi­cers have done (while) armed to some­body till they’re not stand­ing here to have a discussion.”

Dunlap-Banks said she filed the law­suit to seek jus­tice for her­self and oth­ers in her position.

“I real­ly just want to speak up for peo­ple who can’t speak up for them­selves,” she said. “Also, for the peo­ple who things hap­pen like this to them and they don’t say any­thing to nobody and they don’t tell any­body, I just want to make it clear that you have to speak up for your­self. You have to demand respect, whether they wear a badge or whether they’re just reg­u­lar folks.

“If you’re wear­ing that badge, if you’re wear­ing a uni­form, then you’re sup­posed to pro­tect and serve, not harm inno­cent people.”

Dunlap-Banks’ attor­ney Xavier de Janon said Fayetteville police offi­cers have a long his­to­ry of attack­ing inno­cent Black and Brown peo­ple, and this law­suit is intend­ed to seek jus­tice for those res­i­dents, too. De Janon ref­er­enced sev­er­al Fayetteville res­i­dents who died or were injured in alleged police bru­tal­i­ty cas­es, includ­ing Jada Johnson, 22, who was shot and killed by police in July, and Justin Livesay, 40, who was fatal­ly shot by police in September.

“This is not an issue of a cou­ple bad apples, because we’re see­ing that the tree is rot­ten,” de Janon said. “We’re see­ing that the roots are rot­ten. So when we demand jus­tice for Miss Ja’Lana, we demand jus­tice for these peo­ple, too, and for the oth­er Black and Brown peo­ple of Fayetteville who might suf­fer when they meet the police, again and again and again.”

Daniels, by phone Tuesday, chal­lenged the Fayetteville Police Department’s claim that the offi­cers involved were look­ing for a vio­lent sus­pect who had last been seen half a mile away from the prop­er­ty. He said his team obtained police radio traf­fic imply­ing there were no poten­tial­ly vio­lent sus­pects nearby.

“The only per­son they was look­ing for was 20 miles away,” he said. Sgt. Alpha Caldwell, a spokesper­son for the Fayetteville Police Department, said Tuesday she did not know when the footage would be pub­licly released.