PHOENIX — Phoenix police have released body camera video of them detaining a 62-year-old veteran man who has filed a civil rights claim saying officers racially profiled him.
The video release came four days after Derrick Lewis told his story to ABC15 in front of the Phoenix Police Department, and the video was provided one week before Lewis' lawyers were scheduled to go before a judge to force the release of the video.
The Air Force veteran told ABC15 Monday that Phoenix police officersracially profiled him when they forced him from his home at gunpoint while looking for a suspect in a domestic violence incident.
Lewis, 62, has filed a notice of claim, the precursor to a lawsuit, over the incident from December 2022, which he says caused him PTSD.
“I’m a law-abiding, taxpaying citizen,” Lewis told ABC15.
Lewis said he and his girlfriend were home that day. After hearing banging at the door, Lewis said police had rifles pointed at him as they forced him to exit and handcuffed him.
“I was surrounded by police, barking dogs, and the helicopter,” Lewis said. “They told me I looked like a man that crashed his vehicle nearby.”
Lewis’ legal claim against the city said he was detained for 45 minutes. He said officers were looking for a different Black man who was 20 years younger than him and five inches taller. The man police were searching for also had short hair and a face tattoo, which Lewis does not have.
The video, released to ABC15 Friday afternoon, showed the incident lasted less than 15 minutes from when police called for the home's occupants to come out to when Lewis was allowed to go back inside. While Lewis walked down the driveway with his hands up, officers started to question aloud whether they had the right guy. Lewis was put in handcuffs for about three minutes, while officers consulted a picture of the suspect on a cell phone.
“This is the umpteenth time that they have racially profiled someone,” said Rev. Jarrett Maupin, a longtime Valley activist. Maupin said Lewis is the first in a series of people he will bring in front of Phoenix police headquarters in the coming weeks to make new complaints about Phoenix police abuse and misconduct.
“There is an endless litany of people who have been maimed, mistreated, and murdered by the Phoenix Police Department, and it really is time for it to come to an end,” Maupin said.
“We're hopeful that we will be able to clean this up with or without the feds' help, but if the city of Phoenix won't do it, the feds will,” said Joel Robbins, a civil rights attorney representing Lewis.
Robbins is also frustrated by the police department’s lack of transparency about Lewis’ detainment. His firm first asked for police body-camera video of the incident in March.
“It's very important for our community and the police to learn to change, so everyone is treated the same regardless of the color of their skin,” Lewis said.
Lewis’s legal claim asks for a $250,000 settlement.
Contact ABC15 Investigator Melissa Blasius at Melissa@ABC15.com.
