SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- A disabled man sued Syracuse police and Centro today over officers' use of a Taser to remove him from a bus last spring because he would not sit.
Brad Hulett, 35, sued the police department, the bus company, the Onondaga County Sheriff's Office and Rural/Metro Ambulance, along with employees of each agency over the May 3 incident.
The tasering was captured on video by a surveillance camera above the driver's seat. Hulett accused the officers of excessive use of force for using the Taser on him and then dragging him from the bus.
The bus video and a video from the booking area at the Onondaga County Justice Center jail provide evidence of one of the injuries Hulett suffered in the incident, according to his lawyer, Rick Guy.
The video on the bus shows Sgt. William Galvin Jr. and police officer William Coleman lifting the back of Hulett's shirt so they can use the Taser in that area. Hulett's lower back appears normal in the video (about 1:30 into the video above).
The video then shows Hulett falling as the officers move him off the bus. They drag Hulett away from the bus and one of the officers stands over him as Hulett lies on the pavement.
"You want it again?" the officer yells repeatedly at Hulett in the video.
Galvin then grabs Hulett's right foot and drags him about 10 feet along the pavement.
Brad Hulett, 35, claims Syracuse police used excessive force and wrongfully arrested him after they tasered him for not sitting on a Centro bus in May 2013.
Hulett suffered a broken left hip in the incident, according to medical records from Upstate Medical University.
The officers also likely aggravated a back injury Hulett suffered in a traffic accident in 2006, Guy said.
In the jail video, a large bulge appears on Hulett's lower back when deputies lift his shirt to search him (about 2:20 into the video below). That will likely be used as evidence that the officers injured Hulett, Guy said.
Hulett filed the lawsuit in federal court, claiming the defendants violated his civil rights.
Spokesmen for the police department and Centro said they couldn't comment because the case is the subject of a lawsuit.
Hulett claims not only that police used excessive force, but that they tried to cover it up by falsifying reports and destroying or secreting other videos that Centro surveillance cameras captured outside the bus.
Shortly after the incident, Guy asked Centro to preserve all of its videos on and around the bus. A lawyer for Centro told him in a letter that the bus company provided all of the records Guy requested to Syracuse police or the district attorney's office.
Guy claims that the police or prosecutors still have the remaining videos or that they were destroyed.
In response to Guy's demand in the criminal case for all the videos, prosecutors told him that Centro had destroyed them in keeping with the bus company's practice of deleting all videos after 90 days, he said.
In police reports and in a document charging Hulett with resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, police officers said they told Hulett he was under arrest on the bus before hitting him with the Taser. But in the bus video, no such statement can be heard.
In August, prosecutors agreed to drop the criminal charges against Hulett. District Attorney William Fitzpatrick said then that he was concerned about the inconsistencies in the police reports. He also said he was troubled by the fact that Syracuse police didn't generate a use-of-force report until after a story about the incident was published three months later in The Post-Standard and on Syracuse.com.
In 1991, Hulett was struck by two trains, one after the other, and doctors had to remove a portion of his brain to save his life. He has a large dent in the right side of his skull.
Hulett, in an interview this week, said he has great trouble walking because of the injuries he suffered in the tasering incident last year. He didn't use a cane before, but does now. He's fallen about 100 times -- so often that he's learned how to fall without hurting himself, he said.
"I fall all the time," he said. "I know that when I fall, do not try and twist my leg to try to catch myself. Just fall. Land as best I can. Twisting causes the pain."
After stories about the incident were published in the newspaper and its website, a disabled persons' organization held a rally. The incident became a topic at a special meeting of the Syracuse Common Council.
The Centro incident began because Hulett wanted to stand because sitting was uncomfortable on his back, he said. The driver wanted him to sit.
But because of the injuries to his hip and back he suffered that day, standing is more painful, he said. He no longer rides the bus, taking a taxi wherever he goes, he said. It costs $5 instead of $1 to get to the shopping centers and malls he visits, he said.
Hulett was in a coffee shop a couple months ago when a Syracuse police officer entered. Hulett, thinking the officer recognized him from the publicity of his case, joked with him: "Are you gonna Taser me?" The officer laughed and said no, Hulett said.
Hulett, who said he's unable to work because of his injuries, said he has no problem with most police officers. But he said he hopes his lawsuit acts as a deterrence to any bad cops.
"I'd like most of all to punish them to the point where they're not able to do something like that to somebody else," he said. "Most people are in worse shape than I am. They did that to somebody else, they'd hurt them seriously."
Contact John O'Brien at jobrien@syracuse.com or 315-470-2187.