Late one September afternoon in 2017, on an ordinary residential street in a predominantly African-African neighborhood of the nation’s capital, M.B. Cottingham and his friends had gathered to discuss how to celebrate his birthday that evening. Someone popped a bottle of champagne.
And then everything changed.
In what D.C. residents (and even a ) recognize as common practice in the city, police cars rolled up and the officers jumped out to confront this group of African-African men congregating peacefully on the streets of their own neighborhood. Though the officers had no reason for suspicion, they demanded to know if the men had guns. The men all said no.
One officer approached Mr. Cottingham, a lifelong D.C. resident who works as an ice-cream vendor, selling frozen treats out of a truck. The officer, Sean Lojacono, asked Mr. Cottingham about a bulge in his sock. Mr. Cottingham pulled out a legal amount of marijuana and — having been stopped and frisked countless times by D.C. police since he was 14 and hoping to keep the situation from escalating — volunteered to let the officer frisk him.
What happened next was shocking both to Mr. Cottingham and the thousands of viewers who would later watch the .
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Ranging far beyond what should have been a limited pat-down for weapons, Officer Lojacono jammed his fingers between Mr. Cottingham’s buttocks and grabbed his genitals. Mr. Cottingham physically flinched and verbally protested, making clear that this highly intrusive search was not within the scope of the frisk to which he had consented. Officer Lojacono responded by handcuffing Mr. Cottingham and returning to probe the most sensitive areas of his person — two more excruciating times.
No warrant, probable cause, reasonable suspicion, or consent justified the scope of these probes, which were conducted in broad daylight in public and with no other discernible reason than to humiliate and degrade Mr. Cottingham and to display the officer’s power over him.
“Once he thrust his finger in my bottom, I wanted to turn around and punch him in his face,” Mr. Cottingham said afterwards. “But the thought that kept running across my mind is, they gonna kill you. I thought about teddy bears being up under the tree or becoming a hashtag. I have kids that I have to live for.”
In his three searches of Mr. Cottingham’s anal area, Officer Lojacono didn’t find anything. He didn’t arrest him or anyone else. Instead, as a parting shot, Officer Lojacono taunted Mr. Cottingham and his friends from the loudspeaker on his car as he and his fellow officers drove away.
Depressed, humiliated, and feeling defeated after what he had experienced, Mr. Cottingham turned inward. He didn’t want to go outside. He could barely bring himself to work his ice cream truck. His side-career as a musician that had been taking off, with paid gigs, now fizzled as Mr. Cottingham lost his drive to perform. He hasn’t performed since the search. Meanwhile, Officer Lojacono remains on the D.C. police force.
Last week, Officer Lojacono on Mr. Cottingham’s behalf for the violation of his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures. We have asked a jury to assess the appropriate amount to compensate him for what he has suffered and continues to endure, but the case is not ultimately about money.
Mr. Cottingham is suing for . He is asserting his basic humanity. He is standing up for his community, too often disrespected by police and viewed as potential suspects rather than as neighbors, employees, friends, and family members.
Sadly, we know that for every Mr. Cottingham who has his story captured on video and brought to public attention, there are many more here in D.C. and across the country who suffer this kind of abuse at the hands of law enforcement without recourse or redress — including some whose names do become hashtags.
That is why it is so important that Mr. Cottingham came forward, despite the trauma of what he experienced, to assert his rights, to call attention to the practice of stop and frisk and the abuses that follow, and to shine a light on a harsh reality that many communities of color face.
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Press ReleaseDec 2024
Prisoners' Rights
Criminal Law Reform
ACLU Sues Bureau of Prisons for Keeping People in Prison Longer Than the Law AllowsACLU Sues Bureau of Prisons for Keeping People in Prison Longer Than the Law Allows
WASHINGTON – A federal lawsuit brought today by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of D.C., and Jenner & Block LLP challenges the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) for unlawfully incarcerating people longer than the law allows under the First Step Act. The lawsuit contends that the BOP’s failure to implement the First Step Act according to its plain language violates the rights of thousands of people who should be returning to their communities and rebuilding their lives but instead remain incarcerated. Signed into law in 2018 by then-President Donald Trump, the bipartisan First Step Act was designed to reduce the population in federal prisons, reform extreme sentencing laws, and provide programming and reentry transition services to people in prison. Central to the First Step Act is a system of earned time credits, which allows people in prison to earn time off their sentences and time out of prison by participating in rehabilitation programs. Through the First Step Act, Congress unambiguously ordered BOP to move people out of prison when they meet certain requirements to use their earned time credits. Instead of faithfully following the mandatory law, BOP adopted a regulation treating the law as optional. As a result, thousands of people, who should already be back in their communities and with their families, remain in prison. “Every extra unlawful day our clients spend in prison is a serious injustice,” said Emma Andersson, deputy director of the Criminal Law Reform Project at the ACLU. “It is egregious that the Bureau of Prisons is imprisoning people for months longer than the law allows. The government must follow through on its legal obligation to get people out of prison on time and back into their communities, where they belong.” Additional comments below from: Vanessa Crowe, plaintiff: “Time is what I owed for my wrongdoing, and I have paid my time. But I should not have to spend more time in prison than the law allows. I often reflect on what I will miss during the months after when I should be out of prison. I will miss work and lose out on wages that would help me get back on my feet. I could be a tax paying citizen instead of a burden on society. But most of all, I will miss more precious time with my family. My family and I are ready to tum the page on this period in our lives — we are all ready to start a new life, a life with purpose, hope, and healing together. I want to start that life when I am legally entitled to start it-not five months later.” Arthur Spitzer, senior counsel at ACLU of D.C.: “There’s no excuse for the Bureau of Prisons to pretend not to understand Congress’s clear command that people who have earned the right to early release must be released. This law has been on the books for six years. The Bureau of Prisons has had plenty of time to understand it. Law enforcers should obey the law.” Betsy Henthorne, partner at Jenner & Block: “It has been six years since the First Step Act was signed, but despite Congress’s clear directives, the Bureau of Prisons continues to hold thousands of people in prison longer than the law allows. We should and do expect better—it’s past time for the BOP to ensure that those who have earned their release are able to return home to their families and communities according to the law Congress passed.” -
Maryland Supreme CourtDec 2024
Criminal Law Reform
Roland Branch v. State of MarylandRoland Branch v. State of Maryland
This petition to the Supreme Court of Maryland asked the court to reconsider its adherence to Whren v. U.S., 517 U.S. 806 (1996), which declared that a traffic stop undertaken for pretextual reasons does not violate the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution so long as the police have probable cause to believe that a traffic violation occurred. The ACLU, alongside the ACLU of Maryland, filed an amicus brief in support of the defendant’s petition, in which the ACLU argued that the court should take up the question of whether pretextual stops violate the Maryland Constitution. In September 2024, the Court denied the petition. -
North Carolina Supreme CourtDec 2024
Criminal Law Reform
State v. WrightState v. Wright
This case in the North Carolina Supreme Court involves the question of whether the police violated the U.S. Constitution when they searched the defendant, Mr. Wright’s, backpack even after he repeatedly said no to the search requests. The ACLU alongside the ACLU of North Carolina filed an amicus brief arguing that the search was unconstitutional because Mr. Wright’s eventual “consent” was the result of police coercion. Our brief urges the court to consider the totality of the circumstances that make one more susceptible to coercion, including race and poverty. -
News & CommentaryDec 2024
Criminal Law Reform
Disability Rights
Incarceration Should Not be a Death Sentence for Individuals Who Use OpioidsIncarceration Should Not be a Death Sentence for Individuals Who Use Opioids
New litigation centered on increasing access to substance-use disorder treatment in jails and prisons is helping to reduce mortality rates among incarcerated individuals.