American Military News by Paul Woolverton - The Fayetteville Observer July 20, 2020
A former Army sergeant alleges in a lawsuit that he was stuck in jail for almost three years for crimes he did not commit due to malicious prosecution by the Fayetteville Police Department and because of incompetence on the part of two top lawyers in the Cumberland County Public Defender’s Office.
The man’s lawyer said he should get nearly $7.7 million — $300 for each hour he was jailed.
The plaintiff is 33-year-old Gerard Atkinson of Fayetteville. Atkinson was charged in January 2017 with attempted murder and assault with a firearm on three Fayetteville police officers who were sent to check on him after he called a suicide hotline.
The police arrested Atkinson, the lawsuit says, because during Atkinson’s suicidal crisis his gun discharged and the bullet went through a window toward the street at the same time officers were in the vicinity and walking to his house. No one was injured.
Atkinson said in an interview this month with The USA Today Network that the gunshot was unintentional. It happened, he said, when he put the weapon down after deciding not to kill himself.
More:
https://americanmilitarynews.com/2020/07/lawsuit-police-wrongly-arrested-suicidal-soldier-lawyers-failed-to-defend-him/
