Pubdate: Fri, 06 Oct 2000
Source: New York Times (NY)
Copyright: 2000 The New York Times Company
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Author: Benjamin Weiser

$3 MILLION AWARD IN POLICE BRUTALITY CASE

A federal jury awarded $3 million yesterday to a Bronx woman who said she
had been beaten by an undercover New York City police officer when she was
mistakenly arrested in a drug case in 1998.

The woman, Irma Morales, 51, was released a short time after her arrest,
when another police officer pointed out the mistake, testimony showed.

The officer accused in the beating, Detective Anthony P. Leone, who remains
on full duty, was exonerated by the Civilian Complaint Review Board after an
investigation, lawyers for the city said.

The city, which had argued that Ms. Morales's allegations were without
merit, said it would appeal the verdict, in part because the judge refused
to allow the jury to hear of the detective's exoneration by the review
board.

"There is no evidence whatsoever that the injuries the plaintiff complained
of were committed" by the officer, said Lorna B. Goodman, a senior lawyer in
the corporation counsel's office.

The verdict yesterday in Federal District Court in Manhattan came after a
three-day trial in which the jury was shown graphic color photographs of
bruises on Ms. Morales's arms and legs. The injuries, she said, resulted
from a confrontation with Detective Leone near her home in the Bronx on
Sept. 29, 1998.

Ms. Morales testified that she had been walking to a bus near East 183rd
Street and Prospect Avenue to go to the dentist that morning, when a man
grabbed her, dragged her to an unmarked car and forced her in.

The man, she said she later learned, was Detective Leone. But he did not
identify himself at the time, she said, and she resisted, not realizing that
he was a police officer.

"I started to struggle with him because I wanted him to let me go," Ms.
Morales testified, speaking through a Spanish translator.

"He grabbed me harder, and I started to scream because I was very scared,
scared of being kidnapped or hurt."

"I thought my world was coming to an end," she added. "I didn't know what he
wanted with me."

Detective Leone, a veteran of more than 15 years on the force, defended his
actions in his testimony. He told the jury that he had acted appropriately,
identifying himself to Ms. Morales and treating her as he would any suspect.

He said he was part of a team of officers arresting suspects whose
descriptions were being radioed from another officer who was making
undercover drug purchases. Ms. Morales was stopped, the detective said,
because she matched a description of a woman involved in a drug deal.

Detective Leone denied that her injuries could have been a result of their
encounter. "I did not exert any sort of force that would incur any of that
bruising," he testified.

Ms. Morales had no comment as she left the courtroom, but her lawyer,
Jonathan S. Abady, praised the verdict and criticized the department for
failing to discipline Detective Leone.

"The city and the Police Department are out of step with the public's moral
sensibility with respect to police misconduct," Mr. Abady said.

He said that the jury of four men and four women "represented a fair
cross-section of the community," and that "they were outraged at both the
injury inflicted and the indifference and arrogance of the police."

The jury, which began deliberations Wednesday, told Judge Denise L. Cote
that it was apportioning the bulk of its award, or $2.75 million, to Ms.
Morales for her claim of excessive force by Detective Leone. The rest,
$250,000, would go for her claim of false arrest. The jury made an
additional award of $7,500 in punitive damages against Detective Leone. He
had no comment outside court.
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