Rainbow City police sued over tazer use

A lawsuit filed this month by an Etowah County woman alleges that police officers from Rainbow City repeatedly fired Tasers at her and her teenage daughter at a concert while the daughter was suffering from grand mal seizures.  The 32-page lawsuit, filed July 9 in U.S. District Court, accuses at least five Rainbow City officers and three Gadsden officers who were allegedly handling security for a Jan. 16 hip-hop concert of excessive force, torture "and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment." It also names Rainbow City Police Chief Greg Carroll and Center Stage, the entertainment venue where the suit alleges the incident took place. The woman and her daughter seek damages for pain, emotional distress, medical expenses, punitive damages and attorney's fees.  Gregory Harp, attorney for the plaintiffs, said the lawsuit speaks for itself.  According to the lawsuit, the incident happened at a Jan. 16 concert for hip-hop artist Kevin Gates at Center Stage. Earlier that day, the teenager suffered a grand mal seizure at her high school and was treated there but not taken to a hospital.  The suit states that the teenager, as the result of an accident, suffers from a medical condition that brings on the seizures causing her to lose consciousness, experience muscle contractions and "sometimes exhibit loud vocalizations caused by the forceful exhalation of air from her lungs.  According to the lawsuit, after the concert began at 8 p.m., a performer at one point left the stage and went into the crowd, causing a "stampede" that knocked the teenager to the floor. Other concertgoers "trampled" her, triggering a seizure. This caused the crowd to part around the girl, and her younger sister informed employees of Center Stage that she was suffering a seizure. The suit states an employee picked her up and carried her to the lobby, where she was "unceremoniously dumped" onto the floor and held with a chokehold. The suit alleges the mother learned of her daughter's condition from the sister and came to the venue. When she arrived at the lobby dressed in a T-shirt and pajamas, the mother was "held down on the ground at five different points of her body" by police, then restrained to hold her wrists, hands and fingers immobile. After a police officer twice instructed another officer to "get her," an officer fired his Taser at the mother while she was restrained, causing her to urinate. The Taser was also employed three times against the teenager, who was "face down with her arms secured behind her," the suit states. She temporarily lost consciousness and was taken to Gadsden Regional Medical Center, while the mother was arrested for disorderly conduct.  At the hospital, the suit claims, police made jokes about the teenager and threatened to have her committed to a mental hospital.