The mother of a Black man in Charlotte who died in police custody in 2022 while mentally distressed and complaining of double vision and trouble breathing is suing the city and four of its police officers for excessive force, claiming their mistreatment of him caused her son’s death.
The way police handled Jovontay Williams, a former All-America college football player, after responding to a 911 call by a woman reporting gunshots outside her home in the early morning of June 13, 2022, has been known since 2023, when the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department released bodycam video footage of the incident.
After officers noticed empty shell casings outside the woman’s residence, Williams, 32, was found on the back porch of a nearby home. Police quickly determined that he was unarmed and undergoing a mental health crisis, “acting erratically, exhibiting stress and delirium,” CMPD officials later said in a statement.
At 2:01 a.m., when they failed to coax Williams off the porch, officers elected to use a “soft, empty hands” approach, following CMPD’s response to resistance policy…