A federal judge is being asked to immediately order the Cleveland Clinic to stop detaining people who bring gunshot wound victims to its emergency rooms while a legal challenge to the policy moves forward.
The request is part of a lawsuit filed on behalf of Ibrahim Alim, who was detained last May after he drove his friend with a gunshot wound to the emergency department. Signal Cleveland reported on his story last December. At the time, three legal experts questioned whether the policy — which instructs the hospital’s police to detain people and vehicles accompanying gunshot wound victims to the emergency room — might infringe on constitutional rights that limit how and when officers can detain individuals. Cleveland’s branch of the NAACP also called on the Cleveland Clinic to pause and reverse the policy last year.
In addition to detaining Alim, the lawsuit says officers also unconstitutionally searched him, seized his car keys and used excessive force against him, even though they had no evidence he was involved in a crime. Alim is seeking $10 million in damages, according to the civil rights lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court…