Jaleel Everson says he was heading to the bowling alley to meet with friends when he was pulled over for not using his headlights after nightfall. He soon found himself swarmed by a posse of Jacksonville police officers in multiple cruisers. Cops demanded to know what he had in his car. There were two guns, both legal: one in the glove box, one in the trunk.
Everson says he watched helplessly as officers rummaged through his car without his consent. The officers arrested Everson – who was not a felon – for being a felon in possession of firearms. As he loudly protested and called out for help, he says he was handcuffed, grabbed by the scruff of the neck and flung headlong into a police car, whose door was then slammed into his head, leaving him dizzy and bruised.
Local prosecutors eventually dropped the charges, but only after he’d spent two days in jail and racked up $5,000 in personal medical bills. Everson has a pending complaint against the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office.
Everson’s case wasn’t captured on cellphone and didn’t go viral like several other such incidents that have put JSO in the news in recent years, but less-publicized complaints of police brutality like his are often settled in small sums that have accumulated to nearly to $2 million in payouts since 2022…