Dyma Loving, a young mother of three who was violently arrested by Miami-Dade officers last month after she called the police for help, will be filing a federal civil rights complaint Wednesday against the county.
The announcement was made by Loving’s attorney, Justin Moore, who sent a press release to The Root on Wednesday morning. Listed among the defendants are Miami-Dade County, the Miami-Dade County Police Department, and officers Alejandro Giraldo and J.F. Calderon, the two cops who arrested Loving.
“Dyma’s lawsuit against these parties, both collectively and individually, addresses the complete and total breakdown of the officers’ inability to serve and protect her properly,” Moore wrote.
Loving was arrested on March 5 after an altercation with a white neighbor, Frank Tumm, whom she says threatened her with a rifle.
“He told me that he will blow my ‘burnt black face off [your] fucking neck bitch,’” Loving told The Root.
Loving retaliated at first by the throwing the neighbor’s plants onto the street. Once Tumm became distracted, she and a friend, Adrianna Green, ran from Tumm’s house to call the police. Police arrived on the scene without incident at first, Loving said; officers questioned her, Green, and the neighbor. But that changed once Officer Giraldo arrived on the scene.
Cellphone video taken of Loving’s arrest shows her being thrown violently to the ground by at least three officers. Afterward, Loving says she was kept in a police car for four hours as she waited for Giraldo to finish filing a police report on the incident.
“My trust is completely broken,” Loving told The Root last month. “I will never call the police again. No. No. I will figure it out.”
Video of the incident went viral on social media more than week after the arrest, prompting Miami-Dade Police Director Juan Perez to release a statement announcing that at least one of the officers involved was placed on administrative duty.
“I find the actions depicted on the video deeply troubling and in no way reflective of our core values of integrity, respect, service and fairness,” Perez wrote.
“Upon becoming aware of the video posted on social media, an immediate inquiry was initiated which resulted in the involved officer being relieved of duty and of his role as a field training officer,” Perez said, adding that an investigation into the arrest had been launched.
Bodycam footage released by Miami-Dade police later that week backed up Loving’s story: while Loving got agitated over the officers’ questioning, she never made physical or verbal threats to police. Instead, Loving was thrown into a chain-link fence, then tackled down to the ground, because Giraldo didn’t like the tone of her voice and wanted her to calm down.
She was charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest without violence. Both Giraldo and Calderon are still on the force.
In his press release, Moore called for both officers to be fired immediately for their role in the arrest. Among the claims brought forward in Loving’s suit are false arrest and false imprisonment, malicious prosecution, battery, deprivation of civil rights by excessive use of force, and negligent hiring and retention.
“It is my office’s intention to partake in a thorough, complete and aggressive prosecution of these claims,” Moore wrote.