PITTSBURGH — A shopper is suing Giant Eagle Inc., Police Officer Matthew Coleman and the City of Pittsburgh, citing alleged violations of the Fourth Amendment, Pennsylvania Law Section 1983 False Arrest, Excessive Force, Malicious Prosecution, and ADA/Rehabilitation Act.
Debra Merlina filed a complaint on Dec. 31 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania against the defendants, alleging they falsely accused and arrested the plaintiff.
According to the complaint, the plaintiff alleges that on March 26, 2018, she was falsely accused of shoplifting and/or retail theft by a Giant Eagle loss prevention employee and was unlawfully detained within the premises of the store and at the Allegheny County Jail.
Merlina was incarcerated for approximately 12 hours, during which time she was nauseous and continued to experience excruciating pain from her numerous physical impairments that she mentioned both to Giant Eagle and the police officers, even requesting not to be handcuffed behind her back, the suit claims.
The plaintiff says the police officers did not perform any independent investigation into the false accusations even though they knew that the events leading up to the false arrest of Merlina were video recorded on the store’s security system. Giant Eagle destroyed and/or otherwise failed to preserve the video recording of the events leading up to Merlina’s false arrest, despite its knowledge that such video was likely to be relevant to the criminal charges brought against Merlina and/or potential ensuing civil litigation, the suit claims.
The plaintiff requests a trial by jury and seeks a sum in excess of $35,000 inclusive of compensatory damages and/or punitive damages. She is represented by Timothy O’Brien of Pittsburgh.
The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania Case No. is 2:18-cv-01714-LPL.