PHILADELPHIA – An African-American and Muslim contractor who claimed he was framed for materials theft by a racist employee of a business he was working at and arrested by members of the Philadelphia Police Department, despite there being no evidence he had committed any crime, has settled his case.
Kareem Rice of Philadelphia first filed suit in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas on April 30, 2020, versus the Philadelphia Police Department, Officers Melissa O’Leary, Michael Sowell and Jonathan Dedos, Det. Sharon Murphy, Det. John Frei, Sgt. Steven Vanor, all of Philadelphia, plus A.T. Chadwick Company, Inc., A.T. Chadwick Family Limited Partnership, A.T. Chadwick LLC, Jimmy Kratz, Richard Lipinski, Fran Spause, Thomas Walls and Vincent Fitzgerald, all of Bensalem.
The case was removed to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on May 22, 2020.
Rice said he was one of two African-American employees working on a project for A.T. Chadwick Company and since the beginning of the project on Dec. 4, 2017, the plaintiff’s foreman and defendant Kratz had given his employees permission to discard metal that was not being used as it would otherwise be put in the trash.
“Upon information and belief, Kratz, who is white, disliked plaintiff and had told other employees that he wanted to get rid of him. On or around the week of Feb. 12, 2018, Kratz made a phone call to defendant Walls, Project Manager, and advised him that copper was missing from a storage area where copper piping was kept. Kratz advised Walls that he would set up a camera in the storage room where the copper was kept,” the suit stated.
“On or about Feb. 16, 2018, Kratz had cameras set up in the storage room. Kratz told plaintiff and the only other black employee on the project that they could go into the storage area and take any scrap metal from there. Plaintiff and the other employee were then caught on video taking metal from the storage room.”
When he reported for work on Monday, Feb. 19, 2018, Rice was questioned by foreman and defendant Lipinski as to whether he had taken copper piping. Rice said he did, after being given permission to do so by Kratz.
However, Rice and his fellow African-American co-worker then learned they were fired and led off the property, while the supposed theft was reported to the Philadelphia Police Department, the lawsuit said.
In the investigative interview with officers, defendant Lipinski told defendant Murphy that Rice had taken materials from the job site without adding that he had been given permission to do so by Kratz, the lawsuit said.
Rice learned in March 2018 that there was an outstanding warrant for his arrest relating to the supposed theft, so he turned himself into police and was released on bail. On Jan. 23, 2019, Rice was acquitted of all charges against him.
Rice believed he was set up by Kratz because of his race and the police defendants knew there was no probable cause to arrest him and did so regardless, while his career and livelihood has been negatively impacted due to the arrest.
On May 28, 2020, the Philadelphia Police Department defendants, through their counsel, filed a motion to dismiss Rice’s complaint for failure to state a claim, via insufficient specificity.
The A.T. Chadwick Company filed its own motion to dismiss the complaint on July 17, 2020, for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. Because the company defendants are not state actors, they argued they could not be charged with violating an individual’s rights under the 4th and 14th Amendments.
But on July 8, 2021, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania Petrese B. Tucker ruled to dismiss all claims against the City defendants with prejudice, dismiss all counts against the Chadwick Corp. defendants with prejudice; dismiss Count I against the Project Management defendants with prejudice and dismiss Counts II and III against the Project Management defendants without prejudice.
UPDATE
Subsequent to a settlement conference held on Jan. 27, Tucker ordered the following day, Jan. 28, that the case was closed as a result of a settlement. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.
“The Court having been advised that the parties in the above-captioned matter have resolved the case, it is hereby ordered and decreed that this matter is dismissed with prejudice, without costs, pursuant to the agreement of counsel and Local Rule 41.1(b). It is further ordered that the Clerk of Court shall mark this matter as closed for statistical purposes,” Tucker said.
The plaintiff was represented by David A. Berlin and Matthew B. Weisberg of Weisberg Law in Morton and Gary Schafkopf of Hopkins Schafkopf, in Bala Cynwyd.
The defendants were represented by Caroline J. Berdzik and Jeremy S. Cole of Goldberg Segalla, in Princeton, N.J and Buffalo, N.Y.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania case 2:20-cv-02404
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com