HARRISBURG – An altercation which escalated to gunshots and criminal charges against the alleged assailant being dropped during his trial has now led to a civil lawsuit in a Pennsylvania federal court against the Northern York County Regional Police Department and Heidelberg Township, not long after a separate suit surrounding the same events was brought in York County court.
Richard Louis Starks and Christian Starks of Ocala, Fla. filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania on May 1 versus Northern York County Regional Police Department, Sgt. Jack C. Asper, Officer Steven Lebo and Lt. John Migatulski of Dover, Pa., Heidelberg Township of York County, Pennsylvania in Spring Grove, William K. Knight (a.k.a. Kenneth Knight) of Abbotstown and Marvin Knight, of Hanover.
The suit involves a May 2, 2022 incident at the Paws Pet Resort in Hanover, Heidelberg Township, where plaintiff Richard Starks called the Northern York County Regional Police Department at 8:55 a.m., after his son Christian Starks phoned him that a stranger, later identified as defendant William K. Knight, had arrived at the business and allegedly threatened his customers and employees.
Meanwhile, it is William Knight’s contention that he only came to Paws Pet Resort with a camera in order to take photos of excavation work happening at the site, before being confronted on the property.
The resulting confrontation eventually led to the parties’ vehicles colliding and shots being fired.
After Christian made more than one phone call to 911, officers from the Northern York County Regional Police Department, including defendants Asper, Lebo and Migatulski, responded to the site of the escalating altercation more than an hour later.
During the interim, prosecutors said authorities could not determine if the incident was taking place in York County or Adams County, leading to an initial delay in police response. Once it was determined the incident was happening in York County, Migatulski said he was on the scene within two to six minutes, followed closely by Asper and Lebo.
Counsel for the plaintiffs counter, however, that the Northern York County Regional Police Department failed to respond to their clients in a timely fashion, as an NYCRPD sub-station was located just a few minutes from the scene.
Additionally, the plaintiffs assert that when they did arrive to the scene, responding police officials failed to properly investigate the incident, failed to retrieve key information from the Event Data Recorders on both of the vehicles involved in the altercation (Starks’ Tesla and Knight’s Cadillac, which were both impounded), failed to preserve elements of the crime scene and used racially-discriminatory language to refer to the plaintiffs.
During the resultant criminal proceedings against Starks, who was facing charges of attempted murder, aggravated assault and reckless endangerment, the York County District Attorney’s Office dismissed those charges with prejudice, during the second day of his trial last month.
According to the plaintiffs in this civil action, this was done because prosecutors “failed to make mandatory disclosures of material impeachment and/or exculpatory evidence, in violation of defendant’s rights under the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the Pennsylvania, Brady v. Maryland, and Rule 573 of the Pennsylvania Rules of Evidence, even after defendant’s repeated specific and general requests for such evidence.”
For multiple counts of deprivation of rights in violation of federal law and conspiracy of same, state-law claims of assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligent infliction of emotional distress, negligence, malicious prosecution and civil conspiracy, the plaintiffs are seeking, jointly and severally, compensatory damages, punitive and exemplary damages against each individual defendant, costs of suit, reasonable attorney’s fees, and as otherwise authorized by statute or law, pre- and post-judgment interest as permitted by law, and such other relief, including injunctive and/or declaratory relief, as the Court may deem proper.
The plaintiffs are represented by Charles D. Mandracchia, Jeffrey W. Soderberg and Christopher Mandracchia of Mandracchia Law, in Skippack and Conshohocken.
The defendants have not yet retained legal counsel.
U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania case 1:24-cv-00739
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com