SCRANTON - A man arrested for public intoxication then tossed around a jail cell during Scranton's St. Patrick's Day celebration in 2023 has lost his lawsuit against the Lackawanna County Sheriff's Department.
Kenneth Eiswerth said in a July complaint he was verbally and physically assaulted by a deputy while in a holding cell. That deputy, John Ehnot, was caught on a surveillance camera pushing Eiswerth, which led to two years of probation and the loss of his job.
Reports say Eiswerth became disruptive, and Ehnot dragged him off a bench and pushed him down. Ehnot then pushed him into a corner, slapped him and threw him around the cell.
This led Eiswerth to file suit in Lackawanna County Court of Common Pleas, and the case was later transferred to federal court. He alleged his homosexuality played a part in the assault.
"After being placed in the holding cell, Sheriff Ehnot, though unprovoked, went into the holding cell and began verbally assaulting Plaintiff based upon Plaintiff's sexuality and ultimately began physically assaulting the Plaintiff based upon his sexuality," the suit says.
"Plaintiff, still somewhat intoxicated, was released not only from the holding cell but from the possession of the Sheriff's Department altogether and released from custody in as much as the defendants knew what had just occurred to Plaintiff was wrong and illegal."
But on Feb. 14, Judge Katherine Mehalchick granted the motion to dismiss of Lackawanna County and its sheriff's department. They faced claims like sexual orientation discrimination, failure to train and assault and battery.
"If Eiswerth asserts a 'traditional' Equal Protection claim, he begins to do so by alleging that he was assaulted based on his sexual orientation, a protected class," Mehalchick wrote.
"However, he does not allege any facts which show detainees or individuals of other sexual orientations were treated differently based on their sexual orientation with respect to their being detained for public intoxication or their treatment by Ehnot."
Eiswerth could show no conspiracy either, or that county policies resulted in mistreatment by Ehnot. He had argued Ehnot's history of "excessive force" and a failure to respond to it amounted to a policy or custom.
"Eiswerth continues to make several broad allegations... that the County failed to implement policies governing use of force with detainees or investigation procedures for incidents involving excessive force and that the County's policies failed to 'prevent, deter, report, intervene, or take action against unlawful conduct of other officers,'" Mehalcick wrote.
"Eiswerth fails to identify a written formal policy or any policymaker or final decisionmaker in his complaint to support his claim on a theory of custom liability."
And claims against Ehnot, who didn't file a dismissal motion, amount to claims against the County, Mehalchick wrote in tossing them too.