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A gig worker is filing a lawsuit against a California city after allegedly being bitten and mauled during a traffic stop.
Ali Badr claims he has lost full use of his right arm after a K-9 latched onto it on December 20, 2020. He is suing the city of San Ramon, police Chief Craig Stevens and seven officers attributed to the stop. The lawsuit claims that they all contributed to violating Badr's civil rights when Officer John Cattolico released his K-9 despite the worker and Egyptian immigrant complying with all police orders.
"With the K-9 still latched onto Badr, ripping and tearing at his arm and hand while BADR screamed in pain," the lawsuit states, "Cattolico walked toward Plaintiff while removing his service weapon and pointing it directly at Badr's face."
As the K-9 continued to dig his teeth into Badr's arm, Cattolico allegedly pushed him to the ground and knelt on his back. According to the lawsuit, the dog continued biting into Badr's arm for 50 seconds.
Along with San Ramon and its police officers, Badr is suing CarMommy, which claimed that the car he rented from them was stolen. However, HyreCar Inc. of Los Angeles helped broker the rental between the two entities. CarMommy had called the police alleging a stolen vehicle, leading to the confrontation.
Dashboard and body-camera videos obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle show an unresisting Badr wailing in pain, his arm in the teeth of an aggressive San Ramon police dog for more than a minute as officers tried to cuff him.
"I never do nothing," Badr yelled to officers, the videos show. "I never in my life do anything."
Badr, a 42-year-old resident of Oakland, has driven for Uber and Lyft and started delivering food for DoorDash when the pandemic hit, the Chronicle reported. Forced to give up his own car due to declining income, he agreed to rent a Toyota Camry owned by startup CarMommy, which caters to gig workers, according to the lawsuit.
He told the Chronicle that he fell behind on payments but told the company he would pay them shortly. It was something he had done before, he said. But CarMommy CEO and co-founder John Blomeke had reported the car stolen, said Matthew Haley, Badr's attorney, resulting in the car's license plate number being listed in a state Department of Justice database shared among agencies.
Badr was driving to work at a gas station when the plate triggered one of the city's license plate readers, alerting police of a vehicle reported as stolen. Officers in a half-dozen cars pulled him over, guns drawn and dog barking. He ended up being rushed to a hospital for surgery.
Stevens told the news outlet in an email that the department conducted an internal investigation into Badr's arrest but declined to answer other questions, citing the lawsuit.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
