Four police officers from Knoxville, Tennessee, dodged penalties after a federal judge dismissed the civil rights lawsuit against them following accusations they let a man drown in front of bystanders who were trying to help.
US District Judge Thomas Varlan cleared officers William Romanini, Joseph Mattina, Timothy Campbell, and Brandon Brewer of any wrongdoing last week, according to KNOX NEWS.
In July 2022, several people called 911 to report Mika Wheeler Clabo, 30, was acting erratically, barefoot, wearing only a t-shirt and underpants, and allegedly trying to get away from something.
Clabo then jumped a fence and fell in a parking lot where he saw Romanini and began to run away as he fell down the riverbank and into the water.
Four officers and two EMTs were at the scene; however, they yelled at him to "swim" or "get out" without providing assistance, according to KNOX NEWS.
Several employees from Calhoun's on the River and bystanders were turned away by the officers when attempting to help Clabo.
Witnesses report seeing Clabo struggle to keep his head above water for roughly ten minutes before he was pronounced dead.
Clabo's mother, Kimberly Williams-Clabo, filed the civil rights lawsuit in 2023, claiming officers violated her son's 14th Amendment rights when they refused to jump in the water to attempt to save her son.
The judge ruled that the officers were protected by qualified immunity, which exempts government workers from liability in many cases when there is no established precedent showing that their actions were wrong.
"Regardless of the precision with which the officer defendants evaluated a would-be rescuer's qualifications, no bystander on the scene expressed a willingness to rescue Clabo, much less a professional background or training in water-based rescue," wrote Varlan.
Varlan accepted differing opinions of how accessible the water was from the bank but determined Clabo descended to the river on his own volition.
Clabo's mother revealed that while her son battled his demons, he had been in recovery from drug addiction for a year and a half, including six months of that time in a Knoxville halfway house.
"I mean, he battled his demons, but it did not make him a bad person," she said the the news outlet.
"Because he would do anything for anybody. It didn't matter what it was. He may have been a drug addict, but there was more to Mika than that."
Portions of the lawsuit remain active against the city of Knoxville and Police Chief Paul Noel.
