Witness to Sterling killing files lawsuit: Cops locked me up, took phone, video
The owner of the convenience store where Alton Sterling was killed by police is suing for the way he was treated by police.
Abdullah Muflahi, proprietor of the Triple S Mart, said he saw police confront and kill Sterling, who was selling CDs with his permission in his front parking lot last Tuesday night. Muflahi recorded part of the incident in footage he gave The Daily Beast last week that shows Sterling did not have a weapon in his hand when Officer Howie Lake shouted “Gun!” and Officer Blane Salamoni fired six shots into his chest.
Muflahi claims in a lawsuit filed Monday in Baton Rouge district court that after Salamoni killed Sterling, he immediately told responding officers Lt. Robert Cook and Officer Timothy Ballard to confiscate the “entire store security system” and detain him.
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“I told them I would like to be in the store when [they took it],” Muflahi told The Daily Beast, adding that he also demanded they get a warrant for the seizure of his private property.
Officers didn’t even file an application for a search warrant, The Daily Beast found last week. Nor did Muflahi sign a “Voluntary Consent to Search Form” with the Baton Rouge police.
After taking away Muflahi’s cellphone—and the damning video on it—Lt. Cook and Officer Ballard locked the him in the back of a police car for the next four hours, the lawsuit claims. The only time Muflahi was let out was when he had to use the restroom.“The officers would not allow Mr. Muflahi to use the restroom inside of his business establishment and he was escorted to the side of his building and forced to relieve himself right there within arm distance of a BPRD officer and in full view of the public,” the lawsuit states.
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