A Lorain County Common Pleas judge ruled May 10 that a Lorain Police Department officer and a police dog didn’t violate a Lorain City Schools student’s constitutional rights when the dog ”snipped” the child while hiding in a restroom in the conclusion of a lawsuit that was filed in 2022.
Common Pleas Judge D. Chris Cook presided over the case.
The lawsuit details the incident where Lorain Schools officials called police and asked the Police Department to bring in a narcotics’ dog to help conduct a search for drugs at General Johnnie Walker Middle School, according to court documents.
The Police Department sent Officer Jamie Ball and police dog, Titan, to assist school officials Feb. 25, 2020.
Similar searches are conducted three times each year at the school, officials said.
When the search begins, the school goes into a “‘lockdown drill” to minimize risk to students and are coordinated with an “active shooter” drill as it did at 8:50 a.m., that day, court records stated.
The sixth-grade boy was on his way to his classroom when he stopped to use the restroom just before Ball and Titan entered the facility.
“Once in the restroom, Officer Ball announced his presence and did not receive any response,” the documents stated. “He conducted a visual inspection under the stalls and did not observe any persons. He then directed Titan to search the restroom by searching the stalls.
“While Titan was searching the second stall, unprompted, he darted under the stall into the adjoining stall at which time Officer Ball heard (the student) yell out.
“Officer Ball immediately pulled Titan out of the stall, left the restroom, and notified (school official Jeff) Hawks that there was a child in the restroom who may have been bitten by Titan.”
The child was “snipped” by Titan in the lower leg and the wound required antibiotic cream and a bandage, documents stated.
The judge ruled that the actions of the officer were “hardly extreme or outrageous” and that the student’s constitutional rights weren’t violated by “using excessive force, making warrantless searches, entries and arrests without probable cause, and arresting and charging citizens with criminal offenses which are not supported by probable cause,” according to the document.
The ruling also pointed out that the officer had no reason to believe there was any person in the restroom at the time he entered, the document stated.
