Woman claims she was violently arrested for allegedly jaywalking in lawsuit
By Amanda Hari
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SAN FRANCISCO (KPIX) — A San Francisco woman has filed a lawsuit after she says she was violently arrested for allegedly jaywalking.
Christiana Porter still thinks about the incident every day.
“At times, I just want to crawl up in a ball like an infant and just hold myself because it’s a lot but it’s also very important to speak out,” Porter said.
This week, with her lawyer’s help, she filed a lawsuit.
The lawsuit states on July 29, 2024, she was crossing Geary Boulevard near 2nd Avenue after visiting Office Depot. As she entered the crosswalk to get to the other side, the signal showed approximately eight seconds remaining for her to cross. When she is just steps from the opposite curb, San Francisco Police Officer Josh McFall’s vehicle appears behind her with lights on.
McFall gets out, starts to question her and asks for her identification. When she reaches into her bag to comply, he reaches for his firearm and tells Porter she’s under arrest.
“Get your hands out of your bag and get on the ground,” Porter said, recalling the experience. “I’m not going to get on the ground because my feeling is that I’m probably going to get killed. You’re probably going to shoot me in the back if I get on this ground.”
The experience was traumatizing, she’s a domestic assault survivor and a single mom of five kids. She didn’t know if she would ever see them again.
“My feeling was just to stay alive, just that they’re trying to take my freedom from and they’re trying to take my rights and this is not right,” Porter said.
Porter’s attorney Treva Stewart says a stop like this should have never happened. California decriminalized jaywalking back in 2023.
“This was clearly a pretextual stop, there is an abundance of research that proves that San Francisco police officers engage in discriminatory racial, policing,” Stewart said.
In addition to the emotional trauma of the experience, Porter suffered a concussion, a separated right shoulder and ongoing back and neck pain that has forced her to stop working as an esthetician.
She hopes filling this lawsuit will bring about change.
“Accountability,” Porter said about her hopes for the outcome of the lawsuit. “One hundred percent accountability. No amount of compensation can account what happened to me,”
In a statement from the city attorney’s office, they said, “We are reviewing the complaint and will respond in court.”
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