Mother of autistic boy sues Worcester police after bone broken, records withheld

WORCESTER – Worcester police broke a 10-year-old autistic boy's arm using excessive force and have refused to release records regarding the case to his mother, a lawsuit filed this month in federal court alleges.

In a 22-page lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in WorcesterSept. 8, Lindsey M. Beshai Torres alleges two officers treated her son with inexcusable roughness in 2017, and that top city officials have withheld records about what happened.

"The city manager refused to turn over the public records requested because it did not want Beshai Torres or the rest of the world to know what police did to (her son), or that they have not taken corrective actions against (the officers)," the woman's lawyer, Hector E. Pineiro, alleged.

"The police told Mrs. Beshai the incident should not have occurred," Pineiro alleged in a news release regarding the lawsuit Tuesday morning. "To pacify and make her go away they suggested they could possibly train their officers on how to deal with individuals with autistic spectrum disorder.

"They did nothing and no one was ever disciplined."

In a statement Tuesday evening, City Manager Edward M. Augustus Jr. said the incident "resulted in an outcome that no one desired.

"I feel for what the boy and his family experienced, but because this is an ongoing legal matter, I am unable to comment further at this time," he wrote.

The lawsuit alleges the boy incurred more than $23,000 in medical bills along with physical and mental scars after an encounter with police on Sept. 25, 2017.

It alleges Beshai Torres called 911 around 9 a.m. that day near Gates Lane Elementary School after the boy became upset with her, throwing a bottle at a windshield and yanking a rear-view mirror out of position.

Beshai Torres said she had never called 911 for help with the boy before, and was hoping to get an ambulance to take her son to the hospital.

She alleged that before an ambulance arrived, two police officers, John R. Alers and Paul P. McCarthy (who is now retired), arrived and began talking to the boy.

Beshai Torres alleged she was friendly with McCarthy and that he had interacted with her son in the past. She alleged both officers, despite being aware of the boy's autism, failed to act appropriately and escalated the situation to a place it did not need to go.

She alleges her son, who avoids eye contact, grunted toward the officers from inside her car when they tried to speak with him, and then threw a bag of potato chips outside the car that hit the pavement.

At that point, Beshai Torres alleges, Alers grabbed the boy by the arm and pulled him outside of the car, where he was pinned to the ground and handcuffed by both officers as he screamed.

The woman said she screamed at the officers to let the boy go, but was told to "back off" and let them do their jobs.

She alleges McCarthy placed his knee on the boy's neck, and Alers placed his knee on the boy's legs and handcuffed him as he screamed hysterically and cried for help.

The woman said she screamed and "watched helplessly" as police twisted her son's arm in an unnatural position at the elbow while cuffing him. She said the officers remained on top of the boy for "a number of minutes," and that the boy was taken to the hospital after EMTs saw he had been injured.

The boy required a three-day hospital stay and surgery for a broken elbow, wrote Pineiro, who affixed X-rays of a screw in the boy's arm to the lawsuit.

Pineiro wrote in the news release that continued pain and a scar from the surgery are "relatively slight concerns compared to the depression, anxiety and fear that now haunt the child."

The lawsuit alleges the boy once talked of wanting to be an officer and now is "terrified" of the police.

It also alleges Alers falsely wrote in his report that the boy had sworn at him, pulled wires inside the car and got out of the car himself rather than being pulled out by officers.

The lawsuit lists six civil counts, including excessive force, assault and battery, conspiracy and violations of Massachusetts Public Records Law.

According to the lawsuit, City Manager Edward M. Augustus Jr.'s office declined to release an internal affairs investigation to Beshai Torres after a public records request from her lawyer in 2018.

The city invoked an exemption to the Massachusetts Public Records Law commonly referred to as the "privacy" exemption.

The exemption is not mandatory - meaning the city would not be breaking the law if it released the information, though it might consider doing so a liability.

In his lawsuit, Pineiro noted that Beshai Torres signed a document waiving "any and all privacy or statutory concerns" when she filed her public records request with the city.

The city, in denying the woman's request for internal affairs report and police reports, wrote they "contain personal medical information, the disclosure of which would result in an invasion of the personal privacy of the person in question."

Beshai Torres alleges in the lawsuit that internal affairs investigators interviewed her and told her that what happened was wrong, but that her calls for additional training went unmet, and she never learned the outcome of the process.

"The pep talk given to Mrs. Beshai Torres by WPD BOPS investigators was nothing more than lip service to placate her into thinking something would be done by the city to fix the problem and to prevent future similar incidents from happening in the future," Pineiro wrote.

Pineiro alleged the city has not trained officers on dealing with children or adults with autism despite it being common knowledge that autistic people come into contact more often with police.

He alleged the city should bear liability for failing to train officers, and also for what he alleges is a pattern of allowing officers to use excessive force with impunity.

Pineiro alleged the city has for years allowed internal affairs to conduct investigations in ways that favor accused officers, including allowing them to submit written statements rather than be questioned directly.

Pineiro said even when complaints are sustained against officers, city managers past and current have held a "hands-off" attitude, only requiring the manager to be informed of discipline when it exceeds a five-day suspension.

The policy "insulates" the city manager from hearing serious complaints, Pineiro alleged, reasoning that the manager "never hears" of allegations, even serious ones, so long as less than a five-day suspension results.

"These policies, customs or practices led police officers including Officers Alers and McCarthy to believe they were the above the law, that they could violate the rights of citizens because they knew they would not be disciplined," Pineiro wrote.

Pineiro has long alleged that city police do not adequately police themselves, and has been suing the department for alleged civil rights violations for decades.

The T&G is currently suing the city over its refusal to release internal affairs reports into nearly a dozen cases in which Pineiro alleged misconduct by police, and in which, in some cases, charges were dropped following constitutional concerns.

Augustus has declined to address the T&G lawsuit publicly. However, last month he ordered the law department to stop withholding the conclusions of internal affairs reports it does release to the public - a practice the T&G argues is illegal in its lawsuit.

Augustus cited the current political climate for the policy reversal. He has declined to say whether he believes the public, as the state's appeals court ruled in 2003, is entitled to the conclusions of internal affairs reports under the law.

Contact Brad Petrishen at brad.petrishen@telegram.com. Follow him on Twitter @BPetrishenTG.

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