A North Carolina man unable to communicate because he was experiencing a medical emergency was not given help and instead beaten, tased, and arrested by responding police officers, according to a new lawsuit.

Dillon Ledford sued the Town of Spruce Pine, its police chief, Kasey Cook, and three officers, Michael Hollifield, Michael Sale, and Dalton Mace, accusing them of violating his constitutional rights as well as federal and state law regarding the February 2024 incident.

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On the evening of Feb. 16, 2024, Ledford, who was around 30 years old at the time, was driving home through Spruce Pine after visiting his girlfriend. He claims he stopped at the town’s Walmart to get something to eat because his blood sugar was dropping due to his diabetes, a condition he has had since he was 9 years old.

According to the lawsuit, at about 8 p.m., Ledford entered and then exited the store, walked back to his car, and sat inside, feeling his physical state worsening. Employees who noticed him “twitching” and with “buggy eyes” inside his vehicle tried to communicate with him but to little or no avail, and they eventually called 911 for a welfare check, Ledford’s lawyers said.

Sale and Mace are said to have arrived at 9:10 p.m., with Hollifield shortly behind them. They tried to speak with the plaintiff, but he was nonverbal, the 58-page lawsuit states. “At all times relevant, each Defendant-Officer was able to render medical assistance to the Plaintiff, but chose not to do so,” it continues, adding that the officers also could have called for medical assistance, something Ledford had yet to receive, but they did not.

It was at this point that the officers allegedly told Ledford he was going to be arrested — and, “in a three-on-one assault,” the officers picked Ledford up out of the driver’s seat and “threw” him to the ground. All the while, according to the plaintiff, no defendant was “in fear of harm or danger to himself or others.”

Ledford accuses the officers of having used excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable search and seizure — force that only got worse. According to Ledford, Sale hit him at least 11 times while he was on the ground and unable to comply with the officers’ demands, causing him “great pain and bruising.” Hollifield then allegedly tased Ledford twice, and the three officers are said to have flipped him onto his stomach and handcuffed him.

“It is well-settled law, policy, custom, and tradition that police officers do not brutally beat and humiliate someone in medical distress,” the lawsuit states.

The plaintiff claims this entire encounter was captured on Walmart surveillance footage, and that officers searched his car and found nothing. However, he wasn’t brought to a hospital — but instead, the town’s police headquarters.

Ledford was charged with second-degree trespassing and three counts of resisting a public officer. He says the charges kept him from employment and even led to an internal affairs investigation as he was a law enforcement officer himself at the time, having served as a K-9 officer with the North Carolina Department of Adult Corrections for about three years, per the June 4 lawsuit.

While the charges were dismissed about eight months later, Ledford is now asking for a jury trial and damages relating to his physical, mental, and emotional injuries, as well as reputational harm. And he’s not just targeting the officers but also their supervisors, alleging “inadequate and outdated” rules, training and supervision — and a lack of policies or “insufficient” policies — contributed to the “violations” against him.

Neither the town’s administrators nor Cook, the police chief, investigated or disciplined the three officers who arrested Ledford, according to the lawsuit. “Had Defendant Cook or Spruce Pine investigated the incident, they would have discovered that the Defendant-Officers did not follow all applicable state and federal laws regarding use of force,” it continues. “Rather, the force used on Plaintiff was excessive and unwarranted under the circumstances.”