A woman is suing the Opa-locka Police Department for an alleged rough arrest back in 2022 that was caught on video.
Yolanda Lopez claims officers threw her on the ground, then Tased her multiple times and beat her, all for passing out flyers.
A woman is suing the Opa-locka Police Department for an alleged rough arrest back in 2022 that was caught on video.
Yolanda Lopez claims officers threw her on the ground, then Tased her multiple times and beat her, all for passing out flyers.
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In her lawsuit, Lopez claims she should never have been arrested and that her civil rights were violated.
In the video, Lopez is heard screaming before the sound of a Taser being deployed. It happened twice.
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Now, Lopez is suing the City of Opa-locka and the police department in federal court for the arrest.
"She's very emotional about it. She wakes up at night with nightmares, screaming, thinking that she's in jail. She's been in treatment with a psychologist. And now she's seeing a psychiatrist as well," said Lopez’s husband.
Lopez’s claims she was unlawfully arrested and thrown to the ground. Moments earlier she could be seen standing on the sidewalk holding papers.
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Lopez said she was passing out flyers for her business that had just been shut down. The day before, the decades-old Opa-locka-Hialeah flea market where Lopez ran her store, had shut its doors for good.
"It is really sad and tragic in this day and age that an innocent woman, a mother of two children, a wife, a business owner, could be thrown on the floor, stun gunned, beaten, falsely arrested simply for standing in a public street in a public Right away to try and put food on the table for her family”, said Michael Pizzi, Lopez’s attorney.
Pizzi also said Lopez was exercising her first amendment rights when she was passing out flyers. He added while all of this was going down, Lopez was already on the phone with 911.
She said she called the emergency line because she was being harassed.
Her husband said they want accountability for the officer.
"This shouldn't be happening in the U.S. We're immigrants," he said. "We're from cuba, both of us. And we flew out of a country that is communist and the dictatorship."
The lawsuit seeks millions of dollars in damages. NBC6 reached out to the Opa-locka Police Department for a comment and have not heard back.
