A federal judge in Indianapolis refused Friday to dismiss a lawsuit against four Kokomo Police officers after a man died in their custody in 2017.
The Kokomo Police Department said 21-year-old Tavaris McGuire and two others were arrested February 4th. Officers say McGuire started behaving erratically during the booking process and was clutching his chest. He later died while at the hospital.
The four officers claimed they were immune to the lawsuit because they were acting within their official duties.
A portion of the judge’s Friday ruling said that “a reasonable jury considering the evidence in the light most favorable to McGuire could conclude that each of the Defendants did not act reasonably in waiting as long as they did to call an ambulance because … they did not ‘spring into action,’ their delay was not justified because they were tending to other emergent needs, and there was no one present to provide emergency treatment to McGuire before the ambulance was called.”
