It’s up for debate as to which round the fight between Sarita Merricks and the City of Clearwater is in.
Merricks, a 33-year-old pharmaceutical doctor, first filed a federal lawsuit against Officer Jeff Adkisson, 44, and the city in 2012 for violation of her search-and-seizure constitutional rights, as well as for battery.
Long story short: Merricks’ won the case, as the court initially ruled that Adkisson used excessive force. However, an appeals court overruled. And on November 5 of this year, the district court dismissed the suit for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.
But Merricks, a former standout basketball player at Dunedin High School and, later, at the then-called St. Petersburg Junior College, hasn’t given up.
She’s now filed a suit in local court. It claims that she was illegally assaulted despite being unarmed and not having committed a crime.
All of this stems from a 2008 traffic stop, in which Officer Adkisson pulled-over Merricks’ vehicle for what he suspected was illegally dark window tinting.
Merricks claims that after repeatedly denying Adkisson’s request for permission to search her car, instead of waiting for a warrant to arrive, he claimed to have smelled freshly burned marijuana coming from the vehicle.
Then, with an “aggressive, hostile, and antagonistic demeanor,” Adkisson allegedly reached into the vehicle without Merricks’ consent, opened the driver’s door, and grabbed the keys to remove them from the ignition. When Merricks held onto them, Adkisson allegedly grabbed Merricks’ hand and yanked her out of the car hard enough to tear the rotator cuff in her shoulder, which later needed surgery to repair.
By this point, a large crowd had gathered around the scene near the intersection of Tangerine Avenue and N. Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue.
Upon the incident’s conclusion, no illegal substances or paraphernalia of any kind were found in the car or on Merricks.
