(CN) - A federal judge in Utah sided with a man with intellectual disabilities who claims his rights were violated when he was stopped and thrown to the ground by a Clearfield Police Department officer while walking home from a bar late at night. 

In a Wednesday ruling , U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball, a Bill Clinton appointee, denied former Utah police officer Zachary Fratto's motion to dismiss, concluding that the officer violated Shawn Nicholas' Fourth Amendment rights when he arrested him without probable cause.

The lawsuit stems from a 2024 incident in Davis County, Utah, when Nicholas, 44 at the time, was walking home in the pre-dawn hours from a karaoke night at the Summit Lounge in the city of Layton, where he had been a regular for several years. Nicholas, who claims he only drank Dr. Pepper that night, was walking through a strip mall at about 3 a.m. when Fratto approached him in his squad car and began to question him. 

Nicholas reportedly dodged the officer's questions and refused to show him a photo ID, as requested by Fratto. Ultimately, Fratto performed a takedown maneuver to bring him to the ground and handcuff him.

Nicholas sued Fratto and the Clearfield Police Department for excessive force. Despite Fratto's claims he was protected under qualified immunity, Kimball did not find his arguments persuasive.

"Officer Fratto contends that Nicholas resisted arrest and therefore probable cause existed to arrest him," Kimball wrote. "This logic is circular at best. Officer Fratto had no probable cause to arrest Nicholas when he handcuffed him. Officer Fratto cannot manufacture probable cause by initiating an unlawful arrest and then rely on Nicholas's alleged resistance in order to justify that arrest after the fact."

Nicholas did not violate any Utah laws when he refused to show the officer his photo ID, the judge said. 

Fratto arrested Nicholas for interfering with a police officer, though the charge was later dropped. Utah law requires that such an arrest must be lawful, which Kimball said it was not. 

"Accordingly, the court concludes that Officer Fratto violated Nicholas' Fourth Amendment rights when he arrested and then searched him without probable cause," he wrote. 

Nicholas, a Special Olympics athlete, says that any reasonable officer would have realized he suffers from intellectual disabilities. 

At one point during the incident, Nicholas hurried away from Fratto, crossing a street without using a crosswalk - which the officer declared illegal and demanded that he stop and identify himself. Nicholas refused again and Fratto grabbed his arm and performed a leg sweep. 

"The only resistance Nicholas offered prior to the leg sweep was to put his arms up in a defensive posture and then attempt to pull his free arm away from Officer Fratto," Kimball wrote. "While this qualifies as some resistance it was minor and as such required a minor response by Officer Fratto. Instead, Officer Fratto initiated a takedown maneuver on a person much smaller than he was who he did not suspect to be armed or dangerous."

The minimal resistance combined with the minor offenses and lack of concern for officer or public safety did not warrant the use of the takedown, Kimball concluded.

Nicholas relied exclusively on a 2022 excessive force case, Surat v. Klamser, in which a woman who also was found to not pose any serious threat to the public or police officers was similarly thrown to the ground. Though there are differences, the court agreed that the facts of Surat governed those in Nicholas' case.

"A reasonable officer should have known on July 25, 2024, that the use of a leg sweep takedown maneuver was excessive under the circumstances present during Officer Fratto's encounter with Nicholas," Kimball wrote. "Accordingly, Officer Fratto is not entitled to qualified immunity as a defense."

However, Kimball did grant the city of Clearfield's motion to dismiss Nicholas' claims of excessive force against it for not sufficiently training its officers. 

In his complaint, Nicholas says that the city failed to revise its policies. The city also justified the officer's use of force. 

Kimball wrote that Nicholas failed to provide any factual evidence that sufficiently proved deliberate indifference toward his rights from a city policymaker. 

Nicholas' attorney Anna Christiansen, of Christensen & Jensen, declined to comment on the case, except to say she looked forward to vindicating her client.

An attorney for Fratto did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Source: Courthouse News Service