Several Orange County barbers said Monday that the sheriff's office and a state licensing agency should pay for humiliating the men in front of their customers during a SWAT-style raid last fall.
Barbers at the Strictly Skillz barbershop on North Pine Hills Road said Monday that they are asking a federal court to force the Orange County Sheriff's Office and the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation to pay monetary damages. They also want the court to prevent DBPR and the sheriff's office from working together on similar raids targeting barbershops in minority communities in the future.
"If they think they've done nothing wrong, that means the policies and procedures have not changed," said Natalie Jackson, who is an attorney for the barbers. Jackson declined to say how much money the men seek.
In the lawsuit, owner Brian Berry and barbers Mario Anderson and Reginald Trammon claim deputies in masks and SWAT-style gear burst into the shop on Aug. 21, 2010 with DPBR inspectors.
The men said they were handcuffed in front of their customers. They later learned that the arrests were part of a sting operation targeting barbershops in areas populated primarily by black and Hispanic people. The lawsuit specifically names Sheriff Jerry Demings as well as deputies Travis Leslie, Terry Wright, Kim Parmenter and Tracy Weiss, and corporals Donald Murphy, Antorrio Wright and Keith Vidler.
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