You Got the Wrong Guy,|Man Tells College

MACON, Ga. (CN) - A man claims in court that that he was checking his email in the Mercer University library when a police officer stuck a gun at his head and falsely accused him of watching pornography.

Dexter Campbell sued Mercer University, the Mercer University Tarver Library, and four college police officers in a pro se complaint in Federal Court.

Campbell claims he was in the library, checking his email on a college computer, when defendant Officer D. Bloodworth asked him for his driver's license. He says he provided it, and Bloodworth immediately "placed a gun against plaintiff's head, instructed him not to move and stated that plaintiff was under arrest 'because we've had complaints about you viewing pornography on the computers.'"

Campbell says he "remained still as instructed and calmly responded to Bloodworth ... that he must be mistaken because he was only checking his email".

Campbell claims Bloodworth repeated his false allegation, handcuffed him, advised him of his rights and led him out of the library.

He says he was taken to the university police offices, where he was handcuffed to a chair and repeatedly accused of viewing pornography on the library computers.

Ultimately, he says, he was told that if he signed a criminal trespass warning, he could leave, but if he did not sign the warning, he would remain in custody.

As he did want to remain in custody and had never been arrested before, Campbell says, he signed the warning which stated that he would be charged with criminal trespass if he returned to the Mercer University campus.

Campbell claims that defendants Ray Bridger, a university police sergeant, and Steve Gaines, a university police corporal, were named as witnesses on the warning "despite the fact that plaintiff never even saw or had any interaction whatsoever with either of these two defendants from and after his arrest at Tarver until his release after signing the criminal trespass warning."

Campbell seeks damages for civil rights violations and wrongful arrest and detention.

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