SCRANTON, Pa. (CN) - Police in eastern Pennsylvania shot a man in the back and killed him as he opened the door to his own home, then conspired to cover it up, one of many acts of "intentional discrimination" against the town's Hispanic residents, his sister claims in court.
In a federal lawsuit, Veronica Garay claims Hazleton police officers' killing of her brother is typical of the police department's "intentional discrimination." She claims that police supervisors and city policymakers encourage a "culture of negative treatment towards people of Hispanic descent and minorities in general" and ignore complaints from citizens about the discrimination.
Hazleton, pop. 22,200, is northwest of Allentown and southwest of Wilkes-Barre.
"In effect, supervisors and the mayor communicated to the [Police] Department and the public that any attempt to reform the department would be discontinued and that the custom and practice of the Hazelton City Police Department would remain intact. Many of these complaints were from minority victims," the lawsuit states.
Police shot her brother to death in the early morning of Oct. 5, 2013, as he unlocked the back door of his house, Garay says. Two days later, she told local ABC News affiliate that a Hazleton officer "took the gun off my brother's holster and threw it. My brother never had a gun in his hands. This man murdered my brother."
A "Rally and March for Answers" led by the Garay family followed on Oct. 11, and a public meeting in which one man suggested that Hazleton police should be required to carry body cameras.
Garay says in the lawsuit that on the morning he was killed, her brother Jonathan he was with friends in or around the Capri Bar on Alter Street and police were called at around 2:30 a.m. to deal with a fight involving 10 to 15 people outside of the bar. Jonathan was not involved in the fight; he left the bar with a friend to return his to nearby home, his sister says.
"At this point, nobody requested that the decedent or his friend remain on Alter Street, and in fact the police were clearing Alter Street and wanted people to disperse from the area," the complaint states.
Jonathan walked into his back yard, latched his fenced gate behind him, and began to unlock his back door when Officer Scott Nicholas entered the back yard through the closed back gate. "What ensued following the illegal entrance of defendant Nicholas into the decedent's backyard was wholly avoidable and nothing short of a tragedy," the complaint states.
"Clearly, defendant Nicholas was not authorized to enter decedent's fenced-in back yard nor did he have permission to do so.
"While trespassing on the decedent's property, defendant Nicholas approached the decedent from behind and assaulted the decedent on his back porch/inside the doorway of his home without justification.
"At about the same time defendant Nicholas was assaulting decedent, defendant [Michael] Colasardo also unlawfully entered the backyard of decedent and drew his weapon.
"Upon information and belief, within seconds of entering the decedent's backyard, defendant Colasardo fired his weapon, without justification, two times, striking the decedent in the head and body. ...
"Paramedics and other law enforcement personnel arrived on scene within minutes of the gunshots, and the Decedent was taken to Hazleton General Hospital.... [Jonathan] was pronounced dead at Hazleton General on October 5, 2013 at 3:35 a.m."