Deputies Who Raided Afroman’s House Sue Him For Daring To Turn Footage Of The Raid Into A Viral Video
from the intense-whining-of-children-allowed-to-carry-guns dept
When the Adams County (OH) sheriff’s office raided rap artist Afroman’s home, he didn’t just sit back and assume everyone involved operated in good faith. The raid was captured on Afroman’s security cameras, which the artist soon converted into a viral video/rap song entitled “Will You Help Me Repair My Door.”
The footage — which the deputies tried to prevent from being recorded by cutting power to Afroman’s house and unplugging any cameras they could find — showed the deputies doing all sorts of ridiculous drug warrior stuff. Like cautiously approaching a lemon cake in a glass container on the counter top. And rifling through CD cases looking for evidence of drug trafficking and — according to the warrant — kidnapping. And taking any cash they could find, of which $400 went missing when Afroman was allowed to collect this so-called evidence.
What wasn’t found during the raid was anything pointing to the criminal acts that supposedly justified the intrusion. All deputies found were a couple of joints and some loose cash. An investigation into the missing $400 by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigations came to the conclusion this was a mistake by the deputies, who stated they had simply miscounted the take.
But that’s not the stupidest part of this debacle. The deputies who did all the dumb stuff caught on Afroman’s cameras — dumb stuff authorized by a piece of paper signed by a judge — are now claiming they’re the real victims here, not the person who house was raided and whose property was seized.
Seven members of the Adams County Sheriff’s Office who raided Joseph Foreman’s home last year are now suing him claiming, among other things, that he invaded their privacy.
Four deputies, two sergeants and a detective are claiming Foreman (a.k.a. “Afroman”) took footage of their faces obtained during the raid and used it in music videos and social media posts without their consent, a misdemeanor violation under Ohio Revised Code.
They’re also suing on civil grounds, saying Foreman’s use of their faces (i.e. personas) in the videos and social media posts resulted in their “emotional distress, embarrassment, ridicule, loss of reputation and humiliation.”
LOL. Fuck these guys. There’s no case here. The lawsuit [PDF] makes plenty of claims that might have sounded credible if these officers (1) were not public servants, (2) not performing their public duties, (3) not captured by someone else’s recording equipment, and (4) not doing a bunch of stuff that made them look ridiculous.
Fortunately, by filing this lawsuit we now have the names of some of the deputies who participated in the raid, which should only add to their emotional distress, embarrassment, ridicule, loss of reputation, and humiliation. They are Shawn Cooley, Justin Cooley, Michael Estep, Shawn Grooms, Brian Newland, and Lisa Phillips, and Randolph Walters, Jr.
These idiots, who love power but hate the accountability that very occasionally comes with it, are hoping a judge will force Afroman to take down his publication of his own security camera footage, prevent him from ever doing it again, and give them some of Afroman’s money because he had the audacity to wrest the narrative from their control. These aren’t public servants. These are children playing dress up — daft punks who seem to believe their actions should be eternally free of consequences.
They’re trying to bring a “right of publicity” claim against Afroman — an oft-abused offshoot of copyright law that supposedly allows people to control how their faces, bodies, images, etc. are used to prevent commercial exploitation without their consent.
It’s highly unlikely public servants recorded performing their public duties can prevent use of these recordings in any way that might conceivably result in monetary gain for the person doing the recording. That much seems obvious. This also seems to foreclose this action: it’s unlikely these seven officers (deputies Happy, Sleepy, Dopey, Grumpy, Bashful, Sneezy, and Doc) will be able to claim that their faces/bodies as captured by Afroman’s security cameras have any intrinsic value capable of being exploited in violation of this law. To wit:
(A) “Persona” means an individual’s name, voice, signature, photograph, image, likeness, or distinctive appearance, if any of these aspects have commercial value.
Perhaps if Afroman utilized their “personas” to perform a faux endorsement of his candidacy for sheriff, they might have a point. But copyright law is on Afroman’s side: the footage used in the viral videos was captured by his cameras. And no officer was “exploited” individually for commercial gain. The entire raid, which happened to include these particularly childish law enforcement officers, became the basis for a music video.
Back to the lawsuit. Enjoy this paragraph, in which the seven deputies manage to misspell “plaintiffs'” in the opening sentence:
As a result of Defendants’ actions, Plaintiffs have been subjected to ridicule, even in the further performance of their official duties, by members of the public who have seen some of Defendants’ above-described postings. In some instances, it has made it more difficult and even more dangerous for Plaintiffs to carry out their official duties because of comments made and attitudes expressed toward them by members of the public.
Yeah, that’s a real shame. Too bad about those “official duties.” And Afroman’s video and Instagram posts utilizing his own security camera footage are nothing more than criticism of government employees — the kind of thing given the utmost in First Amendment protections. That he’s making money doing it is beside the point. As the saying goes, if you can’t stand the heat, get out of someone else’s kitchen.
And, as for the worries about further reputational damage, the best way to stop this form of bleeding would be to take your lumps on social media, rather than call attention to your own deep insecurities with a vindictive lawsuit that ensures your names will be seen by far more than Afroman’s social media followers.
The deputies also claim they’ve been subjected to death threats. While that’s unfortunate, it’s neither here nor there. Receiving death threats is not a component of the state’s right of publicity law. And the deputies offer no evidence Afroman is encouraging his fans to engage in this sort of behavior. Indeed, if they had any evidence this was happening, they likely would have arrested Afroman for terroristic threats (or whatever applicable, abusable law is on hand).
This is a stupid, vindictive lawsuit that has zero chance of surviving a motion to dismiss. Maybe the deputies know this. They apparently had to shop around quite a bit to find an attorney to represent them, settling for someone who doesn’t seem to have much experience in IP law or personal injury litigation cases that don’t involve either car accidents or elderly abuse.
This case is going to get into unexplored areas of law that require expert guidance — not because the law needs to be better settled, but because it will take particularly deft maneuvering to keep the judge from spending most of their time expressing their displeasure and incredulity that a member of the bar would even bring this shit into their courtroom. Hopefully the deputies’ attorney has advised them the humiliation and ridicule is going to get a whole lot worse before it gets any better.
Filed Under: adams county, adams county sheriff's department, afroman, footage, ohio, publicity rights, raid, security cameras, will you help me repair my door, will you help me repair my gate
Comments on “Deputies Who Raided Afroman’s House Sue Him For Daring To Turn Footage Of The Raid Into A Viral Video”
How dare you besmirch the name of Daft Punk!
Retaliation
I could see this as a First Amendment Retaliation. Of course it would be better if there was an anti-slapp motion available.
The cops must be high,
The cops must be high,
The cops must be hiiiiiiigh.
So-hi-oh. So expected.
Whoa whoa whoa
Armed robbery is not “performing their public duties”. Clearly the deputies were acting as private citizens here and deserve the privacy due to any felon.
Short of any judgment declaring the performed action as part of their official job, their performace certainly is not in the Public Domain.
Afroman would have needed to first sue those deputies for a civil right donation and get that suit dismissed on Qualified Immunity causes for the acts committed by the deputies in the course of their official duties.
Once he had this defense from the deputies against the civil rights case in black&white, he’d have been able to use this in place of a copyright and privacy disclaimer.
But without such a civil case dismissal, he has to assume all the legal and privacy protections reserved for proper felons to be available to the deputies.
Re:
I actually would prefer that ruling.
Afroman loses because these cops weren’t involved in official duties.
Civil lawsuit for violation of rights under color of law, because, as a settled matter of law and under the sworn testimony of the officers, the warrant service was not part of their duties and therefore can not be covered by qualified immunity.
Re:
“deserve the privacy due to any felon”
I was unaware perps are afforded privacy. (not a lawyer)
I see lots of videos online of those who are breaking the law(s). Is the poster then liable for something?
Any chance of recovery of Afroman’s attorney fees via anti-SLAPP in Ohio?
Oh they miscounted the money…
Uh huh…
They took out the security cameras for ‘reasons’…
Uh huh…
Why no investigation into the alleged kidnapping that wasn’t actually a thing?
Why no investigation into the wanton destruction of property that didn’t need to happen?
Why no investigation into why they used dynamic entry into a home where children were present?
Filing this lawsuit is literally the dumbest thing they could have done.
The raised the attention & profile of this abuse of power against a citizen, there isn’t any way the genie is going back into the bottle, and have revealed themselves as unfit for the job they have.
Who was kidnapped?
Evidence please.
How was that evidence enough for Judge Droopy?
How much pot was in his cd cases?
How much pot was in his suits?
What legal grounds is the policy to disconnect the security system of them home based on?
Given the stupidity of their actions caught on camera, can we assume that they got more stupid once they stopped the recording?
Were there any bodycams on any of the keystone cops who caused more harm & damage than the alleged harms in the unsupported warrant application?
Did he have his momma make another lemon pound cake to send over to the courthouse?
Yes, they are public servants, yes they are cops. Bad ones but they are. And we have both bureaucratic obstacles and incompetent/corrupt people in charge in all power stances (executive, legislative and judiciary) that are not allowing these bad cops to be weeded out. Or make it hard enough that it doesn’t happen.
Stop treating this shit as if it’s not common, as if it is an exception. It’s not. This is valid for many countries including mine. You don’t get a label like “pig” popular to refer to cops if there isn’t widespread violations like this.
Re:
Hell, it’s now a common thing here to just let some minor crime go not to get involved with cops because it can screw you over more than whatever you lost to any criminal. Specially if you are not white or don’t live in the right neighborhood. This is fcked up.
Respect is not owed, it’s earned. And most police forces do not deserve it.
Re:
The part I always liked was being told that the handcuffs were “for my protection”. Sure, having both hands restrained behind your back in a moving vehicle makes you safer…we Americans are true masters of irony and hypocrisy.
We need to remind our “public servants” who it is that they SERVE. This is particularly true of the elected ones, and no, the answer is NOT Elon Musk.
Re: Re:
It does make it somewhat less likely the police will shoot you dead. Maybe that’s what they meant.
Oddly enough: This the same sort of magical/non-rational thinking that gets publisher out trying to murder libraries. “We are entitled to (other peoples monies)/(doing our abuse of other without criticism)! How dare you allow other people to (not pay)/(criticize) us”
Maybe we should “marry” the two groups so as to distract them from the civilized portions of the population.
“As a result of Defendants’ actions, Plaintiffs have been subjected to ridicule”
Um…
Re:
Hey, even Deputy Streisand is allowed his day in court…
Bag of D*cks
If you don’t want to be shown as a bag of dcks how about not being a bag of dcks. Is that so hard to do for fine upstanding law enforcement officers?
ACAB
It’s always ACAB
Re:
I figured the cops picked the strategy, “Always attack. Even in defense, attack.”
No fancy acronym for this however 🙁
If reality makes you look bad the problem is you
If they really want to sue the person or people that made them look like a bunch of incompetent goons they need only look into the nearest mirror to see them.
Re: Come on now
It’s like you haven’t learnt a thing in the 7 years Trump has been our duly elected president so far.
irony
Cops think its an invasion of their privacy to show how they invaded his home
Here’s an excerpt from Steve Lehto’s video about the case (emphasis mine; quote marks are based on his air quotes):
Alyeska’s succinct summary connects the last dot:
On an unrelated note, I can’t find the misspelling:
Re:
Damn you, autocorrect!
Re:
Steve Lehto pointed out that the grounds the cops are suing over, if successful, would make home security systems illegal in Ohio.
So they say but given how downright eager police seem to be to shut down any recording of them that they don’t control they’d probably see that outcome as a feature rather than a bug.
Re: Re:
Except that would include the Ring systems cops keep buying and distributing for free*.
* “free” as in “free beer” with the implication that the COPS can access whatever footage they want.
Re:
Yeah, actually, i’m not seeing the misspelling either. Paragraph 28 for the quoted section, but not seeing it anywhere nearby or ~30 other instances of the word.
Re: Re:
Same here. I can’t find any misspellings either. It’s just weird.
Hey, cops – if you guys can use your own bodycam footage of victims for TikTok, why can’t your victims use footage of cops for YouTube?
Looking at you, davec.
“emotional distress, embarrassment, ridicule, loss of reputation and humiliation.”
i’ll give them one point for even being capable of feeling any one of four of those things, if at all true and not merely a legal stance.
But otherwise, those are known to the rest of the world as consequences of your actions. And this is just a taste of the ignominy you foist upon those who you deem to be suspects, frequently with zero cause.
i’m sure there are more people, and higher up the food chain, who should feel embarrassed and humiliated, but thems the breaks, i guess.
Now if any one of them should be sorry, or experience regret (over their actions, not over them being made public), that would be a shocking improvement.
Search
Good thing you weren’t home. They would have killed you.
It’s a pity that Ohio doesn’t have any Anti-SLAPP laws. I’ll have to write my state congresspeople…
Also, don’t forget the other hit song, Lemon Pound Cake: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xxK5yyecRo
I disagree
I kinda hope it survives the initial scrutiny by the Judge. I can imagine all sorts of juicy embarrassing information can be gleaned by subjecting the officers to Discovery.
I will have respect for cops...
WHEN I see them raiding a multi million dollar home and destroying it.
And then NOT be held responsible, because it was the wrong address.
ALL on video.
https://www.scribd.com/document/633955026/Cooley-v-Afroman-SLAPP-Suit-Motion-to-Intervene
https://www.scribd.com/document/633955573/Cooley-v-Afroman-SLAPP-suit-Motion-Exhibit-ACLU-Memo-Re-John-Oliver-Slapp-Suit
The Constitution is Toilet Paper
Shows the KKK with Qualifyed Immunity Hoods in action. The power establishment utilize the Constitution to wipe thier rear, and assassinate Blacks. The jokes on Afro America for thinking you are free. The only freedom is to serve a system of overt slap your face oppression or die.
Facts at hand
This boils down to one thing and only one thing: commercial!
You can not legally use someone else’s likeness for commercial gain without permission.
The wise thing to do in the face of this lawsuit is pull the music video and post the unedited raw footage. Which he should have done first if he actually wanted to publicly display vs comment.
Once the full footage is is in public domain the footage can then be used in a commercial manner.
Much how public domain news footage is used in films and YouTube videos alike.
You need to do thing the right way even when faced with a wrong.