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Chirag Patel and his father Sureshbhai Patel at the family's home in Madison on April 9, 2015. (Sarah Cole/scole@al.com)
Madison police officer Eric Parker will face federal trial in Huntsville on June 15 for excessive force in a sidewalk stop that seriously injured an Indian citizen.
U.S. District Judge Madeline Hughes Haikala yesterday rescheduled the felony trial, delaying two weeks to allow for a pretrial hearing in Birmingham on June 2.
Parker is charged with deprivation of rights under color of law for slamming Sureshbhai Patel to the sidewalk on a suburban street in Madison on the morning of Feb. 6.
The U.S. Department of Justice on Friday also appointed Saeed Mody of the Civil Rights Division as the trial attorney.
Mody was involved last year in prosecution of several hate crimes and civil rights violations, including a Texas man who kidnapped and beat a gay man, a Utah man who threatened an interracial family and a Houston man who threatened to bomb a synagogue.
Patel, an Indian citizen, had arrived in Madison a week before the incident to help care for his grandchild. He was walking in the quiet neighborhood early on a Friday when a neighbor called police about a suspicious "skinny black man" in a toboggan.
The caller said the man was "walking around kind of close to the garage" and he was nervous to leave his wife home alone. He said the man looked at him and started walking away so he followed him. The police dispatcher then told officers that a suspicious person was reported to be walking in yards and "looking around the garages."
Parker, accompanied by a police trainee, found Patel walking along the sidewalk near the home of his son, Chirag Patel. Police video shows they soon realized that Patel did not speak English. At one point, while holding Patel's arms behind his body, Parker drove the man into the ground, leaving him partly paralyzed.
Eric Parker (Limestone County Jail)
Paramedics took Patel to Madison Hospital. He was transferred to Huntsville Hospital for spinal surgery, spent weeks in rehabilitation and is now in in-home care. He was not charged with a crime. The following week, Chief Larry Muncey recommended Parker be fired and had Parker arrested and charged with misdemeanor assault.
The case drew international attention as the dashcam video played repeatedly on Indian news stations. India sent diplomats to meet with Madison officials and to visit Patel in the hospital. Gov. Robert Bentley wrote a letter apologizing to India.
The U.S. Department of Justice on March 27 charged Parker with a felony that carries up to 10 years in prison. U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance has said the federal charge covers the constitutional right to be free from "unreasonable force."
Meanwhile, the misdemeanor case in Limestone County was postponed to allow for the federal trial.
District Judge Jeanne Anderson set a pretrial hearing in Limestone County for June 10. But the delay of the federal trial means, as it stands today, Parker could appear for a pretrial hearing in Limestone County 5 days before facing federal trial.
Alabama Assistant Attorney General Andrew Arrington has taken over the prosecution for the misdemeanor assault charge, which carries up to a year in jail.
A federal lawsuit, filed on behalf of Patel by attorney Hank Sherrod, is also on hold pending the outcome of criminal prosecutions.