Clayton County approves $5M settlement over alleged abuse in jail
Clayton County Jail
CLAYTON COUNTY, Ga. - The Clayton County Board of Commissioners has unanimously approved a $5 million settlement with a Los Angeles man who was allegedly abused while he was an inmate in the county jail.
According to the lawsuit Arries filed against former Clayton County Sheriff Victor Hill and nine defendants, including several deputies, he was "repeatedly, maliciously, and violently" beaten in the jail. He says he was also unreasonably restrained in a restraint chair and was later found unresponsive.
In his lawsuit, Gabriel Arries said he was so badly beaten while in custody that he was in the hospital for months. He told FOX 5 in 2021 that he had no recollection of what happened to him until he was told while recovering at Atlanta Medical Center.
"I was just in awe of it. It's horrible," said Arries.
MORE: 'We didn’t know if he was dead or alive': Lawsuit against Clayton sheriff alleges man beaten in jail
Arries was arrested traveling through Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport to stay with his parents in Virginia. He lost his job in California, which helped pay for his medication for mood disorders and depression.
When he didn't show up at the Virginia airport, his parents assumed he innocently missed his flight, but it was much worse.
MORE: Ex-Clayton Sheriff Victor Hill facing new civil lawsuit over inmate treatment
"We got a phone call from a Major Allen at the (Clayton County) jail to tell us that our son had a traumatic brain injury, had swelling on the brain, had bleeding on the brain, and to expect a phone call from a trauma surgeon," said Gabriel's mother Francie Cate-Arries.
Former Sheriff Victor Hill convicted of violating inmates' constitutional rights
Video evidence from Victor Hill trial obtained by FOX 5
FOX 5 has obtained the video evidence shown to jurors in the federal trial of former Sheriff Victor Hill. Hill was found guilty on six of seven counts of violating the constitutional rights of detainees inside the jail from Dec. 2019 to May 2020.
In October 2022, a federal jury in Atlanta convicted Hill on six of seven counts of violating the constitutional rights of detainees inside the Clayton County Jail from December 2019 to May 2020 by ordering them held in restraint chairs for hours shortly after their arrests as a form of punishment.
His trial included about a week of testimony from more than three dozen witnesses, including the men who were restrained. Prosecutors said Hill ordered detainees strapped into restraint chairs at the jail for hours even though they posed no threat and complied with deputies’ instructions. The use of the chairs was unnecessary, was improperly used as punishment and caused pain and bodily injury in violation of the civil rights of seven men, prosecutors argued.
The indictment claimed Hill violated his own policy that a restraint chair can be used on a violent or uncontrollable person to prevent injury or property damage if other techniques don’t work and that the chair "will never be authorized as a form of punishment."
Video: Victor Hill confronts inmate Joseph Arnold before being restrained
In video evidence obtained by FOX 5, Victor Hill can be heard berating inmate Joseph Arnold before ordering he be strapped into a restraint chair. This is just some of the visual evidence obtained by FOX 5 from the federal trial of the former Clayton County sheriff.
In one case mentioned in the indictment, Hill was accused of calling a landscaper who had a dispute with one of the department's deputies. The indictment says Hill instructed the deputy to take out a warrant for harassing communications and then allegedly sent a fugitive squad to try to arrest the man on the misdemeanor charge. The man hired a lawyer and cooperated with jail staff before Hill ordered him placed in the restraint chair, the indictment said.
A man arrested in May 2020 for speeding and driving with a suspended driver’s license was also strapped into the restraint chair on Hill’s orders, according to the indictment. A sheriff’s office employee then put a hood over the man’s head, and he was hit twice in the face, causing him to bleed, the indictment read.
The jury did not find Hill guilty on the fifth count, arguing that prosecutors did not provide direct proof that Hill gave the order to restrain the suspect, as they did with other detainees.
Hill's previous legal troubles
Hill had been a magnet for controversy from the time he first took office as Clayton County sheriff in 2005. He fired 27 deputies on his first day, though a judge later reinstated them. He used Batman imagery in campaign ads and on social media and called himself "The Crime Fighter," sometimes using a tank his office owned during raids.
He failed to win reelection in 2008 after his first term and was under indictment — accused of using his office for personal gain — when voters returned him to office in 2012. He stood trial in that corruption case, and jurors acquitted him on all 27 charges.
He pleaded no contest in 2016 to a reckless conduct charge after he shot and injured a woman in a model home in Gwinnett County, northeast of Atlanta. Both he and the woman said the 2015 shooting was an accident that happened while they practiced police tactics.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.