Even after Dallas police realized they had arrested and abused the wrong Black man, they still insisted on filing criminal charges against Silvester Hayes to justify their mistake, incarcerating him for several days, causing the single father of four children to lose his job as a security guard.
And even after all charges were dismissed against the aspiring police officer more than a year later, enabling him to file a lawsuit over the brutal arrest, a federal judge last month dismissed the case, claiming the cops have qualified immunity and had probable cause to arrest him because he had failed to use a turn signal within 100 feet of a stop sign.
But the video shows the cops turned a minor traffic infraction into a violent arrest simply because they failed to compare the information on his driver’s license that listed him as “Silvester Hayes III” to the information in their database listing another Black man named Sylvester Hayes wanted on a felony warrant for domestic violence.
U.S. District Judge Karen Gren Scholer also ruled the arrest to be lawful because she said Hayes resisted arrest when Dallas cops pulled him out of his car without telling him the reason why – after failing to confirm if he was the right suspect, which would have cleared up the mistake in seconds.
The judge also determined Hayes had no grounds to sue because the cops used “relatively minor force” and acted “reasonable” when pulling him out of his car on the side of a road, planting a knee on his face, and stuffing him into the back of the patrol car.
But that is a questionable opinion to anybody watching the body camera footage, which shows a distraught Hayes repeatedly yelling for “help” as several cops piled on top of him.
“Outside of one officer momentarily grabbing Plaintiff’s throat and possibly hitting Plaintiff in the stomach with his knee, the officers used relatively minor force, even as Plaintiff screamed, resisted restraint, and refused to get in the police car,” Scholer wrote in her 20-page opinion.
But the lawsuit, obtained by Atlanta Black Star, which was filed against Dallas police officers Walter Paul Guab and Holly Harris, the cops who initiated the traffic stop, along with several unnamed cops, states the arrest was overly aggressive and unconstitutional, leaving Hayes with permanent injuries and trauma.
“In a blur of excessive force, all of which was documented by Defendant Officers Guab and Harris as well as the Defendant Dallas Police Officers DOES 3 through 10’s body cams, the Officers began to kick, punch, and unnecessarily use their tasers on Plaintiff Hayes,” the lawsuit states.
“Moreover, one or more of the Officers can be seen dangerously pinning Plaintiff Hayes down with their knees on his skull, neck and back. One of the Officers at the scene pulled Plaintiff Hayes’ arm out of his shoulder socket which has caused him on-going pain and mobility issues to this day.”
Now Hayes’ attorney, Mark Robinus, plans to file an appeal, according to the Dallas Morning News.
Watch the video below.
The Arrest
It was Oct. 16, 2021, and Hayes, who was 26 years old at the time, was on his way to pick up breakfast for his children when he was pulled over.
“While driving to get his children’s favorite breakfast meal of French toast and bacon at a restaurant that was located only a few blocks away from his residence, Plaintiff Hayes was racially profiled, followed and then pulled over by Defendant Officers Harris and Guab,” the claim states.
Body camera footage shows the cops telling their supervisor after the arrest that they were sitting in their patrol car running plates on random cars when they decided to look up the registered owner of the car Hayes was driving.
They then cross-referenced his name to their database and discovered a Black man named Sylvester Hayes was wanted on a felony warrant – obviously failing to see the difference in the spelling of their names.
They then decided to pull him over, accusing him of failing to use a turn signal within 100 feet of a stop sign, but they did not explain how they determined the exact distance from the stop sign that he did not turn on his signal.
Nevertheless, the video shows Hayes was cooperative, telling them he was on his way to pick up breakfast for his kids.
But Dallas police officer Walter Paul Guab handed his driver’s license to another officer named Holly Harris, who looked at it for less than a second before telling Guab he was their suspect.
That was when Guab opened Hayes’ car door, ordering him out of the car, threatening to Taser him, but never once telling him the reason why.
Within seconds, several cops were pulling him out of the car and throwing him to the ground, where they handcuffed him as he screamed in protest.
“You are hurting me!” cried Hayes as the cops pressed his face against the ground.
“No, you are hurting yourself cause you’re acting this way,” a cop responded.
“I know I’m pressing your pressure point because you’re acting stupid.”
But all he wanted to know was why they were violently arresting him, which they refused to explain.
Once they had him handcuffed, Harris decided to compare his license to the information on her computer screen, which was when she realized their error.
“It may not be him,” she told another cop.
Meanwhile, another cop can be heard in the background telling the other cops, “he kept reaching,” using the same line cops have used hundreds of times before to shoot unarmed Black men.
“No, I did not!” Hayes responded.
Another cop eventually showed up and started talking to Hayes, who was sitting in the back of a patrol car, telling him, “There is another Sylvester Hayes.”
“And that Sylvester Hayes has a warrant.”
Hayes was taken aback by the comparison, telling the cop, “I got a good job, I work security.”
“I’m trying to be one of you all,” he said, mentioning his aspirations to become a police officer, adding that he had never been in trouble before in his life, other than a speeding ticket.
“I do apologize,” the cop said.
Then a sergeant is speaking to officers Guab and Harris, asking them if the car was stolen or if he had drugs in the car in the hopes of justifying the arrest. But the car was not stolen, nor were there drugs in the car.
“Well, if he resisted, he resisted, so we got him on that,” the sergeant said. “So then we’re good.”
Then the sergeant told the officers to charge him with a gun violation even though the gun was legally registered to Hayes, a fact they could have confirmed within seconds.
After spending multiple days in jail and losing his job as a result, the charges were eventually dismissed in December 2022 which was when they returned his gun.
Meanwhile, Dallas police refuse to tell the Dallas Morning News whether the incident was investigated by internal affairs. When the newspaper appealed to the Texas Attorney General, he ruled in favor of police, allowing them not to discuss any possible disciplinary action against the cops.
Hayes, whose dream was once to become a Dallas police officer, said that job no longer appeals to him, and he is not comfortable calling 911 for help. He is currently working at a high school and hopes to become a football coach.
“No one stood up for me in that moment … after they realized they were wrong,” Hayes told the Dallas Morning News.
But Judge Scholer painted him as the aggressor and the cops as the victims in her opinion last month.
“Plaintiff posed some threat to Guab and Harris,” the judge wrote in the opinion, referencing previous case law that states “a motor vehicle can be used as a dangerous weapon, even when blocked in by a police cruiser.”
“As long as Plaintiff remained in his vehicle, he posed a potential danger to the officers,” the judge wrote.
But all of that could have been avoided had the cops done their due diligence to ensure they had pulled over the right Black man.
“Defendant Officer Harris’ dismay and realization that a serious mistake had been made when her database check further informed her that Plaintiff Hayes had never been arrested in his life and that the gun in his possession was indeed his and was lawfully registered in his name,” the claim states.
