Black Grey's Anatomy worker suing LAPD for $20m after being 'held at gunpoint' in traffic stop

A black Disney production employee has accused Los Angeles police officers of racial profiling and is suing the force for at least $20m (£15.2m).

Lawyers for Ernest Simon Jr, who was working on the production of hit US medical drama Grey’s Anatomy, said Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers undertook an “unwarranted, unjustified, and unlawful” traffic stop in March 2021.

The 31-year-old was held “at gunpoint for over twenty minutes while he laid face down and spread-eagle on the hot asphalt”, according to court documents.

He has been left “terrified to do his job”, the legal documents state, “reasonably fearing the possibility that he could again be subjected to the same, if not worse, excessive force” and that “any time he encounters law enforcement officers, knowing that although he is doing nothing wrong, he could still be subjected to another life-threatening experience simply because of his race”.

An ‘ordinary work day’ took a ‘drastic turn’

Mr Simon’s job meant he was tasked with driving cast and crew members between the show’s filming location and a “basecamp” for production, in Tarzana, California.

The court documents say: “March 18 2021 began as a typical work day for Mr Simon, who was working as a driver for the production of the popular television show Grey’s Anatomy as an employee of The Walt Disney Company’s General Entertainment Division (DGE).

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“His ordinary work day, however, took a drastic turn after Mr Simon – a thirty-one-year-old African American male – was targeted by LAPD police officers who, without any legal justification, initiated a racially motivated ‘high risk’ traffic stop.”

Mr Simon feared “he was going to be shot at his workplace in front of his coworkers for simply being a black man in the wrong neighbourhood,” the documents said.

Lawyers claimed it was an instance of racial profiling and noted the force’s “long and notorious history of racial discrimination against African Americans like Mr Simon”.

Mr Simon is seeking damages of “no less than” $20m in compensation, and has requested a trial by jury.

While the LAPD investigated the officers’ misconduct, it failed to take “meaningful action” to hold officers to account or to provide Mr Simon with “even a semblance of justice”, lawyers said.

Shonda Rhimes, the award-winning producer who created Grey’s Anatomy, told US entertainment site Deadline that “what happened to Mr Simon was beyond unacceptable” and “another example of a broken system that puts valuable lives in danger and damages spirits”.

Sky News has contacted the LAPD for comment. However, a spokesperson for the force told Deadline the department could not comment on pending litigation.

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