Stunned that a citizen would not want to talk to him, Loveland police officer Paul Ashe escalated a routine exchange with a citizen into an overly aggressive arrest, leaving the man bleeding from his head and arm with a dislocated shoulder, facing charges of obstructing and resisting arrest.
“I told you. I gave you plenty of opportunities,” Ashe told Preston Sowl, a 60-year-old man who was one of several good samaritans who had helped an injured motorcyclist who had fallen on his bike.
“All you had to do was talk to me.”
But Sowl was under no legal obligation to talk to him. In fact, even if he had been suspected of committing a crime, he would still have the right to remain silent.
But as a witness to a one-man accident that caused no fatalities, he had the added right to be free from unlawful search and seizures which is why prosecutors never filed charges against him.
Last week, Sowl filed a lawsuit against the Loveland Police Department and four officers who went along with the unlawful arrest.
The incident took place on September 22, 2019 after Sowl and his wife were trying to drive out of the parking lot of a local bar, only to find the downed motorcyclist blocking their exit.
Sowl and several other people rushed to the man and lifted the bike off him. Paramedics were called and they further blocked the exit with their emergency vehicles. And Ashe further blocked the entrance after his arrival because he pulled his patrol car behind the ambulances.
So when Ashe ordered Sowl to leave the area after he refused to talk to the officer, he was physically unable to leave due to the blocked exit.
Here is the exchange between Ashe and Sowl prior to his arrest.
ASHE: Do you mind coming and talking to me?
SOWL: I don’t know what happened.
ASHE: Well, you pulled the bike off.
SOWL: I’m not talking to nobody.
ASHE: Ok, well if you’re not talking to anybody, you can leave.
SOWL: You can leave. You’re dismissed. I can’t leave,” he said, pointing to the blocked exit.
ASHE: You have to talk to me.
SOWL: Nope. No, I don’t.
ASHE: You do, ok.
SOWL: No, I don’t.
ASHE: You inserted yourself.
SOWL: I came down here to help them, and I don’t have to talk to anybody.
ASHE: This can go one of two ways.
SOWL: I don’t have to talk to anybody.
ASHE: Yes, you do.
SOWL: I don’t have to talk to anybody.
ASHE: Either you’re going to stand here and talk to me
SOWL: Nope.
ASHE: And have a short conversation
SOWL: Nope.
ASHE: Or I can arrest you for obstruction.
Ashe then grabbed onto Sowl’s wrist and began ordering him to place his hands behind his back but Sowl resisted arrest on the basis that it was an unlawful arrest.
That was when two other cops, Benjamin Medina and Clint Schnorr, joined Ashe in the unlawful arrest by grabbing on to him and tackling him, fracturing and dislocating his shoulder. Sergeant Brian Bartnes also went along with the unlawful arrest by not releasing Sowls when learning of the arrest. All four cops are listed as defendants in Sowl’s lawsuit which you can read here.