College student complains of rough treatment by Philly cops

Dawan Wilson had never been arrested, had never been in any trouble with the law, and says he certainly never had a gun pulled on him - until early in the morning of Sept. 4.

"Get the f– out of the car!" the Lock Haven University junior recalled a Philadelphia police officer yelling - service weapon pointed - as other officers converged on his 2007 Dodge Caliber near 20th Street and Lehigh Avenue.

"It happened so fast," Wilson, 22, said last week of the incident, which is being investigated by Internal Affairs.

"I don't remember if I opened the car door or if he did," he said, referring to the officer, whom he described as the most aggressive - the one, Wilson said, who administered the most blows during the events that unfolded shortly before 3 a.m.

Wilson, who is African American, said there were five or six officers involved; all, he said, were white except one African American policeman. A sergeant in a white shirt, who was white, was among them.

In a citizen's complaint filed with police, Wilson said he was driving home from a friend's house in West Philadelphia when he saw that a police car had pulled behind him.

"The officer followed me for a little bit before turning on his sirens," he wrote. "I did [not] feel safe so I continue[d] to drive for about 2 blocks, which was 20th and Lehigh because it was well lit."

Wilson wrote that after being ordered to get out of the car and lie down, "they threw me to the ground and repeatedly punched me in the face and [one officer] also put his knee in my back."

The student, who said his right shoulder and lower back were still sore, said police then cuffed his wrists and ankles.

"I was scared for my life," he said.

Wilson said that while on the ground, he screamed in pain and shouted profanities, prompting one officer to blow kisses at him.

He said he heard the police say something about his possibly being drunk because they believed he had been driving erratically.

Wilson, who said he had consumed one drink of E&J Brandy at a friend's West Philadelphia home about five to six hours before being pulled over, was given a Breathalyzer test, which he said showed his blood-alcohol level did not indicate intoxication. An hour after Wilson arrived at Police Headquarters, an officer told him he was free to go, and he was not charged with any offenses.

Wilson and his father, Bruce Athy, said they made several calls over the next days to the 22nd District, in which the incident took place, but got little help.

They got even less from the Police Advisory Commission, the department's civilian oversight agency. An investigator from the commission did not show up for a scheduled Sept. 10 meeting, Wilson and Athy said.

Wilson called it "an additional smack to my face."

Kelvyn Anderson, the commission's executive director, said the investigator suffered a death in the family. "Obviously, we want to make sure we take care of people's needs when they come to us with complaints," Anderson said, adding that the investigator was attempting to reach Wilson to "rectify the situation."

A police spokesman, Lt. John Stanford, said the department did not learn of Wilson's allegations until Sept. 13, when a reporter called seeking comment. An Internal Affairs investigation was then launched, he said. He would not talk about the specifics of Wilson's complaint.

"It's hard to address something if we don't know about it," Stanford said. "If there is an allegation of any physical abuse, that's a problem, that's definitely a situation that has to be investigated. You don't want somebody working under the same umbrella of the Philadelphia Police Department conducting themselves like that."

The car stop was the latest setback for Wilson, who took a year off from Lock Haven after his mother's May 2015 death. He had just returned to school for the fall semester.

After being released, his ordeal was far from over. Police returned his driver's license but said they had no idea what happened to his wallet, Wilson said.

Gone was his Lock Haven student identification card, a debit card, a credit card, an Amtrak pass, and his mother's driver's license - a memento he'd been carrying since her death.

Police also refused to drive him back to his car in North Philadelphia, he said, after accusing him of having been belligerent.

In the parking lot, some officers cursed at him and called him "fat boy," he said. One said, "Look at that stomach," added Wilson, who stands 5-foot-4 and weighs 215 pounds.

He called his brother, who arranged an Uber ride from Police Headquarters, and was treated at Temple University Hospital, where an emergency-room doctor diagnosed him with having contusions, or bruising, on a shoulder and arm, as well as on his face and trunk, according to his discharge papers.

"It really tore him down, losing his mother's driver's license," said Athy, 61, who drove from his home in New Castle, Del., to see his son the morning of the attack. Athy, an inventory material control clerk for Amtrak, said he was furious when he saw his son's swollen face.

"What would make them attack him like that?" he asked. "They almost shattered my son's sense of being. They don't know what people go through. He was already going through it with his mother's death."

In his letter to the Police Advisory Commission, Wilson wrote that the events of that night - and the aftermath - have left him with the sense he was "made to feel irrelevant." He and his father said they were considering legal action.

"I still don't have my wallet with the contents I need, but missed most is the driver's license of my mother, who lost her battle with cancer one year ago," Wilson wrote. "I'm still hung over about that, and her license was my way of carrying a piece of her with me."

deanm@phillynews.com

215-854-4172@mensahdean