Woman sues Modesto, saying police broke her hip

A woman and her adult son are suing the city of Modesto and Police Chief Galen Carroll, saying police officers broke her hip and threatened her son after entering their Modesto home without a warrant or a good reason.

Officers “recklessly knocked and-or threw Patricia Mugrauer, a frail and disabled 67-year-old woman, to the ground, proximately fracturing her left hip,” the lawsuit says. “During their unlawful home invasion, the officers also wrongfully detained and arrested Wade Mugrauer in his own home, held a gun to his head and threatened him with a Taser weapon,” the document says.

The Bee was unable to reach City Attorney Adam Lindgren immediately for comment.

A young woman sharing a room rented by her ex-boyfriend had called police on Jan. 12, 2015, because the couple had broken up and the Mugrauers would not let her in to get her belongings. The tenant was expected home soon and the Mugrauers asked police to wait for his arrival, but officers “forcibly entered” and “knocked” or “threw (Patricia Mugrauer) to the ground,” according to the lawsuit.

“She was in excruciating pain” and asked officers “to call an ambulance several times, but they left her on the floor, suffering,” the lawsuit says.

The suit was filed April 5 in federal court because the Mugrauers’ civil rights to free speech and freedom from unlawful search and unreasonable force were violated, says the document. It also alleges disability discrimination, assault and battery, false arrest and imprisonment, and failure to summon medical care.

Patricia Mugrauer, now 69, required hip surgery, the documents says.

Carroll is responsible for training officers, who should know better than to “exert and abuse their power and authority to effectuate a certain result in favor of one civil disputant over the other,” the lawsuit says.

It seeks unspecified punitive and exemplary damages.

Representing the Mugrauers is San Francisco attorney Sanjay Schmidt. According to Bee archives, his clients have obtained a combined $637,000 in four settlements stemming from local police brutality lawsuits: Modesto last year paid $165,000 after officers allegedly beat and kicked a suspect who was handcuffed and on the ground, and paid $120,000 in 2013 to three women who claimed that officers entered their home without a warrant; Ceres paid $312,500 in 2015 after an officer allegedly broke a woman’s handcuffed arm; and Turlock paid $40,000 in 2012 after a man was arrested on suspicion of a crime he did not commit.

This story was originally published April 11, 2016 at 3:14 PM with the headline "Woman sues Modesto, saying police broke her hip."