SF Inmate With One Leg Awarded $500K After Being Forced To Hop 64 Feet

SAN FRANCISCO — An inmate with one leg who accused deputies in the San Francisco Sheriff's Department of using excessive force when they made him hop into a cell has been awarded $504,000, according to reports.

Vincent Bell, 40, was one of six people charged in a 2012 murder in which a man was beaten and shot, The Associated Press reported. Bell provided the gun used in the shooting, authorities said, and is awaiting trial.

Bell, who had one leg surgically removed, was being held at a jail in 2018 when deputies were told to move him to a smaller, padded cell, because he had been deemed dangerous, AP reported.

But guards said he resisted, instead placing pads on his cell door to prevent them from entering. Bell was taken out of a wheelchair he was seated in, handcuffed and told to hop 64 feet to a different cell. As he hopped, he fell and had to be carried face-down to the cell, where he was stripped and held for 20 hours, a federal judge said.

Jurors found that the deputy used excessive force and the sheriff's office failed to properly train its staff, violating Bell's rights under federal disability laws.

Bell's lawyer EmilyRose Johns told the San Francisco Chronicle on Thursday the verdict should send the city “a very clear message" that it must accommodate people with disabilities, and that deputies "do not get to supplant their personal judgment for the judgment of medical professionals in the jail."