City of Woonsocket Faces Civil Rights Lawsuit
for Alleged Police Misconduct

The Rhode Island chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is suing the City of Woonsocket and a former police detective for wrongfully arresting and incarcerating a homeless man for a 2022 break-in.

The lawsuit filed Thursday in federal court in Providence alleges that Mack Blackie’s civil rights were violated when he was twice arrested and detained by Woonsocket police for a crime he didn’t commit.

Blackie spent more than a month locked up at the Adult Correctional Institutions on the felony breaking-and-entering charge because he couldn’t afford to pay the bail. (The felony charge has been dismissed and the case expunged from Blackie’s record.)

“This is a tragic case,” said Joshua D. Xavier, a Warwick lawyer representing Blackie who is working on the case with the Rhode Island ACLU. “This case really demonstrates that the harm caused by injustice is exacerbated significantly when the victims of the injustice are indigent.’’

Blackie was homeless and struggling with alcohol addiction when he was wrongfully arrested and detained twice in 2022 and charged with breaking into the apartment of a Woonsocket couple.

According to the suit, Woonsocket Police Officer Timothy M. Hammond, who was then a detective, made “false statements” in his recording of a witness statement, as well as in affidavits in support of Blackie’s arrest in August 2022 and again the following October. And though Hammond told the witness that he would arrange a photo lineup so the couple could identify the suspect, the officer never did, the complaint stated.

This story was reported by The Public’s Radio. You can read the entire story here.