Former APD chief must face protester’s defamation suit, judge says

Atlanta’s former police chief can’t yet shake a defamation lawsuit alleging he maliciously and falsely labeled a young protester as one of the city’s most violent gang-affiliated criminals, a federal judge has ruled.

Rodney Bryant, who retired in 2022 after three decades with the Atlanta Police Department, tried to end the case brought against him by Ricardo Haro. Bryant argued in part that he was entitled to immunity because his public statements about Haro, who was arrested in Atlanta during a June 2020 protest against police, were made in good faith as part of his job.

But U.S. District Judge J.P. Boulee decided Friday that Haro’s defamation case can proceed, as it includes some evidence supporting his accusation that Bryant knew Haro had no gang affiliations or criminal record beyond a misdemeanor battery charge.

“This Court finds that Plaintiff’s allegations are sufficient to plead actual malice because they plausibly show that Defendant knew his statements were false at the time they were made and were made in retaliation for Plaintiff’s behavior during his arrest,” Boulee wrote in an order.

Bryant’s attorney in the case, Sandy Milord of the city of Atlanta’s law department, did not immediately comment Monday.

Taylor Wilson, one of Haro’s attorneys, said they appreciate the judge’s order and look forward to sharing the case with a jury.

Haro claims he was arrested by Atlanta police on June 4, 2020, accused of violating a curfew while protesting police brutality and excessive force. He was 19 at the time. Haro says he was charged with misdemeanor battery for allegedly spitting on an FBI officer during his arrest.

Months later, on Oct. 29, 2020, Bryant and federal law enforcement officers held a press conference announcing the results of “Operation Phoenix,” a joint task force initiative to fight a rise in violent crime in Atlanta during the coronavirus pandemic.

Haro was publicly identified at the press conference and in an associated press release as one of 12 people charged as a result of the operation, which began on Aug. 18, 2020.

Bryant’s public comments about the dozen arrested included that they were violent repeat offenders, responsible for some of Atlanta’s worst crime involving guns and gangs, court records show. Haro was the youngest of the 12 by several years and the only one not facing federal charges.

In his lawsuit, Haro alleges his arrest at the protest approximately 10 weeks before the task force was established clearly had nothing to do with the operation. He claims Bryant and others involved in the initiative knew he had no gang ties or violent criminal history but unfairly targeted him because he was accused of spitting on an FBI agent.

“The APD and FBI’s supposed time-traveling task force, and the decision to pluck Mr. Haro from myriad arrests to brand him one of its dangerous targets, is what this litigation is about,” Wilson told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “A curfew violation and an alleged single instance of spitting does not in any rational fashion equate to gang violence, gun trafficking, drug trafficking, or the stated unprecedented rise in homicides during COVID.”