Brooklyn, NY – A federal jury in Brooklyn awarded over $2.3 million to Robert Besedin Sr., a Long Island Air Force veteran, concluding a civil rights lawsuit he filed against two Nassau County police officers. The verdict, reached on Wednesday, resulted from a 2017 incident where Besedin claimed the officers forcibly threw him down concrete stairs outside his Baldwin home.
The jury found that one officer was guilty of using excessive force, and Nassau County was liable for battery by its officers. Additionally, the panel determined that officers Stephen Beckwith and Dominick Mantovani maliciously prosecuted Besedin and abused the judicial process after his arrest in February 2017.
Besedin, who did not attend the court as the verdict was delivered on the eighth day of the trial, was awarded $760,000 in compensatory damages and $1.6 million in punitive damages. His lawyer, Frederick K. Brewington, expressed hope that this substantial award would prompt Nassau County to undertake significant reforms in police training and discipline.
“There needs to be improvement in their training, their investigations, and certainly in their discipline,” Brewington emphasized. According to him, despite the severity of the officers’ actions, they faced neither sufficient discipline nor retraining, which he deemed wholly unacceptable.
The attorneys representing Nassau County, the officers involved, and the police department, Andrew Brancato and Kiera Meehan, declined to comment following the verdict. Similarly, the Nassau Police Department and a representative for Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman did not respond to requests for comment.
During the trial, it was revealed that although Internal Affairs Bureau investigators had questioned Beckwith and Mantovani, they did not review the home security video recording that captured the incident. Brewington criticized the investigation as inadequate, stressing that the video, which contradicted the officers’ testimony, played a critical role in the jury’s decision. “There was a video that was never shown to the officers to make them explain what they did. They took their word at face value,” Brewington stated.
Besides the compensatory and punitive damages, the case highlights broader issues concerning police accountability and the impact of civilian video footage on law enforcement transparency. Until 2021, Nassau County was among the few major U.S. police departments not equipping officers with body cameras—a practice which has only recently been adopted.
Besedin, now 79, argued through his legal representation that his constitutional rights were violated during the incident, exacerbating a traumatic brain injury suffered in 2003. According to testimony, this injury was said to have affected his ability to maintain relationships and manage his auto repair business. The Nassau County District Attorney’s Office dismissed the charges against him, including second-degree assault, harassment, and resisting arrest, nearly a year after the incident.
The case pulls into sharp focus the recurring issues around police conduct, the recourse available for civilians, and the necessary mechanisms to ensure accountability and reform within law enforcement agencies. As civilian videos continue to shed light on police operations, the implications for policy and public trust become increasingly significant.
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