Monroe v City of Charlottesville, Virginia
Man Files Lawsuit Over Rape DNA
A Charlottesville man has filed a federal class-action lawsuit on behalf of himself and other local black men asked by police to submit to DNA testing in the hunt for the serial rapist that has been forensically linked to at least seven attacks between 1997 and 2004.
The lawsuit is the second one filed by Larry Monroe, who filed his first lawsuit against the Charlottesville police Detective James Mooney for $15,000 last year. In the second lawsuit, Monroe claims Mooney harassed him into giving a sample because he was black, not because he fit the description of the rapist.
The new suit targets Mooney, Police Chief Detective Longo and the city of Charlottesville, and seeks to recover $15,000. The lawsuit was filed Dec. 16 in U.S. District Court in Charlottesville, and alleges two violations of constitutional rights.
First, the lawsuit claims the policy of asking Monroe and other black men to provide their DNA for tests violates their Constitutional right to equal protection because the same policy wasn't applied to all white men following unsolved sexual assaults made by white assailants.
Second, the policy constituted unreasonable seizures, the suit alleges.
