Indiana Confidential Informant Files Harassment Suit Against Police Department
A Franklin, Indiana woman has named a suspended police officer in a federal lawsuit filed by a former informant who alleges her civil rights were violated. The officer was suspended earlier in 2010, and it is unclear whether the suspension has any relation to this most recent lawsuit.
Officers Bryan Burton and Ryan Mears were accused of sexual harassment in the lawsuit, filed last month in federal court in Indianapolis
Ms. Toni Twyman was a “CI” (confidential informant) for the department where the two accused officers worked. She claims in her suit that the two officers sexually harassed her in the first half of 2009. She also accused Officer Burton of inappropriately touching and exposing himself to her.
Burton was suspended in March for supplying alcohol to a minor, engaging in "inappropriate, sexually suggestive conversations" with two women and placing a recording device in a private area on the body of a female informant without having a female officer present, as is required by department procedures. There may have been other reasons that led to his suspension including his treatment of Ms. Twyman.
Twyman's lawsuit has not been set for trial. She is asking for unspecified monetary damages.