A federal appeals court, in a lengthy opinion issued Monday, found that a lawsuit filed by a Butler County sexual assault victim against the lead investigating officer on her case can move forward.
Sara Reedy, of Mars, filed the lawsuit against Cranberry Detective Frank Evanson in August 2006, claiming unlawful search and seizure, false imprisonment and malicious prosecution.
Ms. Reedy reported her attack the night it happened on July 14, 2004, at a Cranberry gas station where she was working. She was later charged by Officer Evanson for reporting a false crime, theft and receiving stolen property.
However, a suspect in two other sexual assaults -- one in Cranberry three months later and one in Brookville, Jefferson County, in August 2005 -- confessed to assaulting Ms. Reedy, as well as the other victim in Cranberry.
The charges against Ms. Reedy were dropped a short time later, and she filed the lawsuit.
In July 2008, Officer Evanson filed a motion for summary judgment, asking U.S. District Judge David S. Cercone to find in his favor and end the lawsuit.
The judge did.
However, according to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Cercone failed to follow the standards of summary judgment, which requires a court to view the evidence in the case in the light most favorable to the non-moving party -- in this case, Ms. Reedy.
The appeals court chastised Judge Cercone throughout the 77-page opinion, finding that he often viewed evidence as being inculpatory of Ms. Reedy, when that is not how it should have been considered.
The court also criticized Judge Cercone for finding fault with Ms. Reedy's decision not to seek professional counseling after her assault.
"More specifically, the district court's implication that there is a duty to attend counseling is incorrect. There is no such duty," Circuit Judge Kent A. Jordan wrote. "Moreover, implicit in the court's conclusion that an inculpatory inference can be drawn from Reedy's decision not to attend counseling is a value judgment about how the victim sought to respond to trauma. That is a highly debatable judgment, lacking any foundation in the record."
The appeals court remanded the case against Officer Evanson back to U.S. District Court.
First Published: August 4, 2010, 4:00 a.m.