CLEVELAND — An elderly grandmother is calling for Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb to terminate his former college roommate, Senior Public Safety Advisor Phillip McHugh, who she filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against when he was a Washington, D.C., police detective.
"I'm very concerned about Cleveland," Vashti Sherrod said. "I really am."
Sherrod said McHugh "humiliated and traumatized" her and her husband, Eugene, during a criminal investigation when he was a Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police detective.
McHugh said, "I had no evidence throughout this investigation to refute what happened."
News 5 broke the story about the allegations against McHugh and his personal connection to Bibb last month.
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City records show Cleveland hired McHugh in January as a senior public safety advisor.
The city confirmed McHugh was Bibb's roommate for two semesters at American University in Washington, D.C.
'He believed the white woman... he never believed me'
It all started in May 2015 outside a flower shop in Washington, D.C.
Vashti Sherrod, who was 76 at the time, said a driver backed into her Mercedes, which was parked on the street.
The driver, a white woman, and Sherrod both got out of their vehicles.
Sherrod said they argued. Then, the other driver left.
Hours later, the driver called 911.
Phillip McHugh, who had just been promoted to detective with Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police, went to the driver's home.
According to court records, the driver told McHugh that Sherrod pulled out a black pistol and threatened to shoot her.
Sherrod said the driver's statements caused McHugh to launch a criminal investigation that left her on the verge of a nervous breakdown and caused her to fear for her life.
"He believed the white woman from day one," she said. "He never believed me."
Records showed neither Sherrod nor her husband, Eugene, who was with her at the time, had purchased a gun.
Surveillance video from the scene was too grainy to show whether a gun was in her hand.
'I was so scared'
McHugh said he and prosecutors decided to go forward with the investigation, according to court records.
McHugh then alerted law enforcement agencies to be on the lookout for their car.
Five weeks later, Capitol Police pulled over the elderly couple.
"The Capitol Police were yelling at us, 'Pull over! Stop the car! Stop! Pull over! Do it right now!'" she said. "I was so scared."
She said Eugene, who is blind, ducked under the dashboard.
She said they were so frightened they began to cry.
"There were two officers with shotguns on the side of my window," she said.
McHugh arrived and searched their car.
He did not find a gun.
She said that he then requested she follow him to the police station.
"I was too afraid of him," she said. "I told him no."
'I felt like I had no rights left as an American citizen'
For the elderly couple, the worst was yet to come, Sherrod said.
Just days later, she said that she and her husband were in bed at their Alexandria, Virginia, home when they heard loud banging at their door.
"The next thing we know, the door comes flying open," she said. "They knocked the whole door down."
She said "they" were police. McHugh had obtained a search warrant for her home.
She said McHugh personally searched her bedroom while she and her husband sat handcuffed on their couch.
Sherrod said officers left her home in shambles.
"I felt violated," she said. "I was violated."
Again, McHugh did not find a gun.
"I felt like I had no rights left as an American citizen," she said. "It’s like, how could this happen to us?"
'He didn't have to do that to me'
McHugh then obtained a warrant for Sherrod's arrest.
She turned herself in and was sent to jail.
"A woman of my age, when you’ve got shackles around your feet, and you can’t walk, and you’re falling down, and the police officer says, 'Get up!' and you got a woman who pats you down and tells you to take all your clothes down, it just hurt me so much," she said. "He didn’t have to do that to me."
She was released the same day on her own recognizance.
"As I’ve said publicly before, I am sorry for what happened to her," McHugh said during an interview with News 5 Monday.
"I feel that it’s a terrible event to have gone through," he said. "I can’t imagine what she experienced, but this was not something that I set out nefariously to do to her."
'I didn't believe anyone more than the other'
Months went by.
Then, in January 2016, the charges against her were dropped.
Remember the driver who hit her car?
When the driver met with prosecutors, the case fell apart.
According to McHugh's deposition, the driver now said the gun was a silver revolver, not a black pistol.
McHugh said it was the first time he learned the driver had memory and mental health issues.
I asked McHugh, "Why did you believe her and not Mrs. Sherrod?"
McHugh responded, "I didn’t believe anyone more than the other. I believed the evidence and the facts that I could prove."
When asked about the evidence, McHugh said, "A victim’s statement. Plus, video that did not refute what happened."
Again, the surveillance video does not clearly show what occurred at the scene.
"It didn’t undercut probable cause," McHugh said about the video.
But a federal judge was not convinced.
'A genuine dispute'
After the charges were dropped, the elderly couple sued the Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, the driver and McHugh.
In a memorandum allowing the couple's case to move forward, U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras wrote, "At this stage, the Court cannot conclude that Detective McHugh's actions were supported by probable cause at any point during the investigation."
Judge Contreras wrote, "The Sherrods have raised a genuine dispute regarding whether the warrants at issue here were valid."
He added, "The affidavits drafted by McHugh in support of both warrants state that the security video 'corroborates the victim's series of events.'"
Contreras wrote that "a reasonable jury may conclude that Detective McHugh himself procured the warrants through materially false statements."
Washington, D.C., settled the lawsuit for an undisclosed amount of money.
McHugh blamed the investigation prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney's Office. They were not named in the Sherrod's lawsuit.
"Looking back on this after the last ten years, I would probably press harder. I would probably press harder not to have the case move forward," he said.
'Pull up your big boy pants'
Sherrod's husband, Eugene, died in March.
Despite her grief, Sherrod said she wanted to speak about about McHugh.
She said she has a message for Bibb: That hiring McHugh was a mistake.
"Pull up your big boy pants if you’re a man," Sherrod said. "Hire somebody else."
She continued, "You'll see. It’s gonna come back to haunt you."
Last month, Cleveland council members Richard Starr and Kevin Conwell stood in front of the April 15 council meeting and renounced the selection of McHugh as city safety advisor by Bibb.
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