Two ISU football players sue Idaho, Utah police over alleged civil rights violations

Two Idaho State University football players — one current, one former — are suing Idaho and Utah law enforcement agencies, claiming that they were illegally detained and arrested, and then spent more than 24 hours in police custody after being suspected of robbing an Idaho bank.

Nehemiah McFarlin and Atoatasi Fox, who are both African-American, played on the ISU football team together in 2016 as 18-year-olds. McFarlin played this season with the Bengals; Fox’s last year with the team was 2017, according to the athletic department.

“Other than being black, neither McFarlin nor Fox matched the description of the robbery participant,” states a complaint filed Dec. 5 in Utah federal court.

According to the complaint:

On Dec. 14, 2016, McFarlin and Fox were traveling home for the holidays in McFarlin’s 2017 Chevy Camaro. While driving on Interstate 15 near Malad, McFarlin hit a slick patch and briefly lost control of his car, which went into the median and sustained front-end damage. McFarlin decided to keep driving, but after traveling a few more miles, he pulled over at an exit in Box Elder County, Utah, and called a roadside assistance company.

While McFarlin and Fox were waiting for assistance, two Utah Highway Patrol officers arrived. With weapons drawn, the officers ordered McFarlin and Fox out of the car, searched them, handcuffed them and told them they were under arrest for robbing a bank in Malad.

Earlier that day, following an armed bank robbery, the Oneida County Sheriff’s Office had put out an attempt-to-locate bulletin on a white passenger car with no license plate driven by a black male. A resident allegedly called Box Elder County dispatch and reported two black males in a white car at an I-15 exit.

Additional Utah and Idaho officers arrived on scene. McFarlin and Fox insisted that they were innocent, had alibis and could not have been in Malad at the time of the robbery, according to the documents.

Police transported McFarlin and Fox to Box Elder County Jail, where they were booked and told that they would be extradited to Idaho.

“Throughout the ordeal, McFarlin and Fox were coerced, berated and threatened, and informed they were going to prison for a very long time,” states the complaint.

Police also seized and searched McFarlin’s Camaro, finding no evidence from any robbery.

Eventually, “after Oneida County Sheriff [Jeff] Semrad finally listened to and examined a few of the obvious and apparent facts,” McFarlin and Fox were released at Oneida County’s request at 6 p.m. the following day.

McFarlin and Fox are seeking at least $10,000 apiece in damages for the alleged civil rights violations, including illegal search, seizure and arrest based on their race.

This story was originally published December 19, 2018 at 2:17 PM.