The mother of Schaston Hodge, a 27-year-old man from Dallas who was fatally shot by two Texas State Troopers in 2019, is filing a federal civil rights lawsuit against the officers who killed him, the Texas Department of Public Safety and the City of Dallas. Shandra Hodge, the victim’s mother, said in a lawsuit Tuesday that Texas State Troopers Joshua Engleman and Robert Litvin used excessive force in “the unlawful shooting and killing of Schaston Hodge” and violated his Amendment 4 rights. Engleman and Litvin worked in Dallas after Governor Greg Abbott dispatched state police to the city to help Dallas police curb the rise in violent crime. The DPS said two police officers performing a traffic control noticed a driver who had turned without blinking. The police tried to stop the driver, but the driver kept driving instead of stopping. The dashcam video published by the DPS in January 2020 shows how the driver drives into a long driveway and into a darkened part of the driveway behind the house. The video shows a soldier getting out of his car and walking up the driveway, yelling at the driver to show him his hands. Moments later, several shots could be heard. The bodycam video published by the DPS showed the interaction and the driver, who got out of the vehicle with a gun. The driver, later identified as Hodge, fell to the ground after being shot and the gun was visible by his side.
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Hodge’s autopsy revealed that he was shot 16 times, including shots in the head, front and back body, and both legs. “You killed my son like he was an animal. They shot my son 16 times, they nearly blew his head off, “Hodge’s mother Shandra Brackens-Hodge previously told The Dallas Morning News in a statement. Lt. Lonny Haschel, a spokesman for the state’s Department of Public Security, said in January 2020 that Texas had investigated Rangers and turned over a report to the Dallas County Attorney General and a grand jury declined to indict the soldiers with the shooting. “The entire incident, which was captured on video, was presented to a Dallas County grand jury and a no bill returned,” Haschel said in an email, the newspaper reported. In January 2020, the Texas DPS released bodycam footage showing the gunfight seen below. The lawsuit filed by the victim’s mother does not mention that her son was armed, as the DPS said the video showed, and it said he tried to obey the police officer’s order to show him his hands. The lawsuit also states that Hodge did not immediately stop for the soldiers because he was so close to his home and that he got there about a minute after the soldiers tried to stop him. The lawsuit calls for a jury trial and unspecified pecuniary relief.
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