Accused drug dealer sues Beaufort Co. sheriff, alleging false information kept him jailed
A man accused of trafficking cocaine in Port Royal in 2019 has filed a lawsuit in federal court against the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office, alleging its investigator provided incorrect information to keep him in jail, according to documents.
David Fields, Jr., of Beaufort, filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court of South Carolina on Jan. 28 alleging that Cpl. Justin Saunders with the Sheriff’s Office “knowingly provided perjured or false testimony” when speaking in a court hearing on whether Fields should remain in jail after his July 18, 2019, arrest.
The Sheriff’s Office charged Fields, then 47, after entering a trailer in Port Royal he was in and finding approximately 5 ounces of cocaine, 19 grams of crack cocaine, 948 assorted pills, and six handguns, two of which had been reported as stolen, according to police. Some of the pills tested positive as fentanyl, which is a deadly substance, court testimony said.
At issue is whether police had legal justification to link the home where the illegal items were found to Fields.
At a Feb. 3, 2020 court hearing deciding whether Fields should stay in jail, investigator Saunders mistakenly used information from a birth certificate, mail, and pill bottles to tie Fields to the home — but those items actually belonged to his father, David Fields Sr.
Saunders also testified the incorrect birth date on the certificate. He incorrectly said property records showed the home belonged to Fields Jr., which was used to secure the search warrant.
Court documents do not show Saunders purposely gave bad information, but a federal prosecutor did have to amend the record to fix errors in his testimony.
His testimony was initially used to keep Fields in jail in February 2020. After the errors were addressed, Fields was released. He had been under supervised release for a prior conviction of drug trafficking from the 1990s.
Maj. Bob Bromage with the Sheriff’s Office said the agency could not comment on pending litigation. The U.S. Attorney’s Office of South Carolina declined to comment, according to spokesperson Derek Shoemake.
A reporter left a message for Fields, whose family runs a flower shop in Beaufort.
‘Danger to this community’
Saunders was part of the Sheriff’s Office Crime Suppression Unit and surveilled a home on Wayside Lane in Port Royal in March 2019 after receiving information from a confidential informant that crack cocaine was being sold out of the home.
They monitored the property for months, watching the high amount of foot and car traffic from their perch next to a nearby clock shop, according to a transcript from a Feb. 3, 2020 court hearing. The investigators pulled over several cars seen leaving.
According to the testimony, investigators pulled over an individual who was seen leaving the home and was found with crack cocaine. The person later became another confidential informant and conducted two drug purchases in July 2019 on behalf of the Sheriff’s Office to serve as evidence. They said they bought from Fields.
The Sheriff’s Office also searched property records for the Wayside Lane address, finding a “David Fields” listed as the co-owner.
On July 18, 2019, a “no-knock” warrant was executed with the help of a SWAT team.
In addition to finding drugs and guns at the home, the Sheriff’s Office found a birth certificate, pill bottles, and mail all with the name “David Fields” on them, Saunders said at a hearing. Fields was in the home and arrested.
The property records, birth certificate, pill bottles, and mail would all be used to link Fields to the home where the vast amount of drugs were found, Saunders testified at the Feb. 3, 2020 hearing.
The property records were used in Fields’ search warrant. The birth certificate, pill bottles, and mail were used in arguments to keep him detained because he was out on supervised release on his 1990 conviction when he was arrested.
“Coming out on supervised release and given that second chance and choosing to go right back into that life of drugs, guns, and dangerous drugs and multiple guns, shows that he is a danger to this community, Your Honor,” Janet Carra Henderson with the U.S. Attorney’s Office argued on Feb. 3, 2020. He was detained following these arguments.
But about two weeks later, Henderson amended the record to show the birth certificate, pill bottles, and mail were actually in reference to Fields’ father, David Fields, Sr., who was over 80 at the time.
Saunders had testified those belonged to the wrong Fields. He also testified the incorrect date of birth on the birth certificate. The property records were listed to Fields’ father as well.
“We find this — these falsities extremely serious and concerning. And we think that the government relied upon Corporal Saunders as its evidence to support probable cause for all these. ... And we think that he has proven himself not credible,” federal Public Defender Cody Groeber said at a Feb. 20, 2020, hearing representing Fields.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Mary Gordon Baker said the change in evidence caused her to reverse her decision to detain Fields and instead give him bond. But Baker said there was still probable cause to keep the charges against him.
“We’ve got very serious things found in that house. You have weakened evidence but some evidence that Mr. Fields is intimately knowledgeable about that house and stores things in that house,” Baker said at the court hearing. “The guns are of grave concern to me.”
Those charges are pending.
Fields’ Jan. 28 lawsuit claims his rights were violated under three amendments in U.S. Constitution — the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable search and seizure, and due process rights under the Fifth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment. He is representing himself, without a lawyer.
The Sheriff’s Office has not been served with the lawsuit. The complaint names Beaufort County Sheriff P.J. Tanner, Cpl. Saunders, and several other Sheriff’s Office officials as well.
