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Man Who Tried To Drown Himself Suing Police For Taking Too Long To Save Him

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Sugar Cookie

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A man who tried to drown himself at a Virginia pool during a bipolar episode is now suing the police officers who saved his life.

Mateusz Fijalkowski, 24, says that officers from the Fairfax County Police Department waited too long to rescue him.

He claims that they left him underwater for more than two minutes and stopped a lifeguard from immediately jumping in the pool to save him.

Fijalkowski, who does not know how to swim, was hired to work as an assistant manager for the pool at Riverside Apartments in May 2016.

He spoke little English at the time and had come to America from Poland through an international summer job program, according to the lawsuit .

Fijalkowski had never had a mental episode in his life. But on his third day at the job, something changed.

He began talking to himself in Polish and arguing with pool guests. A lifeguard called the police after he ripped off one girl's wristband and refused to let her swim.

As eight officers arrived on the scene, Fijalkowski repeatedly blew his whistle, shouted 'I am the lifeguard', and started to pray in Polish.

Authorities had everyone leave the area and called in a Polish-speaking officer as well as Fijalkowski's roommate, who could also speak Polish.

But he continued to ignore everyone around him, throwing his cell phone into the pool twice and climbing the lifeguard tower as he continued to shout.

The third time he entered the pool, Fijalkowski walked into the deep end and grabbed two vents on the bottom of the pool to hold himself down, according to the lawsuit.

A video filmed by a bystander, who was watching from behind the pool's fence, shows that Fijalkowski was in the water for two and a half minutes.

Although the pool had been secured by the officers, and Mateusz was in their sole control, the officers did nothing to stop him from reentering the water,' Fijalkowski's attorney Victor Glasberg told DailyMail.com.

The footage shows officers standing around the pool, looking down at Fijalkowski, as he remains underwater.

It then cuts to the moment Sean Brooks, a lifeguard and Fijalkowski's supervisor, pulls him out of the water and two officers jumping into the pool to help.

Officers can be seen performing CPR on Fijalkowski as more emergency medical technicians arrive on the scene.

Fijalkowski, who vomited in the pool, had to be revived with an electronic defibrillator. He suffered cardiac and respiratory arrest.

'His face was purple. His heart had stopped beating and he had stopped breathing,' Glasberg said.

The pool company has alleged that police would not let Brooks jump in until Fijalkowski 'had stopped moving'.
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5674229/Man-tried-drown-sues-police-officers-saved-life.html
 
Video is weird as fuck. Cant say I blame the cops. He went into the water twice and the guy taping even notes that this time he's really dragging it out and playing it up. When the lifeguard jumps in to save him someone shouts at the police "He's going to drown the other guy" ..meaning the lifeguard. There's zero concern and from the demeanor everyone watching seems to assume its a ploy and he will resurface like he did the other two times. Only after they see he's not breathing do people start blaming the cops for not hopping in earlier. They were doing cpr on him before he's even fully lifted from the water.

Fijalkowski said he has more than $100,000 in medical bills after he spent more than a week recovering at Fairfax Inova’s Heart and Vascular Institute.

He was then placed in a psychiatric unit for six days. Fijalkowski has since moved back to Poland and said he has not had another episode.

'The police allowed me to sink before their eyes,' Fijalkowski told the Washington Post.

'I'm glad that in the end they realized that they shouldn't let me drown, but I don't thank them for letting me die, clinically, before their eyes.'

Fairfax County Police Chief Edwin Roessler Jr defended his officers, claiming they could have gotten dragged underwater themselves if they went in earlier.

'When someone's having a mental episode, the last thing you want to do is go hands on,' he said. 'You use time on your side to let the episode subside.'

'They saved his life - he did not die. You're going to sue someone for saving your life?'
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I found this part of the article very telling. He claims they let him sink, when you can clearly see him take off a flotation device, walk in and hold himself down on purpose. He let himself sink, not the cops, they just watched his nutty ass. He also claims he's never had another mental episode..yet he's been diagnosed as bipolar? You can't be diagnosed with anything after only 1 episode, the episodes are part of figuring out whats happening.
 
I know this shouldn't be funny.

But it is.
So what, I'm going to hell for a lot more than my giggles at every twist and turn thru this thread.

My absolute favorite part:
. As eight officers arrived on the scene, Fijalkowski repeatedly blew his whistle, shouted 'I am the lifeguard', and started to pray in Polish.
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Feb. 14, 2019
A man who nearly drowned in a Fairfax pool cannot hold police or a lifeguard responsible for not pulling him out of the water sooner, a federal judge ruled this week.

While suffering a psychotic break at the private pool where he worked three years ago, Mateusz Fijalkowski entered the water and held himself down by grabbing a drain. Police stopped a lifeguard from jumping in for two minutes and 44 seconds, after Fijalkowski had vomited and released all the air from his lungs. After he was pulled from the water, he was revived with defibrillators and was hospitalized for several days.

Fijalkowski sued, arguing that the delay violated his constitutional rights.

“In hindsight it appears that the police defendants may have waited too long,” Alexandria Federal Judge T.S. Ellis III concluded. “But . . . the police defendants had adequate, rational reasons to support their decision.”


Because Fijalkowski had been exhibiting erratic and aggressive behavior and had twice entered and exited the pool during his psychotic episode, Ellis said, police had “an ample basis on which to conclude that it was neither safe nor necessary” to pull him out.

His attorney Victor Glasberg said, “It’s the judge’s prerogative to rule, and ours to appeal.”

Fijalkowski came to the United States from Poland on a summer job program in 2016. He did not know how to swim or speak fluent English. After the pool incident he returned to Poland, having been diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
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The federal lawsuit filed by Mateusz Fijalkowski against Fairfax County police officers and a lifeguard was fully dismissed by a federal judge, and that dismissal was later upheld by a federal appeals court.

In 2016, Mateusz Fijalkowski experienced a severe bipolar episode during which he entered a Fairfax County community pool and actively tried to drown himself. Eight police officers and a lifeguard stood by the pool for over two minutes, communicating with him and monitoring his actions before diving in to pull him out once he stopped moving. They successfully revived him using CPR and an automated external defibrillator (AED).

Fijalkowski filed a lawsuit in 2018 seeking over $100,000 to cover his medical bills. He argued that the responders were negligent and violated his constitutional rights by waiting too long to pull him out of the water.

Why the Case Was Dismissed

  • Reasoning for Police Immunity: In February 2019, U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III dismissed the case, ruling that the officers were protected by qualified immunity. The court agreed with the police department's defense strategy of "time and distance," which argued that jumping in earlier could have provoked Fijalkowski to fight back, putting both his life and the officers' lives in greater danger while he was actively resisting.
  • Reasoning for Lifeguard Immunity: The judge ruled that Virginia state law barred Fijalkowski from suing the lifeguard or the pool company. Because the lifeguard was acting under the direct, explicitly ordered safety commands of the police on the scene, they could not be held independently liable.
  • Appeals Finalization: Fijalkowski appealed the decision, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed the lower district court's dismissal in March 2020. A subsequent petition to the Supreme Court of the United States was submitted later that year but did not alter the outcome.


 
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