Attorneys representing several families in Galveston, Texas, have announced federal civil rights lawsuits against the Galveston Police Department and the Galveston County Sheriff's Office, accusing local law enforcement of a pattern of excessive force. Speaking at a news conference, the lawyers said they would lay out three separate cases that, in their view, illustrate how aggressive policing has harmed residents in the area.
Much of the attorneys' presentation focused on a single officer, Lieutenant Joel Caldwell, whose career they said crosses both agencies. According to the lawyers, Caldwell moved from the Galveston city police to the county Sheriff's Office, and they described his disciplinary history as striking. They alleged that he was allowed to resign before being appointed to a senior post and that his disciplinary record followed him from one department to the other.
The attorneys raised questions about how that appointment came about. They said Caldwell had made a ten thousand dollar campaign contribution to the man who was later elected county sheriff, and that once the new sheriff took office, Caldwell was promptly named deputy chief of the Sheriff's Department. For the lawyers, that sequence was central to their argument that accountability had broken down inside the agencies.
The first case they outlined involves the Hardman family and the Galveston Police Department. The attorneys said Caldwell, then a police lieutenant, and other officers entered the Hardman home without a warrant and without any emergency circumstances, then deployed pepperballs inside. They stressed that the suspect officers were looking for was not even in the house at the time, and that a woman inside took a direct pepperball hit to her side.
According to the lawyers, the consequences of that raid fell heavily on the household. They said five very young children were inside, the youngest just one year old, and that all of them were exposed to a chemical agent the attorneys described as potentially damaging to the respiratory system. A member of the Hardman family, who they said had been asking what was happening, was also assaulted during the encounter.
A second case presented at the conference involves Ethan Dick and the Galveston County Sheriff's Department. The attorneys said Dick had been working in Galveston when a friend was arrested one evening. After the friend asked him to retrieve a wallet, Dick approached with one officer's consent, but a second officer intervened aggressively, body slammed him to the ground so that his head struck the concrete first, and left him with numerous injuries and lacerations to his face and body before charging him with resisting arrest.
The lawyers framed the lawsuits, which also reference a client named Brandy Vandenberg, as part of a broader demand for police accountability in Galveston. They said one of the complaints had been filed in June, over an incident dating back to June of 2024, and they called on the Galveston Police Department to review the conduct of its officers. Pointing repeatedly to Caldwell's record, they argued that body cameras and other tools meant to ensure accountability should be matched by real consequences when officers are accused of crossing the line.