In a new lawsuit, a woman says her civil rights were violated during a Lower Merion traffic stop

A Plymouth Meeting woman has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Lower Merion Township and its police department over an incident last year in which an officer used a Taser on her four times during a traffic stop.

Officer Charles Murphy used excessive force and violated Chaine Jordan’s rights during the stop on Jan. 8, 2023, during which Jordan repeatedly asked to speak with a police supervisor, according to the suit filed by attorney Nadeem Bezar.

Police officials have said Jordan initially refused to pull over and ignored commands from Murphy.

The suit says that other officers who responded to the scene did not intervene to stop Murphy as he used the Taser and that the officers ignored her requests to speak with a police supervisor. According to the suit, the department and township officials failed to properly train their officers to act appropriately in such circumstances.

“If we put a few things in perspective, this is a broad-daylight stop in a crowded area, a woman who wasn’t being aggressive, a woman who was scared and asked for a white shirt,” Bezar said in an interview Friday, using the colloquial term for a police supervisor.

“She’s struggling and we hope to be heard on this matter, and hope for as strong an outcome as possible, maybe some policy change,” Bezar said.

Lower Merion officials did not respond to requests for comment Friday.

Jordan was charged after the traffic stop with fleeing an officer, and later entered a no-contest plea to that charge and was sentenced to six months of probation, court records show.

Murphy was suspended for 10 days and ordered to undergo training after police supervisors determined that while he did not break the law, he “did not use sound tactics” during the traffic stop. The incident sparked widespread protest, and local representatives from the NAACP said Jordan, who is Black, was unfairly targeted because of her race.

On the day of the incident, Jordan, 36, was driving her uncle to a doctor’s appointment when Murphy attempted to pull her over on Conshohocken State Road in Bala Cynwyd, the suit says.

Then-Police Superintendent Michael McGrath said Murphy initiated the stop because Jordan was tailgating a pickup truck in front of her. Police later learned she had been driving with a suspended license.

Jordan was unable to pull over right away because there was no safe place to do so on the stretch of Conshohocken State Road where the office first activated his lights, according to the lawsuit. She signaled her intention to pull over, the suit said, by putting on her hazard lights.

She pulled into the parking lot of a Wawa near the intersection of Rock Hill Road, the first place she was able to stop safely, according to the suit.

Lower Merion police characterized her decision to drive an additional 1.3 miles as a “short pursuit” by Murphy. Body-worn camera footage released by the department showed that Jordan continued to drive for 2½ minutes after the officer turned on his overhead lights and, at one point, passed the truck she had been driving behind.

» READ MORE: Lower Merion police ‘didn’t use sound tactics’ when they used a Taser on a driver after a traffic stop, chief says

Afterward, when Murphy approached her Volvo in the Wawa parking lot, police said, Jordan refused orders to get out of the vehicle, roll down her tinted windows, or provide officers with her insurance paperwork and driver’s license.

Bezar said Jordan was frightened because Murphy had approached her car with his gun drawn. She held her hands out of her window to show she was unarmed and presented no danger to him or anyone else, according to the lawsuit. She asked to speak to his supervisor and asked him to contact her father, who is a Pennsylvania State Police trooper.

The bodycam footage shows Murphy told Jordan he “didn’t care” that she was scared, told her she could be arrested for obstruction of justice, and threatened to use a Taser against her. At one point, Murphy is heard threatening to break the car’s window.

Murphy reached through Jordan’s window, opened her door, and attempted to pull her out. He used his Taser on her four times while taking her into custody.

At a township meeting after the traffic stop, Lower Merion Police Capt. Gene Pasternak said Murphy and the officers who responded had “every reason to be concerned” during the incident.

“There’s an unknown risk here. You have the pursuit, you have the noncompliance of the occupants, you have the inability to see into the car,” Pasternak said at the time. “These are all concerning, these are red flags. I would be in fear standing next to the car for any prolonged period of time.”

Bezar disagreed and said the situation should have been handled better by all of the officers involved.

“This poor woman went through something she didn’t need to go through,” he said. “And it goes back to both policies and training in the Lower Merion Police Department.”