Via reader Mack, this from The Rutherford Institute, and written up at Richmond-Times Dispatch.

A Hopewell man who filed a federal lawsuit against a Hopewell police officer who had him arrested and detained at a peaceful public protest while armed with a rifle and pistol has settled the case.

The lawsuit was resolved to the “mutual satisfaction” of both sides, the two parties said in separate statements. Specific terms of the settlement were not disclosed; the lawsuit was formally dismissed last week.

The nine-page complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Richmond in 2014 said Brandon Howard drew the attention of Hopewell police on Aug. 26, 2013, when he was seen displaying a 6-by-4-foot sign that read “Impeach Obama” on an Interstate 295 overpass.

He had an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle slung over his shoulder on a strap and a .380-caliber Bersa pistol holstered on his waist.

Howard had been protesting lawfully for about 30 minutes when a Hopewell police officer pulled up to the area on the overpass where Howard was standing and parked his vehicle. Three to five police cruisers arrived a short time later with their emergency lights flashing, the suit said.

Six to eight officers then got out of their cars with their guns drawn and commanded Howard to drop his sign and get on the ground with his hands spread above his head, the complaint said.

After Howard immediately complied, Sgt. John Hunter stated to Howard, “What do you think you are doing threatening people on my interstate?” Howard replied that he had not threatened anyone and was simply exercising his First Amendment and Second Amendment rights.

To that, Hunter said, “Not on my overpass you’re not,” according to the suit.

The complaint says Hunter then handcuffed Howard, with Hunter advising Howard that he was being detained but not arrested after Howard asked if he was under arrest. Howard was placed in a police cruiser and taken to the Hopewell police station without anyone informing him of his legal rights or providing him “with any basis or authorization for his arrest and detention,” the suit says.

Howard spent the following 90 minutes in an interrogation room, with handcuffs still binding his hands behind his back, but was never questioned during his detention, the suit says.

He was then told he was free to go, his weapons were returned, and he was driven back to the interstate overpass.

The complaint said the police violated Howard’s First Amendment right to free speech, Second Amendment right to bear arms, and Fourth Amendment right to be free from a groundless arrest when they confronted him with guns drawn and ordered him to the ground on the unfounded belief that Howard was violating the law by being in public with a rifle slung over his shoulder.

Howard’s suit sought “nominal compensatory and punitive damages in an amount to be determined at trial.”

The settlement “resolved the lawsuit to the mutual satisfaction of the parties,” according to a news release emailed Friday by the Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit civil liberties advocacy group in Charlottesville that represented Howard.

Hunter said in a statement Saturday: “The parties have resolved this matter to their mutual satisfaction. As a gun owner, avid hunter and former Marine, I, John Hunter, respect and honor citizens’ Second Amendment rights. Similarly, as a citizen and former candidate for public office, I respect the rights of citizens to express themselves and engage in political speech as protected by the First Amendment.

“It was not my intention to compromise Mr. Howard’s rights under the Constitution. As a police officer, my number one priority was the safety of the public.”