JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A Jacksonville woman said she was terrified this summer when two officers with the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office overstepped their authority and tried to illegally evict her.
The two were eventually found by JSO to have “failed to conform to work standards.”
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Shana, who asked us not to share her last name, asked the News4JAX I-TEAM to investigate after the officers were only required to undergo formal counseling with their supervisors and were not disciplined over the incident, which Shana called an abuse of power.
“The punishment didn’t match what they did,” Shana said. “Why were they there? Why were they here using taxpayer dollars for a civil matter?”
Shana said she came forward months later to share her story because she doesn’t want the same thing to happen to anyone else.
“It’s alarming, it’s scary, and I just would not want anyone else to go through this,” Shana said.
She shared a video with the I-TEAM, showing Officer L.M. Moses and Officer J.M. Hubbard walking through her former apartment, trying to evict her.
“JSO was at the door basically telling me it was illegal for me to be there and that it was illegal for me to have guests in my home,” Shana said.
But it wasn’t.
The officers had no paperwork or court order to back up the eviction.
The video also captures a woman with the officers. Shana identified that woman as her former landlord.
JSO confirmed to News4JAX that the woman worked for the agency but said her service ended in October 2022. According to a paystub Shana found while living at that apartment, the landlord was a former JSO corrections officer.
Shana believes her landlord used her former employment with JSO to influence the officers to try to unlawfully evict Shana.
“I really believe that this was an abuse of power,” Shana said.
Shana said that while officers Hubbard and Moses were at the apartment, she asked them to call their supervisors to come to the home. When the supervisor arrived, he put a stop to everything.
A document News4JAX obtained through a public records request shows that when the supervisor came to the home, he told Officer Moses to “review JSO orders on evictions” and said that the agency does not “get involved with civil matters.” The supervisor said the officers had no lawful eviction order or valid court documents.
Again, the officers were found to have failed to “conform to work standards” but were only formally counseled and not disciplined.
News4JAX asked JSO why the officers didn’t receive more discipline.
JSO responded in part, saying “…each officer received a formal counseling. This finding may not be considered grievable discipline but is a part of the progressive discipline process utilized by JSO, and is meant to correct behaviors.”