‘Stop dressing up like soldiers and pretending’: SWAT team arrest of innocent teen triggers legal action

The SWAT team arrest of an innocent teen in the state of Maine has drawn a civil rights lawsuit on behalf of the boy targeted by officers even though he had “little in common” with the real suspect in the theft of several pairs of shoes.

It is the Institute for Justice that is working with L.M., a 16-year-old, and his family on the case against police in Portland.

“What happened to my son should have never happened,” said L.M.’s mother, Amber Miller. “Our community is traumatized. The time has come for police to stop dressing up like soldiers and pretending that every suspect warrants semi-automatic rifles and bulletproof vests. We need to rebuild trust—and trust starts with accountability. They can’t undo the trauma my son has gone through, but we’re hopeful the courts will hold the officers and the cities accountable and ensure this never happens to another family.”

The IJ reported, “On May 13, 2025, sixteen-year-old L.M.—identified by his initials because he is a minor—left Deering High School during the open lunch period. Like many students, he stepped off campus to meet friends for a quick lunch run.

“As L.M. walked along the sidewalk, officers in tactical gear carrying assault rifles rounded the corner behind him. Without seeing more than the back of his head, they aimed their rifles at him and ordered him to stop and raise his hands. Terrified, L.M. immediately complied as officers directed him into the street, ordered him to the ground, and handcuffed him.

“The officers were looking for someone else: a different teenager suspected of a minor, nonviolent burglary and theft of several pairs of shoes and a bottle of cologne. L.M. and the suspect had little in common beyond being black teenagers—and even that similarity was vague, because there were obvious differences, including L.M.’s height, build, hairstyle, and the absence of a prominent tattoo on the suspect’s arm.

“Yet even after it became clear that L.M. was not the person they were after, the officers kept him cuffed, questioned him, and searched him—while students gathered and his friends watched in disbelief.”

“In America, police can’t treat an innocent teenager walking near school like an armed threat over a minor theft—and once officers realize they’ve detained the wrong person, the Constitution requires them to let him go immediately,” said Marie Miller, an attorney at the Institute for Justice which represents the Miller family (who are unrelated). “This case is about a basic Fourth Amendment principle: the government doesn’t get to keep holding you just because the government already started detaining you.”

The federal lawsuit seeks accountability for the situation. It charges that police, backed by a SWAT team carrying rifles, mistakenly detained an innocent 16-year-old boy at gunpoint because he allegedly resembled a different person: a nonviolent burglary suspect.

Instead of releasing the innocent teen when officers realized they had the wrong suspect, they “kept the teenager in handcuffs, questioned and searched him, and publicly humiliated him in front of his friends.”

“A SWAT team is supposed to be for a rare, truly dangerous scenario—not a default setting for everyday policing,” said IJ Attorney Jaba Tsitsuashvili. “And once officers know they have the wrong person, the Constitution doesn’t allow them to keep holding the person without any reason to believe they’ve committed a crime. They must stop. The Constitution may not require an apology, but rebuilding trust demands accountability, along with a commitment to do better.”