County Man Sues After Doing Time On TV Crime Show

A King County man forced to come out of his mother's home wearing only skintight underwear while TV cameras rolled has filed a $9 million suit against King County police and producers of the syndicated television show "Cops."

Christopher Jones and his mother, Diana, filed the suit late yesterday in Seattle federal court.

According to the suit, a crew from "Cops" was riding with King County officers on June 2, 1992, when a complaint was phoned in by Anita Ricci, Jones' live-in companion then.

Ricci dialed 911 and reported Jones had assaulted her and stolen her car, house keys and $100.

Upon the officers' arrival, Ricci was clearly drunk, the suit alleges. She also had a history of "prior and frequent encounters" with police that should have caused them to question her reliability, Jones claims.

Ricci told officers Jones had a loaded shotgun and treated it "as if it were part of his male genitalia," the suit asserts. She also told officers that he was dangerous and likely would harm them.

Officers called for backups. They barricaded the block of Diana Jones' home, just south of Des Moines, where Christopher Jones had gone.

In response to their orders - and with the "Cops" cameras rolling - Jones, who had been sleeping, walked out of the home with his hands up.

He was "wearing only skintight underwear," and his legs, arms, chest and head were "fully exposed to the police and to public view," the suit states.

Police didn't tell Jones why they were there or ask for his version of events, the suit claims.

Even though he placed his hands behind him as a sign of submission, the arresting officers "violently threw (him) to the ground on hard gravel," the suit says. "One of the officers drove his knee into (Jones') neck and back."

Police then asked his mother for permission to search the house to look for the alleged stolen property and the gun. They found the shotgun.

One member of the "Cops" crew then approached Diana Jones while she was still in a state of shock "and asked her if she wanted a video for her son's defense," the suit alleges.

The crew member wore a "Cops" hat. Believing he was a police officer, the mother signed a document without realizing it was a release giving the show's producers permission to record and air the arrest of her son, the suit says.

Diana Jones thought her signature was necessary to obtain the video recording for her son's defense, the suit asserts.

Spokesmen for King County police and for John Barbour Productions, the producer of "Cops," were not available for comment last night.

Seattle attorney Stephen Plowman, who represents the Joneses, last evening said Ricci later wrote a statement "saying she'd fabricated the whole thing and that it was he (Christopher Jones) who'd walked out courteously and she who'd attacked him."

Criminal charges against Jones, now 20, were dropped, Plowman said.

Plowman accused officers of taking the "Cops" crew along with them "because they didn't have anything better to do that evening. They had to put on a show for the `Cops' TV people."

The segment involving his clients has aired three times, Plowman said.

"The reason they got so upset is they got calls from friends of theirs in Japan and as far away as New York," he said. "They really did get some response from people."

The suit alleges the Joneses have suffered "unwanted public contempt" as a result of Christopher Jones being depicted as a "notorious and serious criminal" on television.

Besides monetary damages, the suit seeks a court order preventing the duplication or rebroadcast of the episode.