NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Nearly a year to the day, Bianca Clayborne was driving through Coffee County, where a traffic stop resulted in the Tennessee Department of Children's Services taking all five of her children.
A year later, she is suing everyone involved in federal court, including four individual Tennessee Highway Patrol officers, four DCS employees, the Coffee County government and two sheriff's deputies. The children taken away were from infancy to 7-years-old.
Clayborne and her partner were traveling through Tennessee after a funeral in Chicago. The suit said they were initially pulled over for a "slow poke" violation. During a full search of the car, troopers found less than five grams of marijuana in the car, which is typically a simple possession offense that is dealt with a citation.
Instead, Clayborne and Williams were arrested — their five children were placed in the custody of DCS.
"Once the troopers cited Clayborne and chose not to arrest her, she and her children should have been free to leave," the lawsuit stated. "However, the troopers did not release Clayborne from custody. Instead, the troopers decided that they were required by policy to bring Clayborne to the jail to meet with the DCS workers who were waiting for her. Pursuant to Tennessee and federal law, Clayborne should have been free to leave, but the troopers kept her in custody anyway."
Per the suit, Clayborne was then instructed to take a urine test in front of a DCS worker in her vehicle in front of her children, but she wasn't able to do so.
"DCS told Clayborne that her failure to provide a urine sample had 'made matters worse' for her," the lawsuit stated. "(An officer) placed spike strips around Clayborne’s car — with the children inside it."
An ex parte hearing was held without telling Clayborne, according to the suit. That's where the children were placed in DCS custody for the next two months.
At the time, DCS didn't release details to NewsChannel 5 on what led to the removal of the children. Simple possession of marijuana alone does not qualify for such action. In August 2023, the citation was dismissed.
"During these 55 days, the children experienced severe emotional trauma from being separated from each other and from their parents," the lawsuit stated. "The children cried for their mother and father and each other. They worried about whether their parents were OK. They worried about whether their parents had abandoned them. They wondered whether what had happened was their own fault. They feared that they would never see their parents again."
Clayborne is claiming her family's Fourth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated and that they were falsely imprisoned.
The family is suing for compensatory damages.
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