The mother of a young Plum man who aspired to be a model and actor is blaming police for not preventing her son’s suicide after a DUI stop in July 2021.
In a federal wrongful death suit filed last week, Maria Menas said two cops in Washington Township ignored her son’s comments that he intended to kill himself after the July 5 stop in Apollo.
Instead of evaluating Dimitrios Menas’ mental health and taking him to a hospital, the suit says, the officers dropped him off at his Beech Road home, where he shot himself. He was 25.
The suit names Washington Township officers Jarred Kier and Jake Skunda.
They pulled Menas over a little after midnight on Route 66 for suspicion of DUI. Menas told the officers he’d been at a party in Saltsburg where someone forced him to drink alcohol. He also said he was forced to leave after having his gun, phone and shoes stolen.
The cops cuffed him and took him to the police station for a blood draw, then drove him home to the house he shares with his mother. During and after the drive, Menas told the officers he wished he was dead and wanted to kill himself, the suit says.
Menas “displayed a particular vulnerability to suicide,” the complaint states, but the officers acted with “reckless indifference.”
Kier spoke with Maria Menas while her son was cuffed in the back of the police car. He didn’t say anything to her about her son’s suicidal comments, she said.
According to the suit, Kier handed Dimitrios his keys and let him go. The officers didn’t ask about guns in the house.
One of the keys was for a gun safe in Dimitrios’ bedroom. He barricaded himself in the bedroom, opened the safe, took out a gun and killed himself at about 3:30 a.m.
The suit does not make it clear how Maria Menas knew her son had made suicidal comments.
But Maria’s lawyer, Ken Nolan, said the information is in a police report from a Plum officer who was at the house after Dimitrios killed himself. The Plum officer spoke to the Washington Township officers, who said Dimitrios had threatened to kill himself while in their custody.
In addition to the two officers, the suit names Washington Township as a defendant, saying the municipality doesn’t properly train officers in suicide risk.
Dimitrios Menas had been a painter and fitness buff who hoped to be a model, according to his Facebook page.
The suit is seeking unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.
Torsten covers the courts for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but he's currently on strike. Reach him at jtorsteno@gmail.com.
