Lawsuit: Local Resident Accuses Cumberland County Deputy of ‘Sadistic Assault’

Goodlettsville resident Doris Calloway is accusing a Cumberland County sheriff’s deputy of “savage, willful, malicious, sadistic assault” stemming from a roadside interaction between the two just over a year ago.

Calloway filed suit against the deputy, Chance Dixon, in federal court earlier this month. Included as part of the suit is nearly an hour of Dixon’s body camera footage from the March 2021 encounter.

In the video, Dixon approaches Calloway, who is standing outside a car seemingly broken down on the side of a Cumberland County road. Calloway tells the deputy that her car broke down and that her dog is dying inside the car. She also admits to allowing her license tag to expire. Then — “without any apparent reason or provocation,” the lawsuit alleges — Dixon grabs Calloway and tells her he plans to handcuff her. When she asks him why, he responds that he found a meth pipe in her car.

Dixon then brings Calloway to the ground and yells at her to quit resisting. She responds that she is not resisting and “began crying hysterically as he stood over her and grabbed at her arms.”

Dixon ultimately uses his electroshock weapon on Calloway’s back and tells her to put her hands behind her back “or you’re gonna get it again.” She responds that she is “trying but you won’t let me.” He again uses the device on her back.

Eventually, Dixon enlists bystanders as he tries to secure Calloway in the back of his police car. Later, Dixon continues trying to secure her in the back of the car and apparently begins to punch her. After the detained Calloway asks, seemingly in shock, whether he was punching her, the deputy responds, “You ready for another one?”

“I don’t want to punch her, because she’s a female, but sometimes you’ve got to,” Dixon later tells a bystander in the footage.

Calloway appears to admit later in the video to having used meth earlier in the day, but the lawsuit contends that Dixon could not possibly have determined Calloway to be a threat when the encounter escalated early on.

“The video speaks for itself,” Calloway’s attorney, Ben Raybin, tells the Scene. “Ms. Calloway did nothing to deserve being treated that way. We look forward to vindicating her constitutional rights in court.”

The lawsuit is seeking punitive and other damages. Multiple attempts to reach Cumberland County officials for comment were unsuccessful.

Dixon's body camera footage can be seen in four parts via the Scene's YouTube account: Part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4. The first segment can be seen below, along with a copy of the suit.

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