Civil rights suit against St. Paul cop survives.

Byline: Kevin Featherly

Minnesota's 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has thrown out one cause of action in the case of five people who claim they were falsely implicated by a St. Paul cop in a faked sex-trafficking conspiracy.

But that doesn't end the case against St. Paul Police Sgt. Heather Weyker, who remains on the force as an investigator in the department's fraud and forgery unit.

The three-judge 8th U.S Circuit panel's ruling let stand a second cause of action and remanded the cases back to Minneapolis' U.S. District Court. Written by Court of Appeals Judge David Stras, it instructs the lower court that a potentially "fact-intensive analysis" might be needed regarding Weyker's role in the case.

While it's effectively a split decision, two plaintiff's attorneys said they were happy with the results.

"Ultimately, we look at it as a win," said Andrew Irlbeck, a St. Paul civil rights attorney whose client, Hamdi Osman, was held in federal detention for five years before prosecutors dismissed charges against her.

"We didn't lose; we're still in the fight, so we're happy," Irlbeck said.

"I would call it a stamp of approval," said attorney Joshua Newville, who represents plaintiff Ifrah Yassin in the suit.

"We've maintained from the beginning that this case should go forward through discovery and we should have a trial," he said. "Officer Weyker should be held responsible for her conduct."

Plaintiffs accuse Weyker of faking evidence and coercing testimony in furtherance of a broad, multi-state sex-trafficking prosecution, which ultimately led to 30 people nearly all of them Somalis being criminally charged in Tennessee. Most of the defendants were from Minnesota.

Weyker is defended in the civil suit by attorneys from the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. The DOJ declined to make any of them available for comment.

After former Minnesota U.S. Attorney B. Todd Jones rejected the case, Weyker convinced a federal prosecutor in Tennessee to it take on, plaintiff's lawyers say. In 2012, nine defendants were tried in Nashville; all were either acquitted or had their jury convictions reversed.

Among those acquitted were Ahmad Abnulnasir Ahmad and Mohamed Amalle, two plaintiffs in the Minnesota federal civil case.

With the criminal case blown, charges against all other defendants, including Yasin Farah, Hamdi Osman and Bashir Mohamed, were dismissed. All three likewise are plaintiffs in the civil suit.

In a separate part of Stras' June...