Federal Lawsuit Targets Carthage Over Veteran's 'God Bless Our Homeless Vets' Sign

A U.S. military veteran stood on the public sidewalk outside Carthage City Hall on the morning of September 20, 2024, holding a cardboard sign that read "God Bless Our Homeless Vets." Within minutes, according to a federal civil rights lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, a Carthage Police sergeant detained him, demanded his identification under threat of arrest, and trespassed him from all City of Carthage property.

The encounter was recorded twice. Ten days later, the Carthage city manager sent one of the recordings, the police body-camera footage, to the veteran himself, along with a written apology and a rescission of the trespass. The federal lawsuit was filed twenty months later.

The Lawsuit

Jeffrey Gray v. City of Carthage, Texas, et al. was filed May 21, 2026 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Tyler Division (Case No. 6:26-cv-00238). The defendants are the City of Carthage, City Manager Stephen K. Williams, and Carthage Police Sergeant Dustin C. Mims. Williams and Mims are sued in their individual capacities.

The complaint brings four counts under 42 U.S.C. § 1983: First Amendment suppression of speech in a traditional public forum, First Amendment retaliation, Fourth Amendment unlawful seizure and compelled identification, and municipal liability against the city. Gray seeks declaratory relief, nominal and compensatory damages, punitive damages against Williams and Mims personally, attorneys' fees, and a jury trial.

The factual narrative in the complaint runs like this. Gray, a veteran and citizen journalist from Saint Augustine, Florida, came to Carthage on the morning of September 20, 2024. He entered City Hall, asked permission to use the restroom, told a staff member he would be standing outside with his sign, and was waved through without objection. He then stood to the side of the City Hall entrance with his sign. Within minutes, city staff called the police. Sergeant Mims responded, told Gray to move out to the public roadway, and after Gray respectfully declined, went back inside to ask staff whether they wanted Gray issued a criminal trespass. He returned outside, trespassed Gray from all city property, and compelled his identification under threat of arrest. The complaint says Gray asked to speak with the city attorney, the mayor, or the city manager before the trespass was issued, and that each request was denied. The complaint says City Manager Stephen K. Williams was inside the building throughout, watching through the glass.

After Gray left, according to the complaint, the sergeant went back inside and briefed the city manager in person, with the body-worn camera still rolling. The complaint quotes the city manager telling the sergeant: "Being public property, as long as he is not harassing and bothering people, I don't know that we can do anything with him, you know, and we just gotta be careful." The lawsuit says the city manager did not order the trespass rescinded at that moment, and instead described Gray as the kind of person who "films" and goes around to "stir up something" and "get you" in a lawsuit. Ten days later, the complaint says, the city manager called Gray, apologized in writing on city letterhead, rescinded the trespass without a commission vote, and committed to scheduling civil rights training for the Carthage Police Department.

Gray is represented by Brandon J. Grable of Grable PLLC in San Antonio.

The Videos

The encounter was recorded twice, and both recordings are public.

The first is Jeffrey Gray's own. He carries a personal camera and runs the HonorYourOath YouTube channel. His recording captures the outside-the-building portion of the encounter from his perspective. It was published September 23, 2024 and has more than 220,000 views.

The second is the Carthage Police body-camera footage. The sergeant was wearing a body camera throughout the encounter. On Monday September 30, 2024, the city manager uploaded that body-camera footage to his Google Drive and sent it to Gray, along with the apology email. Gray published it on October 2, 2024. It has more than 314,000 views.

I reviewed both videos in full.

What I Observed

The two recordings line up with the petition's account of the outside-the-building encounter. Where the complaint quotes the sergeant directly, those quotes appear in Gray's recording at specific timestamps.

At about 3:52, after Gray tells the sergeant he is engaged in protected speech on a traditional public forum, the sergeant responds: "They understand that. They know what you're doing, but they don't want you up here by the door."

At about 4:38, Gray asks: "Am I being detained or anything?" Sergeant: "You absolutely are, now." Gray: "Am I required by law to give you ID?" Sergeant: "You absolutely are now." Gray: "And if I don't, what will happen?" Sergeant: "You will go to jail." All three of those quotes appear, word-for-word, in the federal complaint.

At about 6:26 through 6:39, Gray asks to speak with the city attorney, the mayor, and the city manager. Each request is refused.

At about 8:04 of Gray's video, just before he leaves, he asks the sergeant: "Is your body cam recording?" Sergeant: "Absolutely." Gray: "Was it recording the whole time?" Sergeant: "Absolutely."

The body camera fills in what Gray could not see from outside.

In the inside briefing before the trespass, a female staff member tells the sergeant Gray was "making everybody nervous" and that "the girls are nervous." She says: "we don't want him by the front door doing it. You know, soliciting right here at the door." Before the sergeant walks back outside to issue the trespass, he asks the staff: "So he's not going to want to move, so y'all want him trespassed from the property?" The complaint says the sergeant did not exercise independent law-enforcement judgment but asked city employees whether they wanted the trespass. That moment is on the body camera.

At about the 8:04 mark of the body-cam segment, the sergeant walks back inside and finds the city manager. He tells him Gray "actually wanted to argue a case stating that I didn't have the right to" trespass him from the property. The city manager responds:

"Being public property, as long as he's not harassing and bothering people, I don't know that we can do anything with him, you know, and we just gotta be careful."

That is the same quote the federal complaint attributes to the city manager. It is on the body-camera footage the city manager himself sent to Gray.

The body camera keeps rolling. The city manager continues: "He didn't look like he was filming, but you got these people that go around and try to stir up something and get you in [a lawsuit]. That's exactly what he was doing." About a minute later, he says it again in slightly different words: "There are people out there that are trying to get you in a lawsuit, so they'll come in here, and then you're like, well, you want nothing. Well, then you need to leave, right?"

The trespass was not rescinded in that moment. That happened ten days later, after Gray contacted the city manager directly.

After Gray had already been trespassed and was gone, a staff member added a more specific claim: "He asked Jeremy for money when he came in." The complaint specifically denies that Gray was soliciting money. Gray's own video shows him asking only to use the restroom on his way in. The federal court will resolve the dispute.

What I did not see in either video: the city manager watching through the glass during the outside encounter. The body camera is mounted on the sergeant, not pointed at the city manager during that period. The complaint says the city manager watched through the glass. The recordings I reviewed do not independently confirm or contradict it.

Asking Carthage

I am attempting to open a line of communication with the City of Carthage about what the federal complaint alleges and what the body camera shows. I have sent a set of on-the-record questions to City Manager Stephen K. Williams and to City Attorney Collin Underwood, and I have asked them to respond. With the Memorial Day weekend underway, I do not expect a response before next week. Any response will be added to this article as soon as it arrives.

Sources Cited

• Jeffrey Gray v. City of Carthage, Texas, et al., Case No. 6:26-cv-00238, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Tyler Division, Original Complaint filed May 21, 2026 (24 pages).
• HonorYourOath video, "Detained, Trespassed and Threatened With Arrest", published September 23, 2024.
• HonorYourOath video, "Update Bodycam Trespass Rescinded", published October 2, 2024.