Marc Mitchell was at work when the police came to arrest him, last April, at the New Orleans hotel where he was a houseman. They handcuffed him in front of the customers and staff and took him to jail.
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Mr Mitchell was a victim, not a suspect. His booking sheet showed that he'd been arrested on a material witness warrant - a controversial tool used to detain witnesses and victims who prosecutors fear won't show up to trial.
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He signed the subpoena which legally obligated him to turn up at court, but told the district attorney's office he did not want to continue helping them them prepare their case due to safety concerns. "They were not looking out for me at all," he said.

The DA's office worried he might not testify. They obtained a material witness warrant, and five days before the trial was due to begin Mr Mitchell found himself at Orleans Parish Jail, under the same roof as the man he was due to testify against, who had already ordered his murder once.
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Someone arrested on a material witness warrant can in theory be detained indefinitely, and in most states detainees are not granted the basic constitutional protections afforded to suspects under arrest, such as Miranda rights, the right to a public defender, and the right to a prompt appearance before a judge.
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Orleans Parish, which sits within the most incarcerating city in the most incarcerating state in America, is one of those jurisdictions. The DA's office there says it does not keep records of when it requests a material witness warrant, but a local non-profit justice watchdog, Court Watch NOLA, undertook a time-consuming trawl through case files and found at least 30 cases last year in which one was issued.

In one case, a female rape victim was jailed for eight days after refusing to co-operate with a prosecution. In another, a domestic assault victim was jailed for six. Both were in the same jail as the perpetrator. Other cases included male victims of assault and attempted murder.
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Four days after Mr Mitchell was released, he was sacked. He is still unemployed, save for odd jobs in construction.
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The Orleans Parish DA's office was forced to apologise last week after it was found to have been issuing so-called "DA's subpoenas" - a fake subpoena which warns witnesses that they could be fined or sent to jail for ignoring it, despite having no such authority. A spokesman for the DA said the office would immediately stop issuing the notices.

At the centre of the controversy in Orleans Parish is District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro, who angered victim rights groups earlier this month when he described jailing victims as an "inconvenience" that he would continue to regard as necessary to getting convictions.