A nightmare before Christmas: How a Marine mom found herself falsely imprisoned for the holiday

Jennifer Heath Box shivered on a mat on the floor, her back pressed against another inmate's back, as they desperately tried to stay warm. The air conditioning blew a frigid breeze through the Broward County Jail in south Florida. Guards walked by wearing coats and beanies.

It was Christmas Eve. Her son, a Marine, was leaving on Dec. 27 to spend three years stationed in Okinawa, Japan.

And the police had arrested the wrong "Jennifer."

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"The fact that it was just so easy to have arrested me just makes you question how many more people [are] out there like this," Box told Fox News Digital, sitting in her Texas home two years after she was arrested and jailed for three nights on someone else's warrant.

Box is now suing the Broward Sheriff's Office, alleging deputies violated her Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure when they failed to do "basic due diligence to confirm whether the person they planned to arrest was actually subject to the arrest warrant."

‘I think y’all have the wrong person.'

Box and her husband rushed to the front of the line, eager to get off the cruise ship on Christmas Eve 2022. They had just spent six days at sea with Box's brother, celebrating his second recovery from cancer. Now, Box wanted to get home to celebrate Christmas with her kids, the last time for at least three years the family would all be together before her son left for Okinawa.

But when she scanned her badge to disembark, staff said security needed to meet with Box. Soon, police and Customs and Border Protection surrounded Box and her husband.

"They asked if I was Jennifer Heath," she recalled. Box kept Heath as her middle name after marrying her husband.

She repeatedly asked the law enforcement officers standing around her what was going on. Eventually, they said they had a warrant for her from Harris County, Texas.

"It's for endangering a child," a deputy said.

Box's eyes went wide. Her husband said, "I think y'all have the wrong person."

Police had a warrant for "Jennifer Delcarmen Heath," who was 23 years younger and nearly half a foot shorter than the "Jennifer" who had just gotten off a cruise ship.

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According to court filings from July 2022, Jennifer Delcarmen Heath was accused of endangering her children, ages 1 and 3. 

Jennifer Heath Box, who was 48 years old at the time, had no minor children. The suspect on the warrant was younger than one of her daughters.

"Endangering a child? What child would I endanger?" Box asked, stunned.

Officers handcuffed her and put her in a sheriff's office SUV, where interior video shows Box continuing to insist there must be some mistake as she was transported to the Broward County Jail.

The booking officer said she didn't see any warrants in the system for Box when she scanned her driver's license, but Deputy Peter Peraza insisted that they book her anyway, according to the lawsuit filed against the sheriff's office, Peraza and other deputies and corrections staff.

Box's attorneys at the Institute for Justice, a nonprofit civil liberties law firm, said Broward County deputies overlooked at least 10 significant discrepancies between Box and the subject of the warrant, including the vast age and height disparities, different Social Security and FBI numbers and contrasting eye, hair and skin colors. The only information that implicated Box was a copy of her DMV photo that had been attached to the warrant.

Box felt humiliated and terrified as she was strip searched, given a prison uniform and placed in a cold, dirty cell, where she said she witnessed continuous screaming and violence in the adjoining men's area.

She woke up Christmas morning after a restless night shivering on the floor next to a stranger and was denied bond because the other "Jennifer" had an extradition warrant, according to the lawsuit. Harris County had up to 30 days to come get her, an officer allegedly told Box.

At home, both Box's brother and her husband were fighting layers of bureaucracy. Officials with Harris County said they needed BSO to send over the warrant and Box's fingerprints for comparison, but BSO refused, according to the suit.

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Finally, the evening of Dec. 26, Box was able to file a complaint, asking BSO to compare her fingerprints to those of the suspect.

Box walked out of jail around 10 a.m. on Dec. 27. Her son was boarding his flight.

"They took from me things that I will never get back," Box said. "I'll never get that time back with my kids. I'll never get to have that opportunity to have those memories."

She recalled talking to the officer who escorted her out of the detention center about all the things she had missed out on over the holidays. His demeanor started "completely arrogant," she said, but softened when she told him she didn't get to see her son before he left for the Marine Corps.

"'Things happen,'" Box remembered the officer saying.

That was the closest she ever got to an apology.

'No employee misconduct found'

The Broward Sheriff’s Office told Fox News Digital in a statement that it "sympathizes with the difficult situation Ms. Jennifer Heath Box was in," but blamed Harris County for the mishap.

"Had it not been for the arrest warrant filed by the Harris County Sheriff’s Office, Customs and Border Patrol would not have flagged Ms. Box, BSO would not have been notified, and she would not have been arrested," a spokesperson wrote.

The statement added that the "actions of the BSO deputy involved in arresting Ms. Box were reviewed by the Broward Sheriff’s Office Internal Affairs Division, and no employee misconduct was found."

Institute for Justice attorney Jared McClain said that while Harris County and CBP also made mistakes in the case, it "does not excuse the behavior of Officer Peraza and the Broward County Sheriff’s Office."

"They had a duty to ensure that the person they were arresting was actually the subject of the warrant--especially in the face of Jennifer's repeated and credible insistence that they had the wrong person."

CBP flagged Box's name to BSO before she left for the cruise, according to her lawyers, giving deputies ample time to confirm her identity "before they decided to arrest the wrong Jennifer."

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BSO made similar errors in at least two other mistaken identity arrests, including one in which a man spent five days in jail before police ran his fingerprints and confirmed he was the wrong person, according to the suit.

"Despite this history of jailing innocent people who share a name with someone with an outstanding warrant, Broward County failed to adequately train its officers or implement new policies, practices, or customs ensuring that BSO staff verify the identities of arrestees," the suit alleges.

BSO did not answer Fox's question about whether the department had made any policy changes after Box's arrest.

The suit seeks an admission that the defendants violated Box's constitutional rights, as well as damages.

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As Box prepared to decorate her Christmas tree this year, she told Fox News Digital she wants to see more checks and balances put in place so no one else endures what she went through.

"I want to hold those people accountable," she said. "You're messing with people's lives. It's not just [fun and games] or whatever and, ‘I’m gonna put someone behind bars, I'm gonna check off the box, and I'm gonna go home to my family.' You hurt so many people in this situation besides just myself."

Elizabeth Heckman contributed to the accompanying video.