Settlements

The women alleged years of sexual harassment, including unwanted touching, sexist remarks, and retaliation for reporting misconduct. They also claimed that male officers were favored in assignments and promotions. Individual payouts included $1.1 million to Senior Police Officer Tracy Rhoads, $450,000 to Senior Police Officer Jessica Bastian, $437,500 to Captain Cynthia Donahue, and $387,500 to Public Safety Digital Evidence Specialist Shannon Duffy. The City also agreed to significant reforms, such as a third-party review of the City’s harassment policies, investigations of internal complaints, updated promotion processes, and training enhancements.

Cronin was accused of a sexual assault that occurred in 2019, when he was a minor. He alleged that he was arrested in 2022 and charged with sexual assault based on an incomplete and mishandled police investigation. In 2023, a judge dismissed the City’s charges against Cronin due to a lack of probable cause. Cronin’s attorneys then claimed that police failed to secure exculpatory social media messages and that the detective (who was later suspended and subsequently resigned) never completed the investigation. The same officer failed to complete investigations into at least forty-five other cases between 2019 and 2022. The City later reformed its case management system and internal policies. Half the settlement would be paid by the City’s insurance carrier, and the other half would come from the City’s Property and Casualty Fund.

Hollman, a sixty-two-year-old deacon, died after Atlanta Police Officer Kiran Kimbrough used a Taser on him following a minor car crash in August 2023. Hollman refused to sign a citation stating that he was at fault for the crash, which escalated into a struggle when Kimbrough attempted to arrest him. Hollman repeatedly said he could not breathe, but Kimbrough nonetheless pinned him to the ground and deployed a Taser on him. Hollman became unresponsive and was pronounced dead at a hospital. An autopsy ruled the death a homicide caused by cardiac dysrhythmia from the Taser and underlying heart disease. In response to the incident, the City implemented new policies, including launching a civilian response unit for some calls for service and eliminating arrest requirements for refusing to sign a traffic citation. In October 2023, Kimbrough was fired for failing to follow arrest protocols.

Robinson died at the age of sixty-two in January 2019 after police officers pulled him from a car and allegedly beat him during a search for a murder suspect. Robinson, who had recently suffered a stroke, died two days later from brain bleeding. Robinson’s family sued the City in October 2019, and the Jackson City Council approved the settlement in April 2024. Robinson’s sister then sought to continue legal action, claiming the City violated a confidentiality agreement. However, on May 31, 2024, Circuit Judge Faye Peterson ruled that the sister’s arguments did not have merit and that the settlement was legally binding. Two officers were charged with second-degree murder in Robinson’s death, but those charges were later dropped. A third officer was convicted of culpable negligence manslaughter in 2022 before the Mississippi Court of Appeals overturned his conviction in 2024.

In 2019, officers were chasing a fifteen-year-old carjacking suspect, D’Shaun McNear, when his vehicle fatally hit thirteen-year-old Chappman as she was walking from her school to the library. An investigation by the City’s Office of Professional Standards found that officers reached speeds of ninety miles per hour in a thirty-five zone, and it recommended disciplinary action against several officers, including the driver of the lead police car and supervisory staff. However, Cleveland Police ultimately disciplined only two officers. The City cited the potential costs of a trial in its decision to settle. Chappman’s mother, Sherrie Chappman, expressed hope that the case would prevent future tragedies by curbing unsafe police chases.

Williams was among the most prominent witnesses who testified in former Officer Derek Chauvin’s 2021 murder trial. In his lawsuit filed in 2023, Williams alleged that police assaulted him while he was attempting to stop Floyd’s killing, and that he suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

The lawsuit, filed in 2018, alleged that the practice violated their religious rights and caused emotional distress. Clark stated that she felt “naked” and “violated” when forced to uncover. In 2020, the New York City Police Department agreed to change its policy on religious head coverings. The settlement provided compensation of up to $13,000 each for more than 3,600 similarly affected individuals who were arrested between March 2014 and August 2021.

On October 8, 2020, Sutherland called 911 while experiencing a mental health crisis. Responding officers Ronald Zalunardo and John Afanasiev handcuffed Sutherland and restrained him in the prone position outside a convenience store, with Afanasiev applying pressure to his back, before Sutherland died. While the official cause of death cited methamphetamine intoxication and cardiac arrest, a second autopsy commissioned by the family concluded that Sutherland died due to positional asphyxia and ruled his death a homicide. The family’s federal civil rights lawsuit alleged wrongful death, negligence, and excessive use of force. Although California passed a law in 2021 banning police from using maneuvers that put people at significant risk of positional asphyxia, Stockton Police Department policies as of March 2024 stated that experts continued to debate positional and restraint asphyxia.

The lawsuit, filed in 2021 by the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas and Kansas Appleseed on behalf of the youth advocacy group Progeny, alleged that police added individuals to the list without notice and with no requirement that individuals be suspected of a criminal offense. Police allegedly added people to the list based on vague and racially biased criteria, such as their clothing, tattoos, or attendance at certain funerals. Under the terms of the settlement, $550,000 went to the plaintiffs, and $75,000 was designated to fund a “special master” to provide third-party oversight of the list for three years. The Wichita Police also revised its policy so that officers must witness suspected criminal gang activity multiple times before listing someone, and officers cannot consider attending events like funerals or family gatherings to be a criminal activity.

During a July 2020 search for armed suspects, officers detained Contreraz at Wright Park even though he did not fully match the suspect description. Contreraz alleged that while he was seated and conversing with officers, Officer Christopher Bain suddenly pulled him backwards by his handcuffs, slamming his head onto a table behind him. The officers released Contreraz after they realized he was not one of the suspects. As of April 2024, Bain remained on the force.

The lawsuit alleged that the Boulder Police Department lacked policies to ensure accessible communication with people with disabilities. In May 2022, officers allegedly ignored Montoya’s requests for an American Sign Language interpreter, and they removed Montoya’s children after incorrectly determining that she lacked the resources to care for them. The officers took the children to Montoya’s sister-in-law, and the children were kept from Montoya for two months. As part of the settlement, Boulder committed to implementing new policies to ensure effective, accessible communication with people with disabilities.

In violation of the Chicago Police Department’s “no-chase” policy for minor traffic offenses, police initiated the chase after a driver ran a stop sign. Officer Jhonathan Perez, who remained on active duty as of March 2024, pursued the fleeing vehicle at high speeds before slowing down immediately before the crash occurred. The crash left Jones, who was a passenger in the fleeing vehicle, unable to walk, talk, or care for himself. Attorneys for Jones argued that the Police Department’s failure to follow policy caused irreparable harm, and the settlement, including $20 million from the City and $25 million from its insurer, would help cover his lifelong care.

Officer Robert Slechter claimed that McIntosh reached for a gun before Slechter shot McIntosh three times. Police found a loaded firearm nearby, though it bore no usable fingerprints. McIntosh’s mother, Cynthia Lane, filed a civil rights lawsuit in 2015 alleging a police cover-up, with officers altering their accounts after viewing surveillance video that contradicted their initial statements. While two oversight agencies cleared Slechter, the Civilian Office of Police Accountability recommended the termination of another officer, Saharat Sampim, due to inconsistencies in his testimony. However, Sampim retired before facing discipline.

Peets was wrongfully convicted of a 1996 shooting after New York City Police Department (NYPD) officers allegedly fabricated a story about his involvement, withheld exculpatory information about an alternative suspect, and destroyed key biological evidence. At the crime scene, one victim identified another individual as the shooter, but the NYPD released that person without further questioning and never disclosed this information to lawyers representing Peets. Officers also failed to send a bloody bullet fragment to the laboratory for testing, and then the NYPD lost the fragment. Officers Claude Staten and William Fullam also failed to disclose their prior knowledge of Peets, which may have contributed to their misidentification of Peets as the shooter. His conviction was vacated in 2022 after DNA testing on a hat believed to belong to the shooter excluded him as a match. The settlement highlighted ongoing concerns about police misconduct and the importance of discovery laws in preventing future injustices.

The person, whose name was redacted from the complaint, alleged that a police officer deployed a Taser on him “for no reason” as he was following police orders to raise his hands during an arrest in May 2022. The payment resolved the complaint before the person filed any lawsuit.

Espinoza filed the lawsuit against former Las Animas Sheriff's Lieutenant Henry Trujillo, former Deputy Mikhail Noel, Undersheriff Rey Santistevan, Sheriff Derek Navarette, the Las Animas County Sheriff’s Office, and the Las Animas County Board of County Commissioners. In November 2022, Espinoza was driving a separate vehicle when officers pulled over his son. Espinoza alleged that after he stopped his own vehicle and was trying to comply with the deputies’ instructions, Noel and Trujillo detained and assaulted him without justification in front of his son, including stunning Espinoza thirty-five times with a Taser. The Sheriff’s Office fired Noel and Trujillo in September 2023 over their roles in the incident.

On October 27, 2021, Snow’s mother, Melissa Walton, contacted the Boise Police Department out of concern that her twenty-six-year-old son was suicidal and standing on top of a building. After learning that Snow had an outstanding warrant, officers planned to check on his welfare and arrest him. According to police reports, when Snow pulled out a black object and “took a shooter’s stance,” officers opened fire and fatally shot him. The object Snow was holding was later identified as a portable speaker. The officers involved did not face criminal charges following an investigation by the Critical Incident Task Force.

In August 2020, Aurora Police Department officers held Gilliam at gunpoint and handcuffed her because they mistakenly believed that she was driving a stolen vehicle, even though Gilliam was with her young daughter, sister, and two nieces. Former Police Chief Vanessa Wilson apologized to the family, and attorney David Lane filed a lawsuit on behalf of Gilliam and her family.

The crash occurred when Officer Tracy D. Heusinkveld, who was attempting to stop a different driver without activating her emergency lights or sirens, accelerated to sixty-eight miles per hour in a forty-miles-per-hour zone and struck Manderson Davis’s vehicle as she turned left at an intersection on a green light. Manderson Davis died at the hospital hours later from her injuries. The City did not admit wrongdoing but agreed to the settlement to avoid the uncertainty and cost of trial. The settlement was divided among attorney fees, escrow, and Manderson Davis’s two daughters. Heusinkveld retired in 2019.

DuBoise was sentenced to death but always maintained his innocence. His conviction relied heavily on a flawed bite-mark analysis and a jailhouse informant whose testimony was later revealed to be fabricated. After DuBoise was denied post-conviction DNA testing for years, The Innocence Project took on his case and uncovered DNA evidence that ultimately proved his innocence. He was released in 2020 and fully exonerated. DuBoise then filed a lawsuit against the City of Tampa, several police officers, and a forensic odontologist, leading to the $14 million settlement approved in February 2024. While DuBoise expressed gratitude, he emphasized that no amount of compensation could restore the decades lost to wrongful incarceration.

The shooting, captured on surveillance footage, occurred when officers in an unmarked vehicle approached Adams in a parking lot. Police claimed that Adams was armed and failed to comply with verbal commands before running toward parked cars. Attorneys for the family argued that Adams posed no threat, but police shot Adams six times in the back, killing him. While the City did not admit wrongdoing, it cited the financial and legal risks of going to trial as the basis for the settlement. Following the settlement, the family vowed to pursue criminal charges against the officers.

The federal lawsuit Jared Goyette et al. v. City of Minneapolis et al. alleged widespread violations of journalists’ First Amendment rights by the Minneapolis Police Department and other law enforcement agencies. The journalists, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota and pro bono attorneys, reported that officers pepper-sprayed and tear-gassed them, shot them with foam bullets, and arrested them without cause, even though the journalists had identified themselves as members of the press. The settlement was divided between eight journalists and the Communications Workers of America. Although the City did not admit wrongdoing, the journalists said they considered the case to be a landmark moment for press freedom. This settlement was in addition to a separate $825,000 settlement reached with the Minnesota State Patrol.

The lawsuit, filed in 2022, alleged that officers racially profiled Johnson, held him at gunpoint, threw him to the ground, and handcuffed him despite no evidence linking him to any crime. The settlement included policy reforms, including annual in-person officer training on implicit bias and de-escalation, the hiring of a consultant to review the racial profiling policy, and public reporting of arrest and stop data by race. Two of the officers named in the suit remained with the Arlington Police as of early 2024, while a third left in 2022.

On November 15, 2021, twenty-four-year-old Carter and her mother, Kimberly Jones-Mbuyi, called the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department (MNPD) after Carter’s ex-husband, James Leggett, allegedly violated an order of protection by texting Carter and appearing outside her relative’s apartment with a gun. According to the lawsuit, officers told Carter and her mother that they could not arrest Leggett. Instead, Officer Jason Hees and another officer escorted the women back to Carter’s home, conducted a perimeter sweep, and then left. Leggett arrived within minutes and shot Carter, who later died from her injuries. An internal investigation conducted by the MNPD’s Office of Professional Accountability concluded that the officers should have performed a lethality assessment and verbally offered shelter and counseling to Carter. Hees was suspended for two days, but the second officer involved, who was in training, was not disciplined. In addition to the monetary settlement, the MNPD finalized two policy changes: requiring officers to activate their body-worn cameras when providing information about shelter and counseling to domestic violence victims, and requiring officers to issue a “be on the lookout” alert for individuals suspected of violating an order of protection.

Fifty protesters and journalists filed a lawsuit against the City of Seattle and the Seattle Police Department for excessive force during BLM protests in summer 2020, and the King County Superior Court of Washington approved a $10 million monetary payment to the plaintiffs. The protesters represented in this case experienced a range of debilitating injuries, including cardiac arrest, a seizure and coma, a partially blown-off finger, permanent hearing loss, broken bones, concussions, and wounds. The plaintiffs also asked the City for non-monetary provisions, such as ordering the City to make a full accounting of the changes that have occurred because of the protests. In a related development, the Seattle Office of Inspector General’s final report on the summer 2020 protests put forth twenty-two recommendations for the Seattle Police Department to improve communication with media and legal observers, improve crowd management, increase police accountability, and more.