Ferguson slapped with $40 million civil rights lawsuit

[KamaAina]

http://wonkynewsnerd.com/ferguson-slapped-40-million-civil-rights-lawsuit/

A group of Missouri residents, including a clinical social worker, are suing the city and police department of Ferguson for $40 million for what they describe as “wanton and excessive force” by police during recent unrest after the shooting of an unarmed black teenager by a white police officer....

Matthews was shot with rubber bullets, had his face slammed into concrete and had his head pushed underwater “to the point that he felt he was going to be drowned,” he said. He was arrested on a charge of failure to disperse, although, he alleges, he had not been involved in any protests.

Coleman and Green “were engaged in peaceful protests...regarding the shooting death of Michael Brown Jr.,” they said, when police in riot gear arrived and began firing tear gas at them. Coleman and Green were gassed and shot with rubber bullets, despite the fact that “Coleman and Green got on their knees and presented no threat,” they said. They were also arrested and charged with failure to disperse.

Kerry White was filming the protests in Ferguson when police officers took his camera, removed his memory card and threw it on the ground, he said. He was arrested and charged with failure to disperse, “even though no basis at all existed for that charge,” he said.

Coming up on Fox: This whole protest is all a giant scam.

[LiberalAndProud]

1. Good I think.

But I do worry that the bill will land on the very people the police department harms in the form of new taxes and more warrants, and the department will continue business as usual. A complete and comprehensive house cleaning is in order. What are the chances that this lawsuit will bring about any of that?

[Louisiana1976]

2. Who knows how good the chances are? I'm afraid they won't be very good and the Ferguson

police department will continue business as usual. It'll take more than a lawsuit to change things.

[KamaAina]

3. One assumes the city of Ferguson has insurance

so their carrier will have to pay up.

[LiberalAndProud]

4. What sort of insurance policy would that be?

No snark intended. I'm uneducated as to what kind of insurance policy would cover this sort of incident and which carriers would offer it.

[KamaAina]

5. Or they could do what NOLA has done for many years

refuse to pay their legal judgments. Srsly.

edit: Or they could pull a Detroit and declare bankruptcy. Fortunately, Missouri does not have an emergency manager law, or a repuke governor.

[LiberalAndProud]

7. Or they could spend the settlement money on the lawsuit.

My state is currently at the $3.7 million mark spent battling Kansas over a $5 million settlement. As far as I know, no insurance companies have any interest in that battle, so I hadn't considered the insurance angle.

And you're right, getting a court judgment is not the same thing as getting paid.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

6. Who pays?

Is the money simply collected in taxes from the residents of Ferguson to be paid over to this group of residents? Are the very people who were tear gassed and shot at and terrorized now going to have to cough up more in taxes to pay out to this particular group?

(Edit: I see I should have gone ahead and read the comments before posting, since this was just asked and addressed above already.)

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

8. Also, in re:

Kerry White was filming the protests in Ferguson when police officers took his camera, removed his memory card and threw it on the ground, he said.

Seems to me there's a market out there for an app that automatically streams the video you shoot with your smartphone to a remote storage site to prevent cops from simply doing this sort of crap, if it doesn't exist already.

[KamaAina]

9. I think you may have a startup there.

Come out and join me in $iliValley!