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By Packratt, on March 7th, 2010
After the recent outages the site has been experiencing lately I’ve been keeping a close eye on the traffic we’ve been getting and I’ve noticed an interesting thing. A lot of visitors come here by searching for variations on “police misconduct statistics” and then they leave in search of a more “official” site since we’re not run by any governmental agency or major non-profit organization… but then they come back after a while and start really looking through all the information this site has to offer.
Why? Because, despite what most people think, nobody else is doing what we’re doing to track police misconduct on a national scale. Not the government, not the DOJ, ACLU, or even the NAACP… But, even if some of them are tracking it in some way, nobody is as open and transparent about it as we are and nobody is giving the public access to that data.
Yet, because we aren’t associated with any of those agencies or organizations, this project relies entirely on reader donations to keep going. We do not get any public or private funding of any kind to do the incredibly intensive work required to track police misconduct reports around the US and use that data to generate the statistical information that you can only find here… because we’re the only ones seriously trying to track police misconduct at this time.
It takes over 50 hours a week just to keep the news feed going that tracks police misconduct reports, even more to translate that into the information you find here… and all of that is unpaid work I do just to keep people informed about a very important issue that affects more people than most people even realize.
But, again, we can’t do this without help and this is going to be a particularly tough month to get through, the toughest month so far I’m sorry to say. I’ve personally sacrificed a lot to keep this project running, so please, consider doing your part if you want to see the NPMSRP continue providing you with this information you won’t find anywhere else by donating today. Because, honestly, we’re not going to make it through the month, let alone this year, without your help.
Because without an effort like this, you’ll never know just how bad the problem might really be… until you become a victim too.
Thank you!
By Packratt, on March 7th, 2010
Think back, if you’re as old as I am then think way back, to when you were a kid in school. In my day, at least, when kids did something stupid they got a detention or got sent to the principal’s officer for a swat from old woody or got to spend a few Saturdays with some quiet reflection time.
Times have changed with the introduction of police in schools nationwide though. Things that used to be handled in school with a usually-reasonable degree of, despite what they told you about permanent records, temporary discipline are now handled as life-altering criminal cases complete with handcuffs, tasers, mace, arrests, court, jail, criminal records, and all the other grief that comes with being swallowed by the US criminal justice system.
The use of sworn police officers in US schools has skyrocketed in the last 10 years over concerns heightened by rare, but high profile, school shooting incidents like Columbine. These officers, often referred to as “School Resource Officers”, are typically pulled from the ranks of patrol officers who were originally trained to deal with adult suspects, not children.
While some departments actually do try to select officers with the proper temperament for dealing with children and commit them to additional training to transition from aggressive crime-fighting on the streets to patrolling the hallways of a school… others use School Resource Officer programs as a place to send problematic officers, a worst-than-desk-duty assignment to send the cops that other cops don’t want to work with anymore, and send them there with no additional training.
In those places, again in the name of “school safety”, we have been turning our schools into something more resembling prison camps, mini police states, complete with lock-downs, spot searches, armed officers, and harsh punishments for minor offenses. If we needed a reminder of this, New York City NY with its 5,000+ armed and sworn “school safety agents” happily obliged, as Bob Herbert with the New York Times explains.
In March of 2009 two 6th grade students were cuffed and arrested for writing on desks with erasable markers as they were returning to clean the desks as directed by their teacher.
In February 2010 another student, a 12 year old girl, was frogwalked out of school in handcuffs to the local precinct for the same offense as well.
In November 2009 NYC settled suit for $55,000 with a 16-year-old who suffered injuries when a “school safety agent” kicked open a bathoom stall door which slammed into his head. Even though the student did nothing wrong, the officer just said “That’s life. It’ll stop bleeding”
The list of incidents described by Herbert continues with even more stories of abuse in his article about a class-action lawsuit filed by the NY ACLU against New York City over the mistreatment of children in schools by these “School Safety Agents”… including one story about a 5-year-old child in kindergarten handcuffed and shipped off to a psych ward for acting out in class in 2008.
But, if you’ve been following the National Police Misconduct Statistics and Reporting Project for a while you’ll know that this isn’t a uniquely “New York” problem, or even a big-city problem. In fact, over the last 10 months the NPMSRP tracked 52 police misconduct incidents involving school resource officers or regular duty officers who were patrolling schools, including elementary schools.
In fact, there have been 16 incidents recorded in the first couple of months of this year alone, most of these involving sexual misconduct with students. In fact, most cases of police misconduct involving school resource officers that are tracked by the NPMSRP involve criminal sexual acts against students ranging from sending sexually-oriented text messages via cell phone to outright sexual assaults.
Dolton Illinois, for example, isn’t a big city by any means with 48 officers in a department that serves around 24,000 people. But Dolton serves as a well-known example that that illustrate how some departments are lax about who they place in schools. After all, Dolton Illinois is where police officer Christopher Lloyd, who was involved in the questionable shooting death of his ex-wife’s husband during his previous stint with the Robbins Illinois PD, was placed in a school for developmentally challenged children where he was caught on camera assaulting a 15-year-old student over a minor dress code violation in May of 2009.
Yet, despite the story making national news, ill-supervised and ill-trained school resource officers continue to make the news. For example, some of the other cases tracked in just the last few months include:
In March 2010 Boise Idaho police officer Stephen Young, assigned as a school resource officer for 5 years, was arrested on allegations that he sexually assaulted at least 5 different infants, none of whom were related to him. Police are still investigating to determine if there were more victims but Young was able to retire, and thus will keep his pension, one week before his arrest.
Also in March of this year, Providence School Resource Officer Robert J. Hamlin Jr was arrested on two counts of conspiracy to deliver cocaine in a drug bust that caught two other officers as well. Counselors were made available to several of the schools he worked at to address concerns by students who said they trusted him as a role model.
In February 2010 Searcy Arkansas police officer Hamilton Riley, assigned as a school resource officer at Ahlf Junior High School, was arrested at 1:00am when he was caught inside the bedroom of a 16-year-old girl with whom he was rumored to have an illicit relationship with. Instead of providing counselors, this school reportedly reacted by threatening kids with detention if they talked about the incident in school.
In February 2010 an unnamed Memphis Tennessee police officer assigned as a school resource officer at a local high school was suspended while under investigation after a 17-year-old student accused him of forcibly raping her. Students say they’re not surprised as they see officers do questionable things all the time. Since then, Memphis Police have been criticized by the Memphis Schools superintendent for allegedly arresting children for looking at them the wrong way during what the MPD describes as a “crack-down on school crimes… meanwhile the MPD officer accused of rape is still under investigation a month later pending forensic testing results with no charges filed to date.
While it’s unlikely that many school districts will rethink the approach of placing police officers in schools and police departments will be reluctant to relinquish that expansion of authority and revenue that school resource officer programs bring, it’s clear that at least schools and police departments must stop thinking of schools as a place to put their problematic officers out to pasture.Additionally, law enforcement agencies should retrain officers or specifically recruit officers for school duty in order to ensure that they don’t apply aggressive tactics learned in the academy for use against adults on the streets to children in schools where those tactics are excessive and result in unnecessary injuries and arrests.
Finally, school resource programs must have additional oversight that is tailored to watch for inappropriate relationships between officers and under-aged children that also monitor for unnecessary aggression or arrests since many of these programs don’t have the same reporting and oversight requirements that officers on the street have to deal with.
Placing officers at schools bring not only the risk of harm to the students that are unnecessarily arrested or victimized by problematic police officers, but they can also risk the trust that police work so hard to cultivate with students. Each story reported doesn’t only violate the victim cited, but also every child in that school where there officer worked as well.
After all, where are children, some of the most vulnerable members of our society, going to turn to for help if they are shown in real life that they cannot trust the police? Ask yourself, if you were one of these kids in these stories, who would you turn to for help first? A police officer, or a local gang looking to recruit new members?
Again, we must ask, since law enforcement agencies won’t… what did your local school resource officer teach your child in school today?
By Packratt, on March 5th, 2010
It’s long past time for another Police Misconduct NewsWatch, where we take a look at a few of the stories the National Police Misconduct News Feed uncovered during the week that merit a little bit more detail than the slightly over 100 letter (after link) limit that Twitter puts on us.
While we missed a week or two, the 79 reports that were captured since March 1 still leave a lot of reports to discuss… So without further wait, here we go.
Pittsburgh Says “Perjury Schmergery”
A judge in Pittsburgh PA dismissed charges against a high school student that made national headlines after he was beaten by 3 undercover cops when it appeared as though the cops perjured themselves in their testimony and sworn affidavits when a witness contradicted what they wrote in their reports about what she told them.
However, instead of looking into filing charges against the officers, the DA is caving to demands by the police union by looking into refiling charges against the kid… after the officers work on changing their story while enjoying their taxpayer funded paid vacation that would probably be more enjoyable if they weren’t under investigation by the FBI and if two of them weren’t facing civil rights lawsuits in two other seperate, but similar, cases.
Florida Says “Pattern Schmattern”
Oak Hill Florida police sergeant Michael Ihnken seems as though he might have a bit of a sticky finger problem after he resigned from the Volusia County Sheriff’s Department under allegations that he stole $400 from a prisoner he was transporting and then was accused of stealing a flashlight from a motorist last year.
All that didn’t seem like it would help his case when he was accused of stealing keys and a wallet containing $55 from a man police found dead in July. But, the state attorney’s office decided that there still wasn’t sufficient evidence the charge the officer with a history of theft allegations with a crime and it’s not likely that he’ll face any internal discipline either.
Fort Wayne Indiana Cop Strives for Record
Fort Wayne Indiana police officer Scott Morales has an impressive record, though not one he’s likely to get a plaque for. It seems as though this 19 year veteran of the police force has racked up 14 career suspensions during his time with the Fort Wayne PD that range from the use of excessive force to unwarranted searches and falsified reports. Last month he was suspended for a mere 3 days for tasering a handcuffed detainee and this month he was given a 5 day suspension for supposedly leaving his assigned post while on duty in a case of “alertness on duty”.
If it seems odd to you that the officer would be punished more for that minor policy violation than he would for a case of excessive force, the Fort Worth police chief explains that they use a “progressive system” of discipline where each subsequent disciplinary action results in more severe punishment… which begs the question of just how many more complaints will it take for him to progress his way out the door?
…apparently more than 14. I wonder if that Guinness book has a record for career police officer suspensions? If they didn’t, maybe they do now.
Would You Like To Sign His Paycheck?
In Baltimore Maryland, a jury trial has ended in a $123,000 award to two sisters who were violently strip searched after they were falsely arrested by a police officer who is now barred from testifying in city courts due to dishonesty.
Apparently, Baltimore PD Sgt Allen Adkins falsified evidence to justify arresting the two sisters in a bar on allegations of drug trafficking, after which he forcibly strip searched them in such a violent manner that Baltimore Circuit Court Judge Wanda Heard declared that “In my 30 years of practice I have never seen such an emotionally distraught witness”.
Sergeant Adkins is still employed with the Baltimore Police Department, though they claim that he doesn’t have the ability to arrest anyone anymore… if that makes the citizens of Baltimore feel better about continuing to pay his salary.
Even When It’s Police vs Police, We Still Lose
You know how cops always complain that all police brutality lawsuits are frivolous, especially in Chicago where they’ve vowed never to settle a police misconduct lawsuit again? Well, in a strange case of the pot calling the kettle black, a Chicago Illinois police officer is suing the Forest Park IL police department on allegations of excessive force.
Chicago IL police officer Richard Schmidt is suing over an incident in 2008 when police were called to a local bar after Schmidt allegedly started tearing the place apart during an apparent St Patrick’s Day bender. Schmidt, facing seven felony charges including aggravated battery to a police officer, says officers needlessly punched, kicked, and tasered him seven times that night. However, the responding officers say Schmidt elbowed one of them in the face and that he spit in a paramedic’s face who tried to treat his injuries afterward.
Either way, seems like one of those cases where nobody wins… well, by nobody I mean taxpayers since they’ll be stuck paying all the lawyer fees at the least…
Quote of the week:
“It was sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you show up in riot gear, you’re going to get a riot.”
-University of Maryland English major Roxy Shorrock on her experience after Prince George’s County MD riot police suppressed a student celebration of their win over Duke. Via The Diamondback
By Packratt, on March 4th, 2010
I’m sure everyone knows how much I hate having to remind everyone about this, but this project relies entirely on reader donations to keep going. We do not get any public or private funding of any kind to do the rather intensive work required to track police misconduct reports around the US and use that data to generate statistical information and the subsequent informative articles that you can only find here… because we’re the only ones trying to track police misconduct like this.
This is going to be a particularly tough month to get through, I’m sorry to say, so you’ll be seeing a lot of these reminders I’m afraid… So, please, consider donating today to keep the NPMSRP going, thank you!
By Packratt, on March 4th, 2010
As we’re in the third month of this year, I’ve already started thinking about our Q1 Police Misconduct Statistical Report that I hope to put out sometime next month. In a departure from the way I did these in the past, I want to add some trending data to the reports, especially since the Q2 report will actually have some year-to-year comparisons available.
But, before I spend too much time on that, I thought I would gauge what readers thought about trending data, so I’ve prepped a sort of preliminary preview based on data gathered from April 2009 to February 2010…
The first thing I thought might be interesting would be to compare last year’s localized incident map with the year-to-date incident map. I still don’t have any way to make these interactive since it would cost me thousands to buy the commercial version of the apps needed to do that. But I think these might do…
First, here’s last years localized reporting map, followed by the reporting map for the last two months:
Next, here’s a look at the general officer’s reported data over the length of the project so far along with some breakdown of that data in front so that you can see the ratios between types of reports.
Update:
Now that I’ve had a little sleep, I should explain a little about what you’re seeing in the graph. The December numbers are low since we were only able to do half a month due to financial issues. January and February are trending lower than last year’s average but this is likely due to a combination of my missing stories since my time has been so stretched lately and because reports probably trend lower in winter months because there isn’t as much contact between police and the public when it’s snowing and cold outside.
Since this is only looking at data in a time frame of less than one year, we can’t make any real comparisons from year to year yet, but that will change next quarter when we can do that kind of comparison to see if there is any actual trending worth discussing. So, while including trending data in the Q1 report might not yield much results, that should change in the Q2 report and beyond. So, to keep the reports uniform, I was considering adding this kind of data, though maybe not in this way, to the reports.
First, I probably won’t do the incident mapping comparison but do a Police Misconduct Rate map comparison or a trend map which can show where misconduct rates are trending up or down. There may be other changes by the time I get to the Q2 report, but I did want to gauge what general reactions to including trend data were before I spent my limited time on it.
So, let me know what your thoughts are, thanks!
So, do you think adding trending data to the NPMSRP reports would be useful?
Let me know!
Do you think the NPMSRP Quarterly Report should have trending data similar to this?
- Yes (67%, 6 Votes)
- Maybe, with some changes (11%, 1 Votes)
- No (0%, 0 Votes)
- Don't know (22%, 2 Votes)
Total Voters: 9
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By Packratt, on March 2nd, 2010
Sorry about the recent outage, it lasted a little over an hour during which time the site would only come up with a blank page. I’m still working with our provider to figure out exactly what happened, but it was really interesting that the last recorded visit to the site prior to the outage was from the Maricopa County AZ government network a little after our news feed recorded that the Maricopa County sheriff was under investigation.
Hopefully it was just rather coincidental… but we’re checking to see what happened in the meantime. Thanks!
By Packratt, on February 28th, 2010
As I mentioned last month, I’ve stopped producing monthly reports since they tended to confuse new visitors and the search engines tend to refer people to those reports instead of the more substantial and comprehensive quarterly and yearly reports.
But, even though I’m not producing full reports each month, I am still giving readers an overview of what was recorded by our National Police Misconduct Statistics and Reporting Project for each month at the end of that month. So, here’s what the NPMSRP recorded in the month of February:
The total number of reports tracked are up this month with about 406 reports tracked in comparison to last month’s record low of 367. Though, again, the number of reports includes reports that deal with policy issues, so the more important numbers to look at involve the number of officers involved in those reports.
In January there were 419 law enforcement officers involved in those 367 reports and 25 law enforcement leaders (sheriffs and police chiefs). This month there were 468 officers involved and 35 law enforcement leaders. So there was an increase there as well but 468 is about what we would expect to see in a short month like this based on last year’s average of 472 officers per month. However, 35 is a bit high for the law enforcement leadership numbers since the average last year was about 31 per month.
The price of police misconduct was also up a bit from last month’s $12,000,000 to $30,810,000 in police misconduct lawsuit settlements and judgment costs this month. But fluctuations are expected each month so no surprises there, especially with the $16.6 million dollar judgment made against Nassau County this month.
There were 116 police officers arrested or charged with criminal offenses this month. 5 officers were convicted, 23 took plea deals, and 35 were sentenced. Allegations of misconduct were made against 77 officers, 85 were subjects of internal or criminal investigations, 16 resigned, and 39 faced disciplinary action. Of those 39 who were disciplined, 17 were fired.
In a majority of the cases tracked, 77 officers were involved in alleged instances involving the use of excessive physical force and 58 were involved in an alleged act of sexual misconduct including 28 officers who’s sexual misconduct involved at least 25 juvenile victims.
Theft, embezzlement, and fraud cases were the third most common complaint with 48 officers involved, then 46 for raid/search warrant involved incidents, 33 for DUI offenses, 30 for firearm related excessive force, 28 on allegations of false arrest or malicious prosecution, and 24 were involved in domestic violence incidents.
407 alleged victims were cited in reports of police misconduct tracked this month, with 20 related fatalities.
Right now I’m not going to rank the states/cities for this month like I did last month since that takes a bit of time and doesn’t really mean much over a short period of time like a month. However, I am working on yet another police misconduct mapping project that I’ll use to provide a more frequently updated and comprehensive view of police misconduct using the NPMSRP reports. Though I don’t have an ETA for that yet.
If there are any questions, please feel free to leave a comment below or contact me at packratt@injusticeeverywhere.com
Thank you!
By Packratt, on February 25th, 2010
In what is the biggest story of the week so far, New Orleans LA police Lt Michael Lohman has plead guilty to a federal obstruction charge concerning his testimony to federal agents about his role in a cover up of the Sept 4, 2005 post-huricane Katrina officer-involved shooting incident on the Danziger bridge that left 2 dead and 4 seriously injured. Lohman was not there when the shootings took place, but instead had responded afterward to direct an investigation into the incident and he found out pretty quickly that it was a “bad shoot”… in other words, it was an unjustified shooting incident.
The factual basis document signed by Lohman goes into detailing a rather convoluted process by which he conspired not only with the officers involved in the shooting incident, but also the officers that he had assigned to investigate the shooting incident to develop a plausible false story to justify the shooting that included a planting a gun since none were found at the scene of the shooting.
The conspiracy to cover up the unjustified shooting went so far as to involve Lohman not only telling the officers to get their stories straight before being interviewed, but to also sit down with all of them to help them get their falsified stories together… and when that failed, he rewrote the entire report on his own to make it more convincing.
If anyone ever wondered at what extent law enforcement officers might go to concoct a cover up, the Danziger bridge incident now offers us a rare view into that depth, and it’s pretty deep. At each point in the process, from the time he arrived on the Danziger bridge to the point where he finally agreed to cooperate with federal investigators and plead guilty, he knew he was building a lie to hide the murder of two people and attempted murder on several others.
The scope of this conspiracy to obstruct justice involved no only Lohman and the 7 officers involved in the incident, but also the officer that he assigned to investigate it, bringing the total number of officers involved up to at least 9, if not more. While headline-worthy not only for the history of the case, but also for the scope of the subsequent cover-up, this type of conspiracy to obstruct justice is not unique by any stretch… in fact, there have been several other similar cases recently:
On February 16, 2010, Stoughton MA police officer Anthony Bickerton plead guilty to obstructing a federal investigation into corruption within the Stoughton Police Department that involved theft when Bickerton hid evidence at his home for another officer targeted by the probe. Bickerton was the third officer ensnared by this particular probe that had another officer plead guilty in January and a third turn over and cooperate with federal agents. All three had resigned abruptly late last year.
On December 15, 2009, federal authorities indicted the Shenandoah PA police chief and two of his officers for conspiracy to obstruct justice, witness tampering, and evidence tampering in a racially motivated murder case involving several local teens that the officers allegedly helped concoct stories to prevent their prosecution for the crime. Not only this, but the police chief and a fourth officer were indicted for extortion charges in a separate case. On top of this, a lawsuit was filed alleging yet another cover up where officers allegedly beat a detainee to death then hung the man in an effort to make the beating death appear to be a suicide.
On January 21, 2010, the city of Marlow OK fired two officers and continues to investigate the chief of police on allegations that they had lied about a drug bust at trial which forced prosecutors to drop all charges in the case. Furthermore, allegations of rampant corruption within the department includes missing drug evidence, warrantless raids, motorists being robbed by officers, a cover up of an officer-involved fatality, and allegations of child molestation made by 8 minors against one officer still on active duty. The police chief has been on paid leave since late October.
On February 11, 2010, four Manhattan Beach CA police officers where placed on paid leave while investigated on allegations that they attempted to cover up a DUI hit and run accident that involved a fellow officer’s vehicle. The vehicle in question caused a three car pileup and fled the scene before officers arrived. While it was later located, abandoned at a nearby gas station, officers never filed a report once they discovered it was registered to a Manhattan Beach cop.
On February 11, 2010, the town of Dolton IL was ordered to pay $110,000 in damages to a man who had been beaten and threatened with a loaded rifle pointed at his head, then was wrongfully arrested to cover for the incident when officers allegedly planted drugs on him to justify the arrest. While the victim was later cleared of all charges, the police chief was accused of purposefully withholding exculpatory evidence that would have cleared him sooner. After all was said and done, 5 officers and the police chief were implicated in the assault and subsequent attempted cover up.
The list of similar cases tracked by the NPMSRP over the last 10 months goes on even further, including the well-known “Walt Disney the Truth” case in Hollywood Florida to the the recent cover up of a DUI accident involving the police chief of Riverside California… and many more beyond that.
All of these cases share the commonality of conspiracy in which multiple officers work in concert to cover up illicit or improper activity through falsified statements and/or evidence tampering. What make these different is that the cover up involves officers who were not a party to the original incident, but who do engage in criminal acts through the act of conspiracy. It is, at it’s essence, a practical application of the blue wall of silence to the Nth degree. Not only is it that the officers refuse to “rat out” a fellow cop, but that they are willing to take it a step further and become criminals to cover for another officer actively.
The problem, of course, is that these kinds of cases demonstrate one of the most frustrating, and frightening, aspects of police misconduct in that, for every case of conspiracy to obstruct that is ultimately uncovered… how many more were such conspiracies were successful in hiding the truth?
How many victims of police misconduct will never see justice and how many officers will continue to operate in a state of pure impunity because of it?
We cannot ever hope to find out so long as law enforcement agencies are permitted to operate in secret by keeping internal investigations and misconduct records from the public as is the law in a majority of US states. Worse yet, the frequency of such conspiracies can only grow as more and more states continue to join the others in creating exemptions to public records laws which close police disciplinary records from public records requests.
Yes, the latest development in the Danziger bridge case should be lauded as a step towards justice, but for every success in uncovering such conspiracies, we can’t help but wonder at how many more never see the light of day, and how many more will continue to occur in the future in the darkness of governmentally-enforced secrecy.
Ultimately, this is nothing to cheer about until such cases lead to reforms that open up the disciplinary processes in our law enforcement agencies and improves the level of accountability that the public should expect from the same police officers charged to hold the public accountable for their misdeeds. Because, in the end, these kinds of cover-ups are indicative of a problematic system of police accountability that is permissive of such behavior.
It’s not just a problem with few bad apples, but a problem of those apples stewing together inside a bad barrel that the public is rarely allowed to peer inside of.
By Packratt, on February 23rd, 2010
I’m sure everyone knows how much I hate having to remind everyone about this, but this project relies entirely on reader donations to keep going. We do not get any public or private funding of any kind to do the rather intensive work required to track police misconduct reports around the US and use that data to generate statistical information and the subsequent informative articles you can only find here.
So, please, consider donating today to keep the NPMSRP going, thank you!
By Packratt, on February 22nd, 2010
Late last week a federal jury in Brooklyn NY awarded $16,600,000 to a man who lost a leg after a Nassau County NY Sheriff’s Detective crushed his legs with his police cruiser when arresting him on allegations that he was making harassing phone calls his ex. In making their decision, the jury decided that the detective had acted with malice and intent when he hit the man with his cruiser to make the arrest.
Of course, when people think about police misconduct civil lawsuits, it’s this kind of case that they think about, generally because the cases where there is a large sum of money involved tend to make the most headlines and tend to alarm the public, who generally have to pay that bill one way or another. But, are all police misconduct lawsuits like this and are they as common as most people think?
Our National Police Misconduct Statistics and Reporting Project (NPMSRP) indicates that lawsuits as a result of police misconduct allegations aren’t actually as common as you would think and, when they do happen, aren’t nearly as beneficial to the victim as this one was.
In the last 10 months, the NPMSRP tracked 925 civil lawsuits regarding police misconduct reported in the media, this represents about 27% of all reports of police misconduct that were captured during that time period. What about all those other cases? As I mentioned in our Police Misconduct Victim’s Guide, getting an attorney to take a police misconduct lawsuit on is a lot more difficult than most people are led to believe.
Why?
During the same 10 month period, the NPMSRP statistical analysis indicated that, of the police misconduct lawsuits filed, only 1/3 of those resulted in an award for the plaintiff. Of the 33% of police misconduct lawsuits that resulted in a win for the victim, 74% were settled out of court and only 26% resulted in a favorable judgment for the victim.
So, police misconduct lawsuits are very difficult to win. Not only this, most police misconduct lawsuits are taken on a contingency basis since the victims are usually in debt already from the cost of defending themselves against criminal charges along with medical bills and sometimes even the loss of employment that can come from a false arrest, which occurs in many of the cases. When lawyers lose a contingency case it’s costly, they spend months developing these cases and spend a lot hiring detectives and professional witnesses like medical experts and former officers.
So, many lawyers are very selective about what cases they take, not because many of the cases don’t have merit, but because the risks of losing money on the case are greater than the potential win. This may seem like a surprise, but remember that not all cases result in large wins like the case in Nassau County. In fact, most don’t even come close.
Again, in that same 10 month period, the median award for all successful police misconduct litigation was $225,000. This means that half the cases won more than $225k and the other half won less than $225k. While whether a case was won in court or outside of court did affect the median outcome, it wasn’t as significant as you would think. Of the cases resulting in judgments the median award was $330,000 and settled cases had a median award of $207,500.
So, how much of that do lawyers take home? Well, it varies. Sometimes lawyers win legal costs as part of the settlement or judgment, but on a contingency basis they can stand to win a portion of the total award depending on the contract agreed upon between the victim and lawyer taking the case. In general, from my own experience, I’ve seen these range from a low 35% up to 60%, but generally stick around 40%.
So, an average judgment payout for a lawyer is around $133k, but remember that attorneys usually work on cases for several years when they are forced to go to trial, which is why they tend to prefer settlement offers and even tend to write this into contracts by taking a lower percentage cut when a case settles as opposed to a win, even though the payout tends to be less.
But, this isn’t the total cost of police misconduct litigation as the city has to pay it’s lawyers too, and they often turn to outside help to defend themselves against police misconduct litigation and that can be quite costly. In fact, more often than not the legal fees the government pays out are more expensive than the awarded amount, some documented cases indicate that the cost of a $300k judgment can cost taxpayers over a million dollars when all is said and done. Even when we don’t count legal fees and other associated costs of police misconduct litigation, the total cost to taxpayers over the last 10 months has been $245,606,510 in known settlements and judgments alone, though, over 10% of awards are unspecified due to non-disclosure settlement agreements.
There you have it, police misconduct lawsuits are a lot less common than you think, lawyers don’t come out of the woodwork whenever police misconduct happens, and the victims of police misconduct probably don’t win nearly as much as you think, despite what police organizations might try to tell you. This is why victims of police misconduct really need to understand what to expect once they become victims, because it’s not as easy as most people think to get compensation for the harms done by police misconduct.
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