As if it weren’t bad enough that we have repeatedly been gaslit by agenda-driven media outlets who “report” that the Antifa/BLM-led riots they’re covering have been “mostly peaceful” even as cities are on fire in the background, a pattern has emerged in these Democrat-run cities where the so-called protesters are filing lawsuits and winning nice payouts as a result.
For instance, in Los Angeles last week, a jury awarded one such agitator $3.75 million in a lawsuit alleging that the man’s uncle ordered his fellow officers to shoot him with foam rounds because he wouldn’t leave the area as instructed. The man, Asim Jamal Shakir Jr., claimed he wasn’t aware of any dispersal order because he arrived late, and that the foam projectiles injured him to the point he could no longer do the things he loves most, like operate a camera:
Before long, Shakir spotted his uncle in amongst the group of LAPD officers in front of him and confronted him over the fact he was on the side of law enforcement and not those protesting the killing of George Floyd.”Our ancestors are turning over in their grave right now!” Shakir shouted, at which point his uncle said to his colleagues, “That’s my nephew,” and “I’m going to be on his ass if he doesn’t get out of here.”Shakir alleged that his uncle then motioned towards him and told his fellow officers to open fire with the hard-foam bullets. He was struck once in the hand, knocking his phone onto the ground. As he bent over to pick it up, he was struck a second time.
According to the L.A. Times, this isn’t the first BLM settlement the city has faced, and there are other BLM lawsuits against the city pending:
The city is still facing a large class-action lawsuit by Black Lives Matter-Los Angeles and other groups over its handling of the 2020 protests. Several other suits have already been settled, including one by a protester who was awarded $1.25 million for being shot with a projectile while he was backing away with his hands above his head.Earlier this year, the Los Angeles City Council approved an $860,000 settlement to Deon Jones, a protester who was shot with a projectile and badly wounded by a city police officer during another Floyd-related protest. Jones claimed his constitutional rights were violated by LAPD Officer Peter Bueno when the officer shot him.
In Denver, the City Council just approved a multi-million dollar settlement with left-wing protesters that stemmed from a lawsuit alleging that the Denver PD violated their 1st and 14th Amendment rights by arresting them after they failed to abide by an emergency curfew:
Hundreds of protesters cited for curfew violations during the 2020 racial justice demonstrations will receive portions of a $4.7 million settlement approved Monday by the Denver City Council.The payment to resolve a class-action claim is the largest settlement to date in a series of cases related to Denver Police Department officers’ actions during protests motivated by the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police, city officials confirmed. It’s an offshoot from a set of cases that separately resulted in a $14 million jury verdict against the city last year over claims of excessive force — a damages award that, if it stands, would dwarf Monday’s curfew settlement.
Last month, New York City approved a $13 million settlement over the alleged actions of the NYPD during the George Floyd demonstrations:
New York City has agreed to pay more than $13 million to settle a civil rights lawsuit brought on behalf of roughly 1,300 people who were arrested or beaten by police during racial injustice demonstrations that swept through the city during the summer of 2020.If approved by a judge, the settlement, which was filed in Manhattan federal court Wednesday, would be among the most expensive payouts ever awarded in a lawsuit over mass arrests, experts said.The lawsuit focused on 18 of the many protests that erupted in New York City in the week following the killing of George Floyd by a police officer in Minneapolis. With certain exceptions, people arrested or subjected to force by NYPD officers at those events will each be eligible for $9,950 in compensation, according to attorneys for the plaintiffs.
This was in addition to another class action settlement they agreed to earlier this year involving the protests:
New York City has agreed to pay several million dollars to settle a lawsuit brought by protesters who say they were assaulted, abused and trapped by police using a technique known as “kettling” at a demonstration in the wake of George Floyd’s killing.In court papers late Tuesday, the city said it will pay $21,500 to each of at least 200 protesters who were detained, arrested or met with force by police during a June 4, 2020, protest in the Bronx’s Mott Haven neighborhood.The city said it will also pay $21,500 per plaintiff for legal costs and an extra $2,500 to protesters who were given court appearance tickets, meaning the bill from the class-action lawsuit could be close to $10 million or more.
In a May report from the Guardian, it was gleefully noted that “Cities across the US have agreed to pay out a total of more than $80m in settlements to protesters [allegedly] injured by police during 2020 racial justice protests – a figure experts believe is unprecedented and will rise further as many lawsuits are still playing out.”
A California civil rights attorney, Carol Sobel, predicted to the news outlet that after all the cases were settled, we could see “record amounts… paid out across the country”:
“As I see this now, when all of these cases are concluded, it will probably be a record amount, total, paid out across the country,” said Sobel, as well as a record number of settlements.
One of the civil rights attorneys in the NYC cases, Wylie Stecklow, said the quiet part out loud in response to the favorable verdict in his case:
Wylie Stecklow, an attorney for the protesters in the class action lawsuit, said the growing cost to taxpayers should serve as a “red flag” for city leaders about the NYPD’s inability to correct its “decades old problem with constitutionally compliant protest policing.”“While the arc of the moral universe is indeed long, sometimes it needs reform to bend towards justice” he said.
In other words, the point is to punish the city and its law enforcement agencies so badly that they figure it’s better to look away rather than take action when radicals take things too far.
Are the police right in every incident involving the use of aggressive tactics including force against these groups? Of course not. But the goal of the woke protesters and their lawyers, as noted above, is to shame and demoralize local leaders and LEOs so much so that they effectively give up and allow the lunatics to run the asylum, a situation that unfortunately is playing out all over the country.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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