Police Misconduct Blog

Derek Chauvin’s criminal trial in the death of George Floyd is scheduled to begin shortly. He faces charges of second-degree murder, third-degree murder, and manslaughter in the death of Floyd. The eight-minute video of Chauvin kneeling on Floyd’s neck until he went motionless and later...

On March 12, the Minneapolis City Council voted 13-0 to approve a $27 million wrongful death settlement with the Floyd family over George Floyd’s death last May.
This marks one of the largest police misconduct payouts in history. The video of Floyd’s gruesome death as he lay...

A judge ordered the state of Mississippi to pay $500,000 to a man wrongfully imprisoned for nearly a quarter-century. The order included a $50,000 payment to Curtis Flowers’ attorneys.
Flowers was tried six times in a 1996 quadruple murder case. After spending years on Death Row,...

In Washington State’s history, no police officer has ever had their badge revoked due to excessive force. While police reform legislation nationwide has aimed at chokehold restrictions, the need for body cameras and similar measures, a bill passing the state Senate on February 24 takes a...

Four years ago, Quanice Hayes, 17, was shot and killed by Portland police. He was a suspect in an armed robbery and carjacking at the time. In February 2021, Deputy City Attorney Daniel Simon announced a settlement in the lawsuit against the city filed by Hayes’ family. They will receive $1.5...

An investigation commissioned by the city of Aurora, Colorado finds that the police officers had no reason to stop Elijah McClain, 23, in the summer of 2019, let alone put him in a chokehold. Fire department paramedics attending him after his collapse gave him the powerful sedative ketamine, which...

A mental health crisis two days before Christmas ended with the death of a young Navy veteran. The family of Angelo Quinto, 30, called 911 after he began behaving erratically. After suffering a head injury in an assault a year earlier, he had grown paranoid and anxious. His sister, Isabella, said...

In November 2014, a Cleveland, Ohio police officer shot and killed 12-year-old Tamir Rice. Two years later, the city paid his family $6 million. This payout averted a civil rights lawsuit. The family's attorney called the settlement "historic in financial terms," although no amount of money could...

When Kelsey Love gave birth to her son on May 16, 2017, she had to chew off the newborn’s umbilical cord. The Indiana resident had given birth, alone, in Kentucky’s Franklin County Regional Jail. Although she screamed in pain during the labor, no jail staffers came to her aid.
In...

Were You Sexually Abused By a Police Officer? Ever drive by a convenience store and see a police car parked outside? Cops love hot coffee, fast service and the later hours offered at most convenience stores. The owners and employees of those stations like having cops around because it deters...