New York City agreed on Thursday to settle a class-action lawsuit and pay more than $13 million to protesters who were arrested or beaten during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests.
Protests against racial inequality erupted across the country in 2020 after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Rioting and looting led to hundreds of arrests and more accusations of police misconduct by activists.
The class action lawsuit was filed by the NYC chapter of the National Lawyers Guild in 2021 and alleged that police officers had violated the civil and constitutional rights of protesters. The plaintiffs’ attorneys said they sifted through countless hours of surveillance and cellphone videos in order to find evidence of police malfeasance.
Among those accusations are that NYPD orchestrated a “coordinated” campaign of brutality and unlawful arrests.
One plaintiff named Adama Sow claimed that police held protesters in a hot correctional bus for hours after they were placed in zip ties and their hands turned purple.
“It was so disorganized but so intentional,” Sow said. “They seemed set on traumatizing everyone.”
Some of the protesters will be ineligible to receive the settlement, which comes out to about $10,000 per plaintiff. Protesters arrested for assaulting an officer, arson, trespassing, or property destruction are among those who will be excluded.
Civil rights lawyer Wylie Stecklow called the settlement a wake-up call to change law enforcement policies.
“NYPD’s suppression of dissent has continued through numerous mayoral administrations,” he said. “While the arc of the moral universe is indeed long, sometimes it needs reform to bend toward justice.”
Other settlements involving similar individual lawsuits have already cost the city $12 million according to the comptroller.
A poll in June found that support for the Black Lives Matter movement had fallen to just above a majority, 51%, its lowest point since the death of George Floyd.
Here’s a local news report about the settlement:
New York City to pay $13M to 2020 racial injustice protesters in historic class actionwww.youtube.com
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