In November 2012, Cleveland patrolman Michael Brelo joined more than 100 fellow officers in an armada of 62 police cruisers to pursue a 1979 light blue Chevy Malibu. After a 22-mile chase that reached upwards of 100 miles per hour, the vehicle came to a halt in East Cleveland.
Neither the driver, 43-year-old Timothy Russell, nor his passenger, 30-year-old Malissa Williams, ever got a chance to explain why they fled. Moments after they stopped, 13 officers, including Brelo, unleashed a hail of 137 bullets into their car. Brelo fired 49 of those rounds, reloading his weapon twice and finishing the assault from atop the hood of the rusty Malibu. When the shooting subsided, Russell and Williams were both dead, each suffering more than 20 bullet wounds.
Last week, a judge found Brelo not guilty on all charges stemming from the incident, ruling that the shooting was justified and that it was impossible to determine if the fatal shots were fired by him or one of the other 12 officers. Brelo was the only officer facing criminal charges in the shooting and remains on the force. Though the Cleveland Police Department's astonishing trigger-happiness led to a Justice Department review that culminated this week in an expansive set of reforms (which the head of a Cleveland police union has already denounced), the city's taxpayers have been on the hook for the tragic mistake for months.
In November 2014, a county judgeapproved a $3 million out-of-court settlement resulting from a wrongful death lawsuit, to be paid by the city of Cleveland to the victims' families and their lawyers. That money, like the rest of the police department's budget, comes from taxpayers.
Some say this system of liability allows officers to do a difficult job without constant fear of being sued, while also ensuring that victims of potential mistakes can seek damages. In many cases, however, it's hard not to feel that we are subsidizing negligent police behavior and misconduct, at a time when city budgets are tight and calls for improved accountability in law enforcement are louder than ever.
As the Washington Post's Radley Balko noted in a 2014 blog post, these lawsuits are "supposed to inspire better oversight, better government and better policing." When the Baltimore Sun reports that the $5.7 million in taxpayer funds paid out to settle police misconduct cases between 2011 and 2014 could "cover the price of a state-of-the-art rec center or renovations at more than 30 playgrounds," for example, citizens are supposed to respond by demanding political change that will help address the root causes of these lawsuits and ensure their money goes to building playgrounds instead.
It hasn't always played out like this at the voting booth, but maybe it's time we begin applying political pressure on the issue of policing.
The sheer size of this financial burden is a big problem, as the regular six- and seven-figure police misconduct settlements around the nation demonstrate. And while the reports below point to some substantial figures, the total amount we're actually paying remains something of an unknown, as the terms of settlements are sometimes sealed to the public and police data collection concerning civil suits and their outcomes has long been criticized as inadequate. There's also the broader question of what messages the civil justice system's indemnification of police sends to officers and the taxpayers who are liable for the costs that officers incur.
If the public ends up paying for an officer's misconduct or alleged misconduct, it seems fair that they'd want the officer and the police department he or she works for to make efforts to keep taxpayers from having to shell out for future settlements or judgments. Instead, we see police departments routinely failing to discipline problematic officers, including those named in lawsuits, even when they may already have a record of misconduct or complaints.
We also see departmental inaction as officers across police forces repeatedly face the same accusations of misconduct, either due to violations of policy or because the policies themselves are inappropriate. We see police departments resist reform and transparency, which would cut back on allegations of misconduct, including in false claims officers inevitably face. And we see a system of adjudication that now regularly seeks to settle lawsuits, supposedly saving taxpayer dollars in part by keeping the facts of a misconduct case from going before a jury, which may decide a plaintiff deserves an award larger than the settlement. (Police don't pay regardless, and this approach coincidentally saves them from further public scrutiny.)
Some police departments have made proactive reforms in the face of these taxpayer-subsidized infractions. Others were forced to change after things got so bad that the Justice Department had to intervene. But many police forces, including those in some of the cities below, have seemingly taken advantage of a system that empowers officers to act with impunity and provides little pressure to deter future misconduct.
There is no easy solution for this deeply entrenched problem. Speaking out with your voice and your vote is a start. Others have suggested a reform that would shift some financial liability in civil lawsuits back onto police -- who are, after all, responsible for the actions in question.
But if we continue to do nothing, we are giving tacit approval to a relationship in which taxpayers are victimized twice -- both as direct casualties of police misconduct and unwilling enablers who must eventually pay for that misconduct.
Here's what police misconduct cases are costing taxpayers in big cities across the nation:
Boston
$36 million between 2005 and 2015.
A report by the Boston Globe published in May found that the city had paid $36 million to resolve more than 2,000 legal claims and lawsuits against the Boston Police Department over the past decade. The payouts went mainly to resolve cases concerning alleged wrongful convictions or police misconduct, and $31 million of this total stemmed from 22 cases, including nine awards of more than $1 million. One notorious case, in which a black officer allegedly beat a white citizen so badly that he was left with permanent brain damage, led to a $1.4 million settlement. Criminal charges were never filed against the officer, and though the Boston Police Department fired him for unreasonable force and for lying about the incident, an independent arbitrator later ruled that the city had to rehire him with back pay, full benefits and compensation. That's a testament to the power of police unions and the arbitration process to shield officers from being held accountable for their actions.
That's enough money for Boston to cover the cost of large-scale renovations to a local high school athletic complex two times over.
Construction began last year on new facilities for the West Roxbury Education Complex. The $18 million project will give the school a new football field, baseball field, softball field and a multi-use field, all with new artificial turf surfaces, as well as a new running track and other features to accommodate spectators.
Chicago
$521 million between 2004 and 2014.
The Chicago Sun-Times reported in 2014 that brutality-related lawsuits cost Chicago taxpayers more than half a billion dollars in the preceding decade. About 15 percent of these payments went to victims of police torture under the rule of notorious former Police Commander Jon Burge, according to the Sun-Times. Chicago voted earlier this year to set aside additional funds for reparations to the more than 100 black men who faced beatings, suffocation, electrocution and other abuse in order to force confessions between the 1970s and early 1990s. In 1994, a powerful police unioncharacterized a decision to uphold Burge's termination as a "miscarriage of justice." Burge ultimately spent 3 and 1/2 years behind bars on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice.
That's enough money for Chicago to cover nearly the entire cost of a new, state-of-the-art research hospital being built downtown.
The Ability Institute of RIC is a $550 million project under construction on the lakefront, just two blocks from the Research Institute of Chicago's existing facility. The Chicago Tribune reports that each floor "will be dedicated to a different area of rehabilitation: nerve, muscle and bone; spinal chord; pediatrics; and cancer of all kinds."
Cleveland
$8.2 million between 2004 and 2014.
The Cleveland Plain Dealer reported in December that the city's taxpayers had paid $8.2 million over 10 years to resolve lawsuits against the police alleging brutality, misconduct or wrongful arrests. The city paid judgments in over 60 cases in this decade, both by settlement and jury decision. These included a $3 million settlement to the families of Williams and Russell, killed by a barrage of police gunfire in 2012. Most of the 100 officers involved in that incident avoided any significant disciplinary action, and the lone sergeant fired in its aftermath was ultimately rehired following a decision by an arbitrator.
That's enough money for Cleveland to pay almost its entire share of the cost to build a new YMCA facility downtown.
The city broke ground on the $12.5 million project earlier this year after raising around $4.5 million from private donors, leaving Cleveland with $8.9 million in construction costs. YMCA executives say the new building will allow them to more than double their previous membership.
Dallas
$6.6 million between 2011 and 2014.
According to the Baltimore Sun's report, Dallas residents shelled out $6.6 million for a number of substantial settlements and jury judgments between 2011 and the summer of 2014. A Dallas Morning News report from earlier in 2014 pointed specifically to two seven-figure settlements. In one, the city approved a $1.1 million settlement for a black man who was beaten during an arrest and jailed for months on a charge that was dropped when video of the incident contradicted the officer's account. The officer was ultimately cleared in an internal investigation, and eventuallyresigned from the police force for unrelated health reasons.
That's enough money for Dallas to have more than doubled its police community outreach budget for each year between 2011 and 2014.
The Dallas Police Department's community outreach budget, which funds a variety of projects designed to strengthen bonds between officers and citizens, allocated $1.7 million to these efforts in fiscal year 2013 and gave a slight bump to funding in fiscal year 2014. In previous years between 2012 and 2010, that number was closer to $1.3 million.