Austin, Texas Makes its Largest Payout in a Fatal Police Shooting Case
In February, 2017, the Austin, Texas, city council approved a settlement of $3.25 million to be paid to the family of David Joseph. This was the largest settlement of its kind in the city’s history. Seventeen-year-old Joseph was an African American allegedly shot and killed by an Austin city police officer on February 8, 2016. Joseph was unclothed and unarmed at the time. The officer who allegedly shot him was at the scene because of a report about a man harassing residents in the North Austin neighborhood. The officer claimed that the teen charged him and that he feared Joseph could overpower him. The officer fired his weapon twice.
The Austin Police Department terminated the officer who shot Joseph, and he was the first police officer in eight years to lose his job over a fatal shooting. The Austin Police Department concluded that alleged lethal force used against Joseph was unjustified.
This large payout by the City of Austin as a result of an officer’s alleged use of lethal force is one of several fairly recent multi-million-dollar payouts by other large U.S. cities after controversial, high-profile police shootings, most of which supposedly involved young black men. Days following the alleged fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, police in Los Angeles allegedly shot and killed Ezell Ford, an unarmed black man. Ford’s family was paid $1.5 million by the city. Six million dollars was the settlement in favor of the family of 12-year-old Tamir Rice to be paid by the City of Cleveland after he was allegedly shot and killed by police as he sat in a park with a toy gun. Ramarley Graham was an unarmed 18-year-old who was allegedly fatally shot by police after they followed him into his home; New York City paid his family $4 million in 2015.
In this continuing series, learn more about these three alleged fatal police shootings that also involved millions in city payouts.
–Guest Contributor
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