Police Violence: It’s Expensive!

Protesters gather outside Austin Police Department Headquarters in May 2020 (Photo by John Anderson)

This was the year that Austinites began to learn the financial cost of the violence committed by our police force at the May 2020 Black Lives Matter protests outside Austin Police Headquarters on Eighth Street. In February, the city arrived at deals to settle lawsuits in the cases of three of the most badly hurt protesters – Justin Howell, Brad Levi Ayala, and Anthony Evans – each of whom was shot in the head by police with "less lethal" lead-pellet crowd control rounds. Those deals cost taxpayers $13 million.

By November, city attorneys, with the endorsement of City Manager Spencer Cronk, had settled eight more of the 20 or so remaining lawsuits brought by injured demonstrators, paying out an additional $4 million. With the video evidence overwhelming and juries awarding large sums to victims of police violence in other cases, the city hasn't yet been willing to take an Eighth Street police brutality civil claim to trial. Attorney Rebecca Webber, who is handling three of the remaining cases, doesn't believe any will go to a jury. "They are settling because they recognize that the brutality by Austin police was so abhorrent that heads will roll at Legal and the City Manager's Office if the evidence ever goes public at a trial," Webber said. "Cut through all the legal flimflam about qualified immunity and official policy. You are left with a department that used brutal violence as crowd control and officers who shot innocent people in the face because they had the temerity to protest police brutality."

Cronk and police Chief Joe Chacon have suggested they prefer writing large checks to Eighth Street survivors to the criminal charges filed against the officers by Travis County District Attorney José Garza. Those cases should be heading to trial in 2023.