Counter Current NewsThe Tampa, Florida City Council voted on Thursday to pay $165,000 in a settlement for an excessive-force lawsuit. The suit was brought by a deaf man who was brutally beaten: punched, kicked and tasered by police nearly four years ago, simply because he did not hear police orders.
Jacob P. Cowie, 30, filed suit against the four Tampa officers in federal court due to the arrest that was caught on video at the 2010 Krewe of Sant’Yago Knight Parade. Naturally, police charged him with “disorderly conduct,” as they do against anyone they want to arrest who has committed no crime. That charge was later dropped, as video proved that he did nothing to warrant this trumped up charge.
The council seemed to understand that the city was in hot water, and they did not question the settlement at all. They did, however, ask officials to report on how much the city has already paid this year to make its legal troubles disappear…
but did ask officials to report on Jan. 9 how much the city has paid this year to make its legal problems go away.
“It seems like more and more,” Frank Reddick, a member of the council, said. The response he got was that the city has already paid $35,000 to a former employee who was fired for being female and Chinese. The city also gave her job back, acknowledging that she was fired because of racism and sexism.
A full $260,000 was paid out to four men and a woman who were arrested in an investigation of the Latin Kings gang. It turns out the case was based upon fabricated information from a snitch who was a felon, and who had been given permission to wantonly break the law as long as they provided police with the information they demanded.
“I think it’s a solid settlement that reflects the egregious conduct that took place in this case,” Maddux said, of the award to Cowie. “I think a jury could have given him more money, but there’s a value in closure and this case has gone on a long time.”
For his part, Cowie said that the police attacked him when he had done nothing other than come to the aid of a man who had been thrown out of a local bar.
Police issued orders to him, but since he was deaf, he was unable to hear those orders, and did not respond to them.
After the arrest, officers dubiously claimed that Cowie tried to assault them, but this was proven to be false. For his troubles, officers smashed his face into an iron bench, then severely beat him to the point that he suffered three broken bones and a shoulder injury that required surgery.
A passerby caught the whole thing on their smart phone, and posted it to YouTube.
A federal judge said that the video “arguably contradicts the officers’ version that plaintiff’s hands were hidden under his body.”
“On the contrary, the video appears to show Reese holding plaintiff’s right arm even before the hitting, kicking and Tasering occur,” U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas B. McCoun III said.
“The left arm, when visible, is seen up near plaintiff’s head as he claims.”
165000 dollars? Well that should teach them damnable nasty taxpayers a lesson.
The pigs, of course, may continue along with their beating and killing program.
Right you are TC the taxpayers get brutalized and beat to a pulp ,the pigs lie and get caught because someone took a video and posted it on Facebook so it couldn’t get disappeared,then get to pay the hush money with their tax dollars.Thug cops are every where in Florida and for the real criminal coverups the father south you go the worse it gets!