New York City has agreed to pay $13 million to protesters who were arrested or beaten during the George Floyd demonstrations, as part of a lawsuit settlement.
As part of the lawsuit settlement agreement, the city will be paying $13 million, or almost $10,000 each to 1,300 people who were arrested or mistreated by the police during the demonstrations in the aftermath of Floyd’s death, according to the plaintiff’s attorneys, the New York Post reported.
Floyd was an unarmed, African-American man who died on May 25, 2020 after a police officer kneeled on him and pinned him to the ground. As Floyd was pinned, he could be heard saying, “I can’t breathe.”
“It was so disorganized, but so intentional,” Adama Sow, one of the plaintiffs said of the arrests, according to the outlet.
Sow alleged the group of protesters they were with had been cornered by police officers, had their hands restrained in zip ties until they had turned purple, and were placed on a hot bus for hours.
According to the lawsuit, which was filed against former New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, former New York City Police Commissioner Dermot Shea, and various other police officers, many protesters who were just exercising “their constitutional rights” to protest had been “corralled into places where they could not escape,” the outlet reported.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs also argued that while the protesters had been “physically restrained” they had been placed in “dangerously close quarters” while the COVID-19 pandemic was happening, something that didn’t happen at similar demonstrations, according to the court filing.
Shea defended the actions of police officers and labeled the demonstrations as “unusually violent,” according to Reuters.
“This was some of the worst rioting that occurred in our city in recent memory,” Shea said of the demonstrations, describing how people had thrown objects such as bricks or bottles and resorted to violent acts.
Floyd’s brother, Terrence, spoke out regarding the violence which was occurring at some of the protests, calling for people to “switch it up” and be peaceful.
The settlement agreement, which is still awaiting approval from a judge, pertains to 18 different demonstrations which took place in Brooklyn and Manhattan between May 28 and June 4, 2020, according to the outlet.
Roughly 300 people who were beaten by police during a June 4, 2020 demonstration were given $21,500 each from a previous $6 million settlement.
