Des Moines Residents Will Shell Out $125,000 To Man Whose Phone Was Illegally Seized By Cops He Was Recording
from the residents-paying-extra-for-bad-customer-service dept
Denying qualified immunity to law enforcement officers who violate rights is a rarity. It doesn’t mean the sued cops lose. It just means they can’t dismiss the lawsuit. In theory, that means officers alleged to have violated rights will now make their case in front of a jury.
But a cop facing a jury is even more rare than an immunity denial. When government employees are faced with being judged by a jury of their peers, their employers tend to start handing out settlements. What this does is force the people they’re supposed to be serving to buy their way out of lawsuits where government misconduct might become part of the permanent record.
That is what has happened here. In May 2018, Des Moines resident and radio producer Daniel Robbins was recording illegally parked cars near the police station. Some of these illegally parked cars were driven by police officers. Detective Brad Youngblut, on his way towards his (possibly illegally parked) vehicle noticed Robbins and decided to start hassling him.
This hassling continued for about 12 minutes. By the end of it, Robbins was surrounded by police officers and no longer had possession of his cell phone and camera. The excuse given for this seizure was… well, no real excuse was given until the Youngblut and the officers were sued. This is what was said at the time:
Detective Youngblut suggested that the officers “just make a suspicious activity case . . . [and] confiscate the camera until we have a reason for what we’re doing.”
Just making some shit up, basically. Once sued, the detective claimed reported car vandalism in the area, as well as a murder of a couple of cops somewhere else in the country by a person filming them, was all the justification he needed to stop Robbins and seize his recording equipment. Also: loitering.
What was left unexplained to any court’s satisfaction was why Robbins’ property was seized and why it took the Des Moines PD 12 days to return it to him. The Eighth Circuit Appeals Court said Robbins’ Fourth Amendment allegations were credible, reversing the granting of immunity to officers by the lower court.
On remand, the district court issued a ruling aligning with the Appeals Court decision, which meant the next step for the officers would be a jury trial. But, of course, the city of Des Moines isn’t going to let that happen. Instead, it’s going to “allow” residents to pay the tab for the misconduct of these officers. (h/t Michael Vario)
The city of Des Moines is paying a $125,000 settlement to a man who was detained by police for recording video outside the police station, court records show.
The city seems a bit bitter about this, but only appears to think the judicial system is flawed, rather than the officers whose rights violations triggered this lawsuit.
“The city won this case at the district court level, which was ultimately reversed by a panel of Eighth Circuit judges,” City Manager Scott Sanders said in a statement. “While the city disagrees with the panel’s determination, it also respects the judicial process and decided to settle the case and move forward.”
To be extremely, explicitly clear, the city did not “win” at the lower level. All it did was talk a judge into granting immunity to officers who certainly appear to have violated rights. That’s not a “win” on any level. It’s the sort of thing that encourages bad cops to be worse cops and ensures that no matter what happens, it will be the general public forced to pay the bills and suffer the losses.
Filed Under: 4th amendment, 8th circuit, brad youngblut, daniel robbins, des moines, qualified immunity, recording police
Comments on “Des Moines Residents Will Shell Out $125,000 To Man Whose Phone Was Illegally Seized By Cops He Was Recording”
Can’t someone refuse a settlement and force it to go to a jury trial?
Re:
Of course they can refuse. This isn’t the mob making you an offer you can’t refuse, even if it may feel that way sometimes. But if someone isn’t happy with the deal being offered they can always walk away from it. It only becomes a settlement once both sides have agreed to the deal.
Re: yes but..
Taxpayers dont get a choice.
Re: Re:
… welcome to ‘democracy’ and the illusion that citizens actually control their government and all the cops, lawyers, politicians and bureaucrats within it
Re:
Yes, a person can refuse a settlement.
The plaintiff has to be willing to drop the case.
LOL
“the detective claimed reported car vandalism in the area, as well as a murder of a couple of cops somewhere else in the country by a person filming them, was all the justification he needed to stop Robbins and seize his recording equipment.”
If this is a murder and vandalism case, why not arrest the suspect instead of the phone. Sounds so silly, yet no murder is even recorded here. So?
where’s the report?
that gag is so old its got whiskers on it. ok big fella, if there was a “report” then print it out and present it. but that’s not possible because there is no report. i swear these ACABs needs to fucking show their work.
Cops need to be reclassified as professionals.
That means maintaining certification on with respect to knowledge and fitness, personal liability insurance so citizensare no longeron the hook for acts of stupid, no unions so no Brotherhoods aka gangs.
As for the judges, they need to be held accountable for their rulings that result in putting known dangerous criminals back into the public fully armed and ready to offend.
Not a Good Look
From the top of yhe story, this all started because the cops didn’t want to be filmed doing things they shouldn’t do, and their solution was to do something else they shouldn’t do while providing a bullshit excuse for doing it. The man they harassed whose property they wrongly confiscated (understandably) didn’t respond well. Rather than do the right thing, the people who could go about this in a way that made the correct people responsible for paying chose to make the public pay instead, leaving the City’s precious record legally blemish free.
Can someone please explain why these kind of things can happen without those responsible being terminated or otherwise losing their positions? Because I feel like the rest of us would be fired the very day for far less when someone in a position to do so found out what happened. These people got to take our money to pay for a mistake they made by VIOLATING THE RIGHTS THEY’RE SUPPOSED TO HELP PROTECT, and all of them still have a job or office. Man, maybe I’m in the wrong line of work. “We won’t do the court thing, we’ll just pay with someone else’s money and move on.” Sounds really nifty to be able to mess up and not have anything bad happen AND have people make excuses for your ineptitude.
Re: RE: How and why
tldr; police unions.
Police unions are able to bully municipalities into ridiculous contract clauses that make it next to impossible to reprimand or fire an officer.
All of the bad things you hear about unions and the fucked up things they enable – lump all those together, crank it up to 911, and you get the police
mafiaunion. Bunch of fuckups, protecting other fuckups and extorting the local population.Re: Re:
It is not the union. They are just trying to get a good deal for the people they represent. Typically the problem is that state legislatures tend to give extraordinary bargaining powers to police unions that prevent municipalities from controlling their police forces. The legislature does not permit other government unions to use the same tactics.
This is really simple. There needs to be a lawsuit from citizens against the city/unions to stop these types of continued, frivilous and unnecessary financial burdens levied upon them. That’s right, start suing the unions, the city and the municipalities and force them to hold their employees accountable for poorly trained, egotistical and tyrannical officers.