The Denver Post
Council gives early OK to settlement in teen's death
Wednesday, June 02, 2004 -
The Denver City Council on Tuesday gave preliminary approval to the city's $1.325 million settlement with the family of Paul Childs, the developmentally disabled teen shot to death last year by a police officer.
The council voted 12-1 to approve the deal on first reading. The settlement faces a second and final review Monday. Typically, votes on final readings go much as the first readings do. "I personally do not believe that a jury trial would ever produce a decision that would tell us what the pain and suffering is worth nor about the quality of our police force," Councilwoman Jeanne Robb said. "We'd have a decision but not an answer." Said Councilman Michael Hancock, "I believe our city's legal team has done what was in the best interest of this city, the family and the community." City officials announced the settlement last week, quelling a potential federal civil-rights lawsuit from the Childs family. The family, represented by Denver law firm Holland & Hart and famed lawyer Johnnie Cochran, had intended to seek $5 million at trial. Denver officer James Turney shot Paul Childs in July at the family's home after Childs walked toward him with a knife and did not heed orders to drop it. City officials suspended Turney in April for 10 months without pay for his role in the shooting and other issues. Specifically, city leaders faulted Turney not for shooting Childs but for failing to defuse the situation before it got to that point. Several council members on Tuesday described the settlement as in the best interest of all involved. They deemed a jury trial in the case a gamble not worth taking and the potential publicity damaging. Councilwoman Jeanne Faatz dissented. Expressing sympathy for Childs' mother, Faatz said she thinks the city would have had a good case if it had gone to trial. Faatz has previously voted against settlements in cases involving plaintiffs hurt after police confronted them for wrongdoing. "The situation was caused by Paul Childs," Faatz said. "He had a knife, and he threatened others with it." Faatz added that a jury culled from across the Front Range would have considered that Paul Childs did not heed Turney's orders and that the Childs family dialed 911 "50 times for matters little and big." The $1.325 million will be paid from a $6.6 million reserve fund the city keeps for legal settlements. With the Childs case settled, city lawyers are girding to defend the conduct of Turney and another officer in the 2002 shooting death of Gregory Smith, an 18-year-old deaf man. The officers shot Smith after he failed to drop a knife. "It is our intent to defend that case vigorously," City Attorney Cole Finegan said. |