"$13.7m settlement OK’d in 2000 mass arrest" by Washington Post | July 1, 2010
WASHINGTON — A federal judge gave final approval yesterday to a $13.7 million settlement between the city of Washington and people who were picked up in a mass arrest during a 2000 protest near the World Bank and International Monetary Fund buildings.
US District Judge Paul Friedman said the class-action lawsuit, which has wended its way through the court for about a decade, will benefit “future generations’’ who want to speak out and air their grievances. He said it sparked a 2004 law that set out policies for police to follow at demonstrations, including a prohibition against encircling protesters without probable cause to arrest them.
Under the settlement, each person arrested and found eligible for compensation will be awarded $18,000, and the record of that arrest will be expunged. It also requires additional training for police officers....
And how do you think that is going to be paid for, taxpayers?
Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, of the nonprofit Partnership for Civil Justice Fund, which represents the plaintiffs, said the case has helped change the way police respond to large-scale protests and demonstrations.
I haven't seen any evidence of change.
Brian Becker, who was arrested April 15, 2000, along with his then 16-year-old son, recalled police in riot gear surrounding a group of marchers peacefully protesting problems in the US prison system. Becker, a group organizer, said he was arrested, spent hours on a bus, and later had his right hand and left foot cuffed together.
They do even worse things to you now.
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