Des Moines Police Win Final George Floyd Protest Lawsuit After Four Years

A federal jury ruled for Des Moines police in the last pending lawsuit from the 2020 George Floyd protests, while a state judge dismissed a second case the same week.

Des Moines Police Prevail in Last of 2020 Protest Lawsuits

The Des Moines Police Department has won the final lawsuit still pending from the 2020 protests that followed the killing of George Floyd, desmoinesregister.com reports. The verdict closes out more than four years of litigation stemming from a wave of arrests and allegations of officer misconduct during that period of civil unrest.

On October 23, a federal jury ruled in favour of Des Moines police officer Jacob Hedlund on all claims brought by Paxton Williams, who was then serving as an assistant Iowa attorney general. Williams alleged that Hedlund pepper-sprayed and tackled him on the night of June 1, 2020, as he stood on the sidewalk outside his downtown home. The jury returned its verdict after two days of testimony.

The outcome in the Williams trial came one week after an Iowa district judge dismissed a separate lawsuit filed by Trent Schwab. Schwab was arrested in the early hours of May 31, 2020, near a location where officers were responding to a crowd breaking into the downtown Hy-Vee store. He acknowledged angrily yelling and stomping his feet at officers but maintained he was turning to walk to his nearby apartment when an officer tackled and detained him. A federal judge had already ruled against Schwab in March 2023; on October 15, the state court made a similar ruling on his state law claims.

A city spokesperson confirmed that the Schwab and Williams cases were the last two from the 2020 protests still active at the district court level.

City Manager Scott Sanders said the city agreed with both the jury verdict and the judges' rulings, and that it had drawn lessons from the unrest to improve future responses. "The Des Moines Police Department was confronted with rare and sudden circumstances and it has responded with improved policies and training to help manage similar situations in the future," Sanders said in a written statement.

Williams, who now works for a private law firm, said he filed the case believing his rights had been clearly violated and hoping it would prompt the city to handle similar situations differently. "I brought this case because I believed there were clear violations of my rights," he said. "I also brought it because I wanted the City and its police officers to take a close look at what happened with me in the hopes that they might handle any similar situation in the future differently."

His attorney, Angela Campbell, was more pointed, arguing the litigation would never have been necessary had Des Moines police taken officer misconduct complaints more seriously. "Regardless of the verdict, there is no question in my mind that Paxton Williams was mistreated by the police," Campbell said, adding that certain alleged conduct by officers had not been permitted to be presented to the jury. She said that if the case prevented even one officer from engaging in unnecessary violence against a civilian, "then all of the work and time put into this case was worth it."

Attorney Gina Messamer, who represented Schwab and other plaintiffs in protest-related lawsuits, said the ruling did not alter her view that her client had been wrongly arrested. "There's no dispute Mr. Schwab was mistakenly arrested when he was simply walking home from work," Messamer wrote in an email. "This mistake could have been avoided if the officers would have done a basic investigation."

The two October rulings are not the only courtroom wins for the city. In August, a jury sided with Des Moines in a lawsuit brought by Denver Foote, a protester who later ran unsuccessfully for Des Moines mayor in 2022. Several other cases were dismissed by courts or ended in nominal settlements.

Other lawsuits, however, have resulted in substantial payouts. The largest settlement — $800,000 — covered claims from 14 people arrested near Court Avenue on the night of the Hy-Vee break-in. The city also paid $150,000 to Essence Welch after a jury found that an officer who pepper-sprayed her near a police line had violated her rights, $100,000 to a news photographer who was tackled and arrested while on duty despite showing his press credentials, and $50,000 — alongside a $25,000 payment from Polk County — to a Black man tackled and charged with rioting while a white companion walking nearby was not.

While the combined settlements exceed $1 million, the full cost of the litigation to the city remains unknown. Officials have said the city does not track legal expenses for its staff attorneys on a case-by-case basis, making it impossible to determine how many hours were devoted to defending the claims.

The conclusion of the final trial does not entirely close the matter for Des Moines. Foote's case remains pending on appeal, meaning additional litigation costs and potential damages remain possible. Questions about the city's protest tactics also surfaced repeatedly during its recent search for a new police chief, which ended with City Manager Sanders appointing then-Major Michael McTaggart to replace outgoing Chief Dana Wingert. The city is additionally contesting a court order requiring it to hand over hundreds of use-of-force records to a nonprofit watchdog organisation.

Source: Google News MT — Crime (en)