Denver City Council on Monday is poised to approve two payments totaling $41,000 to settle civil rights lawsuits against the police and sheriff’s departments.
In one case, the council is being asked to approve $25,000 to settle a federal , a former Denver jail inmate who said he was humiliated because of a hazing ritual, according to the council’s agenda ahead of Monday night’s session. The payment would be made to Hoglund’s attorney, Raymond Bryant of the Civil Rights Litigation Group.
Hoglund said sheriff’s department deputies allowed tier porters to pat down other inmates during laundry service, and he was kicked, grabbed and fondled by another inmate while deputies laughed.
The department involved in the hazing, and amid an internal investigation.
In the other settlement, the city would pay $16,000 to settle a claim filed by Niesha Leaks, who accused a Denver Police Department officer of entering her home without permission.
Leaks would receive $4,000 and her attorney, Ralph Lamar, would receive $12,000, according to .
Leaks was at home in September 2012 when she saw an officer standing in her kitchen. The officer said he had a right to be in her house because no one answered when he knocked, according to the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Denver.
The officer was escorting Xcel employees so they could disconnect an unauthorized power meter.
A federal judge denied the city’s request to dismiss the complaint, saying no reasonable officer would have thought it acceptable to enter the house without a warrant in that situation. The judge wrote that Leak’s Fourth Amendment right was violated, according to a summary judgment.
