Taxpayer Dollars: The High Cost of Police Misconduct Settlements. Whenever there is a settlement that says “the city agreed to pay…” that means it is coming out of taxpayer money, NOT the paychecks of the officers who commit misconduct or brutality.
Nor does it come from the police departments who let their officers continue to wreak havoc on the communities they are entrusted to protect.
The money from general city funds could be used for much better purposes. Instead, they are used by police departments to relieve them of their wrongdoings. There is also nothing that tracks how much money taxpayers are paying out per state, per county, or per city.
Minnesota paid out over $60M between 2010 and 2020, and that’s without the settlement given to George Floyd’s family.
New York paid out over $200M just between 2021-2022.
The City of Philadelphia alone paid out almost $100M in the last five years.
The city of Chicago paid $8.8M for just 3 police misconduct cases this year. Furthermore, they have a budget of $82 million worth of taxpayer money JUST for lawsuits pertaining to police misconduct. They have paid almost $600M since 2016 for issues relating to police misconduct.
The city of San Francisco paid about $70M from 2010 to May 2023. Notably, almost a third of that money was paid out within the last 4 years.
Los Angeles County residents paid $50M last year in a one week period.
Where does it stop?
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