Family Suing LAPD For $75 Million Over Teen's Death
A family in Los Angeles, California has filed a civil rights lawsuit against the Los Angeles Police Department for allegedly shooting and killing an unarmed teen back in August.
The lawyer for the family of Ezell Ford claims an LAPD police officer wrongfully shot and killed the unarmed black teen back on August 11. The family is seeking $75 million in damages from the west coast city.
"The 75 million dollar claim against the city of Los Angeles should send a resonating message that we cannot tolerate or stand for the continued conduct of abuse, discrimination or racial profiling that allowed this poor man to be shot dead," the family's attorney Steven Lerman told reporters during a press conference this week.
Lerman fought claims that Ford had reportedly been reaching for the officer's gun when he was shot and killed. "They knew that he was basically helpless and harmless. And yet, they proceeded to attack him, bring him to the ground and shoot and kill him without justification."
This recent lawsuit comes after riots broke out in the St. Louis, Missouri suburb of Ferguson when a white police officer shot and killed unarmed teen Michael Brown earlier in August. The police force maintained that Brown had been attacking the police officer when he was shot, but witnesses argue that Brown had had his hands in the air when he was fatally wounded six times.
Back in 2013, George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watchman in Stanford, Florida, was acquitted of the murder of black teenager Trayvon Martin, who was shot and killed by Zimmerman in 2012 when walking through his father's housing complex after visiting the convenience store. Martin was also unarmed at the time of his death.
