Photo courtesy of Tammy Ljungblad/The Kansas City Star via AP
The Kansas City police department has agreed to pay a Black teen in Kansas City nearly a $1 million settlement and an apology after he spent three weeks in lockup for a crime he did not commit.
Tyree Bell was awarded the $900,000 settlement after his family filed a civil rights lawsuit against the department in 2017. However, the settlement would have to be signed off by a federal judge as a legal formality, KCUR reported.
On June 8, 2016, 15-year-old Bell was walking home from a relative’s house when police stopped him. After someone called 911 and reported three Black males playing with guns on the corner, officers Peter Neukrich and Jonathan Munyan responded to the call. Once they arrived, one of the males began running in the opposite direction. The officers chased after the suspect but lost him in plain sight. Moments later, the police officers spotted Bell more than a mile away talking on his cell phone.
Though he was considerably taller than the suspect and wore completely different attire, Bell was arrested and placed on a 24-hour “investigative hold.” First, he was held for three weeks in jail without being charged. Then, a detective who reviewed the patrol videos noticed that the teen was wearing different clothing than the suspect, realizing they had captured the wrong person.
Bell’s attorney, Arthur Benson, said the case was more than a mistake in identity or “walking while Black.”
“It was a part of a national disgrace that has been allowed to persist among white police for forty years: cross-race identifications of Black males by white officers are often wrong,” Benson said. “And they are often wrong because too many police departments do not train their officers that all Blacks do not look alike and how to make an eyewitness identification that is not tainted by racial stereotypes. Tyree Bell was a victim of the Kansas City Police Department’s failure to address this national outrage.”
Bell initially sued Neukrich and Munyan, the officer who detained him, the Kansas City Board of Police Commissioners members, and then-Kansas City Police Chief Darryl Forte. However, a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit after the officers were entitled to qualified immunity. The legal doctrine protects them from being sued while enforcing their duties as law enforcement officers unless those actions violate a “clearly established” legal or constitutional right, per KCUR.
In October 2020, Bell’s lawsuit was reinstated after a federal judge said the officers didn’t have probable cause to arrest Bell. The case went to trial, and the judge declared a mistrial after the jury failed to deliver a verdict.
On Tuesday, the pending trial set for Feb. 28 was canceled after all parties were notified about a settlement.
Police Department spokesman Sgt. Jake Becchina said that the department “always sought a successful resolution for all parties.”
“Regarding the settlement of the lawsuit in this matter, the Board of Police Commissioners have agreed to a settlement amount of $900,000 made payable to Mr. Bell and his attorney Arthur Benson representing $458,000 for attorney’s fees and costs and $442,000 for compensatory damages,” Becchina said. “We are glad we reached a mutual resolution and we wish Mr. Bell and his family all the best.”