Did Ferguson Report Speed This KY Police Misconduct Settlement?

They arrested the first black kids they came across, and kept them in jail for 70 days.  $1.5 million is a pittance. These kids' lives are ruined.

I doubt this is a unique incident, or that Louisville Metro police procedures could stand up to the glare of a DOJ investigation.

From the Courier:

Metro Louisville will pay a $1.5 million out-of-court settlement to four young black men who were misidentified and wrongly arrested in March 2014 after mob violence downtown, according to attorneys on both sides.

Larry Simon, local counsel for the men, who were dubbed the "Misidentified 4," said details will be announced at 10 a.m. Thursday at a news conference.

In a statement issued Tuesday, Simon said attorneys also will announce a "call to action regarding flawed witness identification procedures that have repeatedly resulted in egregious wrongful arrests and convictions."

SNIP

They were arrested through an identification process that the Metro Louisville Police Department acknowledges in its policy manual is inherently suggestive.

A Courier-Journal story last March described how a woman reported that she was robbed at gunpoint of her cellphone and purse but, with her boyfriend, could only describe the perpetrators as black, ages 16 to 20, and wearing black hoodies.

The story described how Louisville Metro Police confronted the first four black men they found two blocks away — only two of them were wearing hoodies — and violated department policy in allowing the victim and witness to remain together as they identified the men, who were standing on the sidewalk under the glare of a police spotlight.