Civil Rights Groups Reach a $336K Settlement in North Carolina

A city and two law enforcement agencies in a North Carolina county will pay $336,000 to a group of plaintiffs to settle a lawsuit stemming from a 2020 protest in which demonstrators were pepper-sprayed during a get-out-the-vote rally.
The American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and a Chicago-based law firm announced the agreement in a news release on Wednesday. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in November 2020 and named as defendants the city of Graham and Police Chief Kristi Cole, 15 police officers, Alamance County Sheriff Terry Johnson and 15 deputies.
“It is outrageous that people marching to the polls to cast their ballot were met with police brutality. The right to gather and march in support of a shared cause is at the core of the First Amendment,” Chantal Stevens, executive director of the ACLU of North Carolina, said in the news release. “This agreement is a step in the right direction, but it’s insufficient to reckon with the violence and trauma that these community members endured at the hands of police.”