Chicago Police Officer Suing the Family of the Kid He Shot and Killed

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-35519757

Joel Brodsky, Mr Rialmo's defence lawyer, said it was important in an atmosphere charged by police shootings to send a message that police are "not targets for assaults" and "suffer damage like anybody else".

Mr LeGrier's father, Antonio, filed a wrongful death lawsuit days after the shooting, saying his son was not armed with a weapon and was not a threat.

His lawyer, Basileios Foutris, said Mr Rialmo's lawsuit was "a new low even for the Chicago Police Department".

"First you shoot them, then you sue them," he said.

The lawsuit provides the officer's first public account of how he says the shooting happened.

Mr Rialmo, who was responding to a domestic disturbance call, says Mr LeGrier came charging at him down the stairs and swung a baseball bat at his head. Mr Rialmo says he backed away and shouted at Mr LeGrier to drop the bat, but drew his weapon and fired after the teenager swung the bat again.

Mr Rialmo fired six times, killing both Mr LeGrier and Bettie Jones, a neighbour who was standing behind the teenager.

"The fact that LeGrier's actions had forced Officer Rialmo to end LeGrier's life and to accidentally take the innocent life of Bettie Jones has caused, and will continue to cause, Officer Rialmo to suffer extreme emotional trauma," the lawsuit says.

Lawyers for Mr LeGrier's father and for Ms Jones say evidence indicates the officer was 20 or 30 feet (six to nine metres) away when he fired.

The LeGrier family's lawyer also questions why the teen would attack the officer since he was the one who called police.

"If you're calling multiple times for help are you going to charge a police officer and try to hit him with a bat? That's ridiculous," Mr Foutris said.

I can't...words don't even...WTF?

""The fact that LeGrier's actions had forced Officer Rialmo to end LeGrier's life and to accidentally take the innocent life of Bettie Jones has caused, and will continue to cause, Officer Rialmo to suffer extreme emotional trauma,""

Good, don't shoot innocent people, you *******.

If this emo-cop wins, it's going to open the doorway for more of these cases.

Nice to see a fair balenced discussion here. The nutjob kid had a bat. If these parents had either a.) institutionalized their dangerous child or B.) taken care of him assaulting them this wouldn't have happened.

Brought entirely on by failures of parenting.

You open with criticism of people not being "fair and balanced" and then follow it up with "nutjob" remarks.

As far as the lawsuit, even if the kid did indeed try and kill the officer and the shooting was valid, suing because you had to do an aspect of your job is ridiculous. Might as well have a fireman sue the homeowner over the stress a house-fire caused the fireman.

Lol, cry harder. The Nutjob isn't a "kid" either, he was in college... But dont let the facts get in the way

His job isn't psycologist. The parents of this "special snowflake" created a no-win scenario, and now someone has to deal with the ptsd. Please tell me about your first hand experience with dealing with dangerous people as an authority figure.

You're the only one who seems to be emotional about this. "Kid" is a figure of speech as he was a teen. Calm down.

Having to possibly use your gun and make life and death choices is part of being a police officer, it's literally what you sign up for when you join the academy. I suppose with that comment we can assume you're a cop or in some position of authority that deals with "dangerous people"?

Kid is not a figure of speech its a euphamism, but its not accurate to a college age student.

You honestly think people sign up to join the police with the hope of shooting someone? :/ wow... Wow

That's right, never in the history of history has a teenage adult been referred to as "kid". You got me.

That's not what I said, you're strawmanning because you know you don't have an argument.

Google image "kid" let me know when you find an adult.

You said "having to use your gun" is "literally what they signed up for." Lol, your words. Not a strawman.

Google + Kid = http://a.abcnews.go.com/images/US/GTY_kid_rock_tk_130809_33x16_1600.jpg Anyhow.

What I said in full was: "Having to possibly use your gun and make life and death choices is part of being a police officer, it's literally what you sign up for when you join the academy."

What you did is chop up my sentence to alter the meaning. This was a strawman, because you didn't have a counter argument to what I actually said and you're trying to distract.

Originally posted by Henry_Pym
Kid is not a figure of speech its a euphamism, but its not accurate to a college age student.

You honestly think people sign up to join the police with the hope of shooting someone? :/ wow... Wow

Still I think an officer suing someone over a part of their job is a pretty bad precedent to set.

Him suing the parents of someone he killed is just silly to me.

As for a wrongful death suit against the cop. That is there to help push investigations to make sure the actions the cop took were justified.

It's not just silly, it's utterly repulsive. Who would even think of doing that for ****s sake?

Originally posted by Robtard
Google + Kid = http://a.abcnews.go.com/images/US/GTY_kid_rock_tk_130809_33x16_1600.jpg Anyhow.

What I said in full was: "Having to possibly use your gun and make life and death choices is part of being a police officer, it's literally what you sign up for when you join the academy."

What you did is chop up my sentence to alter the meaning. This was a strawman, because you didn't have a counter argument to what I actually said and you're trying to distract.

Originally posted by Newjak
Some people probably would sign up fi they thought they could shoot someone or get to abuse control over someone else.

Still I think an officer suing someone over a part of their job is a pretty bad precedent to set.

Him suing the parents of someone he killed is just silly to me.

As for a wrongful death suit against the cop. That is there to help push investigations to make sure the actions the cop took were justified.

Originally posted by Henry_Pym
you have no idea why people do things, you are just assuming that because the worst thing that could happen to you falls under his duties it doesn't matter the impact on him. I'm not even sure what a one person distraction would do in a 1v1 debate... But lol.

There are outlets for police officers who suffer from job-related stress, there's job-paid counseling and such. That wasn't the topic though, the lawsuit and it's ridiculousness was; this man is suing because he had to do an [crappy] aspect of his job.

I'm also uncertain how suing the family is going to help him with the apparent mental breakdown he's having?

Originally posted by Henry_Pym
Why? If you are in the wrong why should the state pay for it?

Originally posted by Newjak
Why what? Why do I not want Officers being able to sue for stuff like this? Because it has the potential for abuse. Legit abuse because officers can have tremendous feedback on the process which can effect the outcome of such cases.

Originally posted by Robtard
There are outlets for police officers who suffer from job-related stress, there's job-paid counseling and such. That wasn't the topic though, the lawsuit and it's ridiculousness was; this man is suing because he had to do an [crappy] aspect of his job.

I'm also uncertain how suing the family is going to help him with the apparent mental breakdown he's having?

Originally posted by Henry_Pym
yes, and if firefighters have to fight a fire in a building with Asbestos they should be able to sue the building owner. The officer is suing the estate, not the family. The "Kid" has money coming to his estate but the combination of mental illness and drugs caused an undue hardship on the officer.

Only if said asbestos was put in place illegally after the use of asbestos was banned. Being mentally ill (if that's the case for the kid) isn't illegal. Suing the estate is akin to suing the family.

Possibly dealing with mentally unstable people is part of the job, just like dealing with violent people, intoxicated people etc. It's not like there's a check-off list of people you don't want to deal with after graduating from the academy.

It is negligent when they had described him before the incident as violent and acting erratic. The family should have contacted mental health people long before it escalated to him threatening dispachers over the phone and swinging a weapon at police in the street.

Originally posted by Henry_Pym
Nice to see a fair balenced discussion here. The nutjob kid had a bat. If these parents had either a.) institutionalized their dangerous child or B.) taken care of him assaulting them this wouldn't have happened.

Brought entirely on by failures of parenting.