There is no linkage between the filing of a civil lawsuit alleging police brutality or other misconduct and the initiation of an investigation by OMI or PID, according to OMI and PID staff. According to the City Attorney's office, the superintendent of police and the PID are notified when the City Attorney's office receives notification of a lawsuit; notification of PID began in 1995.73 The City Attorney's office claims that "in the vast majority of cases" PID has received a complaint long before a lawsuit has been filed (yet, this is not always the case). The City Attorney's office ignored Human Rights Watch's question as to whether it notifies OMI when a lawsuit alleging police misconduct is filed or resolved.

Civil lawsuits usually have little impact on the subject officer, since the city pays any settlement with the plaintiff. There is also little impact on the department's practices, even when there are significant payouts.74

After a dozen telephone calls, repeated written requests, and finally threats to sue under the state's public records act, in June 1997 the City Attorney's office provided Human Rights Watch with information about total amounts paid by the city in police misconduct cases. According to that material, the city paid $619,146 in claims involving excessive force or wrongful death in calendar year 1994, $171,267 for excessive force claims in 1995, and $232,450 in excessive force claims in 1996.75 Two significant civil lawsuits alleging police brutality on behalf of Kim Groves's survivors (her murder was ordered by then-Officer Len Davis), and the Vu family (a sister and brother were killed by then-Officer Antoinette Frank) were pending.

73 Letter from Chief Deputy City Attorney Franz Ziblich to Human Rights Watch, June 2, 1997.

74 According to the Office of Risk Management office, the city is self-insured. Telephone inquiry, May 6, 1997.

75 According to a local attorney, civil suits filed in state court and settled or awarded in favor of the plaintiff have not been paid since April 1995. And several lawsuits involving substantial sums, including a $2 million award in a shooting case, resolved in 1995, were not included on the list and presumably were being appealed by the city.