© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Demonstrators demonstrate following the verdict in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who was convicted in the death of George Floyd in Brooklyn, New York, US, April 20, 2021. REUTERS/Gena Moon/File Photo
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Written by Rachel Nostrrant
NEW YORK (Reuters) – New York City has agreed to pay $13 million to hundreds of people arrested during the 2020 George Floyd demonstrations, attorneys for plaintiffs said it was the largest class settlement ever paid to protesters in the United States.
Protests in New York City and across the country followed the killing of Floyd, an unarmed black man who was killed by a Minneapolis police officer who knelt on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes on May 25, 2020, while he repeatedly screamed for help, saying “I can’t breathe.”
On Wednesday, the city agreed to pay $9,950 to each of the more than 1,300 protesters arrested by NYPD officers during various protests between May 28 and June 4, 2020, according to a statement from the plaintiffs’ attorney.
“While making a massive number of protesters financially integrated is an enormous victory to celebrate, the city’s taxpayers will need to continue shelling out millions until City Council stops yielding to the worst whims of the NYPD,” Remy Greene, one of the plaintiff’s attorneys, said in a statement.
People arrested on other charges, such as arson or destruction of property, will be excluded from the settlement, which still requires approval by US District Judge Colin McMahon.
The NYPD said in a statement that it has improved many practices for handling protests such as those that occurred during the pandemic.
“The city and the NYPD remain committed to ensuring the safety of the public and protecting people’s right to peaceful expression,” the statement read.
Court documents showed that protesters at 18 locations, including Union Square, Central Park and Barclays Center in Brooklyn, were subjected to improper use of pepper spray, excessive force with batons and other illegal tactics such as “the kettle”.
Kettling is a tactic in which police hold protesters into a confined space or cordon them off, effectively trapping them.
Batons, pepper spray, other chemical triggers, and even bicycles were used forcefully against protesters, according to court documents.
“The hurtful facts we were protesting about in 2020 remain. Black people and people of color are disproportionately harassed, prosecuted, imprisoned and killed by police,” Savitri Durki, one of the named plaintiffs, said in a statement.
In a separate settlement in March, New York agreed to pay an estimated $7 million to more than 300 people who were arrested during a June 4, 2020 demonstration in the Bronx borough of New York.
