Article author:
Associated Press
San Jose, CA (AP) — A federal jury has awarded $ 21 million to a pregnant teenage family who was shot dead by a masked police officer in Northern California five years ago, lawyers said.
According to a complaint filed by a teenage family, Elenamon Dragon was a BMW passenger when an unmarked van full of Fremont police officers tried to block it in March 2017. Withdrew from the Hayward apartment complex. At the time, Fremont police said a BMW driver, apparently sought after by police, had rammed his car into a van.
Police fired and fatally injured a passenger, the Mondragon. She was 16 years old and was in the first semester of her pregnancy.
The civil rights and tort complaints of her family described the killing as a "failed secret arrest operation," the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Friday's jury trial decision was "a tremendous verdict for the family," said plaintiff's lawyer John Burris.
The jury said it had decided to split responsibilities between the man driving the car and the officers. With this, the city of Fremont is likely to offer an award of about $ 10 million.
Fremont officials did not immediately comment on the jury trial's decision.
In 2018, the Alameda County District Attorney's Office concluded that the deadly police shooting was justified.
