LOS ANGELES (CN) — A federal judge cleared actor and activist Kendrick Sampson to take the Los Angeles Police Department to trial over claims that officers used excessive force against him during a Black Lives Matter demonstration in the wake of the murder of George Floyd in 2020.
At a hearing Monday U.S. District Judge John Kronstadt tentatively denied the LAPD's bid for summary judgment on Sampson's lawsuit accusing police officers of violating his Fourth Amendment right by using unreasonable force and his First Amendment right by retaliating against him for speaking out about police abuse.
The judge said there were enough factual disputes for those claims to be decided by a jury, such as whether or not the crowd at the demonstration was peaceful; whether Sampson and the other protesters were "kettled" between two police lines; and whether officers who ordered to protesters to disperse had instructed them clearly on where to go.
Kronstadt indicated however that he may throw out Sampson's claims that there was an LAPD conspiracy to deprive him of his constitutional rights and that the city's and police department's policies contributed to the purported violations of his rights. He said Sampson hasn't provided compelling evidence to support those.
"I'm not sure I understand," Kronstadt said to Sampson's lawyer Lawrence Middleton with respect to the argument that the police officers communications during the protest constituted a conspiracy. "Is following an order a conspiracy?"
Sampson, 36, who has starred in the TV series "The Vampire Diaries" and "How to Get Away with Murder" among others, organized and participated in Black Lives Matter protests in Los Angeles following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police.
During a May 30, 2020, demonstration in LA's Fairfax District, Sampson claimed he was beaten with police batons and shot at close range with non-lethal projectiles as he and other protesters were boxed in by police. He sued the LAPD and individual officers in 2022 claiming they violated his constitutional rights.
Whereas Lisa Lee, an attorney for the city, argued at Monday's hearing that police video of the demonstration provides undisputed evidence that Sampson was at the front of the protesters refusing orders to disperse, lunging at officers and trying to grab their batons, Middleton said the video shows two competing narratives.
According to Middleton, there was not, as police have claimed, a riotous crowd — rather, it was just people standing around and talking — and Sampson was filming the protest with his cellphone when he was attacked.
The police say protesters had surrounded a local transit bus with passengers on it, and a first group of LAPD officers dispatched to relieve the bus was itself surrounded by thousands of protesters. A second group of officers specialized in crowd control was subsequently sent to the area to help their colleagues and the bus passengers.
Officers repeatedly told the protesters to disperse, LAPD says, then declared an unlawful assembly because the crowd was "violent, boisterous or tumultuous." Sampson, they claim, refused instructions to leave until he had been hit by the officers he was confronting and nearby police cars were set on fire.
The judge didn't make a final decision on the city's motion for summary judgment at the hearing and said he would issue a written ruling. Judges typically are reluctant to decide lawsuits based on the so-called undisputed evidence unless it's so clear-cut that no reasonable jury could find otherwise.
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