Council delays vote in Harding raid suit

City Council delayed a vote Wednesday on whether to spend more than $1.2 million on a legal firm to defend the city in a lawsuit stemming from the botched 2019 Harding Street raid that left two residents dead, four officers shot and a dozen current and former officers facing charges.

Council had been set to hire Beck Redden LLP for the seven-figure sum, a bill that could rise during the litigation. Mayor Sylvester Turner said the city’s legal department is stretched thin and the city has an obligation to defend itself.

The lawsuit was brought against the city, former Police Chief Art Acevedo and other officers by the family of Dennis Tuttle and his wife, Rhogena Nicholas, who were shot to death by police during the raid. The suit asserts that the officers violated the couple’s civil rights.

Authorities later accused the lead narcotics officer, Gerald Goines, of lying to obtain the warrant used in the raid. He has been charged with murder and other crimes, and 11 other current and former narcotics officers face charges, as well.

Councilmembers Letitia Plummer and Tarsha Jackson used a procedural motion known as a “tag” to delay the vote by one week, saying they needed more information about the lawsuit and the city’s defense posture.

“I completely agree that the city needs to defend itself. I think that what’s important right now is just transparency, and I think the public needs to understand better,” Plummer said. “So, the only way that we as council members can explain to the public what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, is for us to get a better understanding. I think this week will allow us to do that.”

Plummer, who chairs the Ethics

Committee, told the Chronicle she hopes to host a committee meeting next week to explore the city's policy regarding who it defends in lawsuits. She said she spoke to the Legal Department on Tuesday and was told that the city has to represent employees who request counsel unless they have been found to have intentionally violated city policy.

The Legal Department declined to answer questions about who the city plans to defend in the lawsuit.

Plummer said she hopes to give the public a better understanding of the policy and how it informs the city’s decisions. Then, councilmembers can vote accordingly next week, she said.

“It’s a new day,” Plummer said, referring to the conviction of former Minneapolis officer Derek Chauvin on Tuesday in the murder of George Floyd. “We have to do right by people.”

Jackson said her primary concern was the price tag, since the city has a staff of attorneys in house.

“I want to understand why the Legal Department can’t represent the city in this case,” Jackson said. “The city should have a designated lawyer to fight these cases because we’re always being sued. The amount is pretty steep, and they’re going to come back again for more money. In the end there’s probably going to be a big settlement anyways, so why not use the money to pay the settlement?”

District K Councilmember Martha Castex-Tatum said she also would seek more information regarding the city’s defense.

“I just want to be very clear about what I’m supporting and that it’s not the supporting of bad actors, and that we are protecting the city’s interests and not the interests of something that went wrong by people who did the wrong thing,” Castex-Tatum said.

The mayor responded: “We don’t know who did the wrong thing. We do have an obligation to protect the interests of the city… If you are sued, I would encourage you to go get you a lawyer. In this case, the city is being sued. For us not to put ourselves in the best position to defend ourselves is the equivalent of simply saying, ‘OK, the treasury door is open.’”

Separately, council members also delayed a vote on whether to hire a firm in the city’s ongoing contract dispute with the firefighters’ union. That measure would pay Denton Navarro Rocha Bernal & Zech P.C. for another $92,000 of services, bringing the tab to $547,500 in that case.

Councilmembers Amy Peck and Michael Kubosh delayed that vote.

“Is there a way to project what the ultimate cost of all these lawsuits against the firefighters may cost the city, and to bring us up to date on exactly where we are on them?” Kubosh asked.

The mayor said the legal department supplied information this week on the lawsuits and would be glad to do so again.

“These are lawsuits in which the city is being sued,” Turner said. “In all of these cases, the city is being sued.”