Suit over LAPD fatality settled

City OKs $1.9-million payment to the family of a man shot dead by police in Lincoln Heights in 2015.

Family of a man killed in 2015 will get $1.9 million from city.

The Los Angeles City Council agreed Wednesday to pay $1.9 million to the family of a man who was fatally shot by police in a Lincoln Heights apartment two years ago.

The 12-1 vote will settle a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the wife and children of Luis Martinez, who the Police Department says was shot after lunging toward officers with a knife.

Attorneys representing Martinez’s family disputed the police account, saying the 35-year-old was in a wheelchair and recovering from a broken hip, leaving him unable to stand and move toward the officers.

The lawsuit maintained that Martinez was unarmed, calling the shooting “unreasonable, unnecessary, excessive and unjustified under the law.”

Gabriel Avina, an attorney who filed the lawsuit, said the $1.9 million was insufficient to account for the family’s loss. But, he said, families often opt to settle their lawsuits rather than putting the case in a jury’s hands.

“I don’t think money will ever replace the love of a father and husband,” Avina said.

A spokesman for the city attorney’s office declined to comment.

Officers went to Martinez’s apartment on April 21, 2015, after receiving a report of a man who was depressed and had stabbed himself, according to a report made public last year.

When the officers arrived, the report said, they saw Martinez sitting in a wheelchair, his shirt covered in blood. As they tried to talk to him, Martinez pulled an 8 1⁄2-inch knife out from under his leg.

Martinez ignored the officers’ orders to drop the knife, got out of the wheelchair and began pacing, the report said. At one point, he pressed the knife blade into his chest.

Officers fired at Martinez after he walked at “a fast pace” toward one of them while still holding the knife, the report said. He fell to the ground but pushed himself up and “lunged” again, the report said, prompting more gunfire.

The Police Commission, a civilian oversight panel, ruled last year that the officers were justified in using deadly force.

But the commission agreed with Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck that some of the officers’ tactics were f lawed. Commissioners noted that the officers didn’t plan how to respond beforehand or communicate effectively as the encounter unfolded.

The officers also left their Tasers in their cars, the panel said, leaving them without a less-lethal device.

City Councilman Joe Buscaino, a former LAPD officer, cast the sole vote against the settlement.

Buscaino noted that both Beck and the Police Commission found the shooting within LAPD policy. The officers were trying to save Martinez from killing himself, Buscaino said, and although it ended tragically, they were doing what they were trained to do.

“How is it we’re paying?” he said. “It makes no sense to me.”