Court approves $2.9M settlement for Ingram-Lopez family

Pima County Superior Court approved a $2.9 million settlement in the lawsuit against the City of Tucson and the Tucson Police Department following the death last year of Carlos Adrian Ingram-Lopez.

Ingram-Lopez, 27, died after Tucson police restrained him for 12 minutes on April 21, 2020, in his grandmother’s garage. The county medical examiner ruled the manner of death was “undetermined.” The cause of death attributed to “sudden cardiac arrest in the setting of acute cocaine intoxication and physical restraint” with an enlarged heart as a “significant contributing condition.”

However, an independent autopsy commissioned by Ingram-Lopez’s family found that cocaine intoxication was not a factor in his death and instead was likely asphyxia due to being held face down.

Ingram-Lopez’s family filed two separate legal claims against the city

on behalf of his mother and daughter. In Dec. 2020, eight months after his death, the family reached a settlement agreement of $2.9 million, according to City Attorney Mike Rankin. Lawyers initially sought $19 million.

An email from Ted A. Schmidt, a lawyer for Ingram-Lopez’s family, said 75% of the funds will go to the victim’s 2year-old daughter. Schmidt called the death “totally unnecessary and tragic.”

“Thankfully, the City of Tucson recognized early on that what its officers did was patently wrong and agreed to do what it could to make this right with the family,” Schmidt wrote in the email sent to The Arizona Republic.

The officers involved in the case resigned but ultimately were not charged in connection with the man’s death. Tucson Police Chief Chris Magnus also offered to resign, but the city rejected the offer.