$650,000 Settlement OKd in Inmate Death
Los Angeles County on Tuesday agreed to pay $650,000 to settle a lawsuit alleging the Sheriff’s Department’s use of excessive force caused the death last summer of Twin Towers jail inmate Danny Ray Smith.
The settlement was approved by the board in executive session.
Smith, who had been arrested on firearms charges, was resisting transfer to a cell with a Latino inmate. The department has typically kept racial groups segregated in the jails to prevent fighting.
Deputies used force to make Smith enter the cell and the inmate eventually dropped to the ground. An autopsy found that “positional asphyxia,” caused when a suspect is placed in a prone position, may have contributed to Smith’s death.
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