one of the excessive force cases that we've been following just settled and you may or
may not be surprised at the settlement amount this is the one in Kentucky where the man was
arrested inside his parents home and was beaten not terribly but still beaten by two Kentucky
state troopers then the dad goes on to get his cell phone and he starts filming or attempting
to the Troopers then took the phone and deleted the footage well as sometimes happens the parents
had interior surveillance cameras that the cops did not know about my buddy Chris Wiest filed a
lawsuit against them he puts them under oath at their depositions and then he asked them about
it both Troopers denied even striking the guy once you had him on the ground did you strike
or hit him with a closed fist at all no sir or any part of your body no sir okay unfortunately
for them they had been caught on camera and Chris had the footage I got the opportunity
to talk with Chris this weekend about a few of his cases including this one again this is
breaking news this case just settled I actually saw it in the news first and then I texted Chris
and said hey congrats on the settlement I'll let him tell you about it along with some of
the other interesting details about this case and about suing the police in general [Music]
but here's what happened on April 9th of 2020 Kentucky state troopers James Cameron
Wright Thomas zartorski and a third Trooper Kevin Dreisbach went to the hornback's home
in Shepherdsville Kentucky to arrest 29 year old Alex Hornback for a missed appearance in Jefferson
District Court hornback's mother and father met the cops at the door and they LED Wright and
sartorski to the basement of their home where their son was while Dreisbach covered the rear
of the house zartorsky and Wright testified in their January of 2021 depositions that they had a
relatively calm interaction with Hornback despite taking him to the floor and that they did not use
any other force or strike him the hornback's lawyer Chris Weist later released home security
video contradicting the trooper's statements I.E showing that they lied the video showed right
grabbing Hornback around the neck and slinging him to the floor though Hornback was not visibly
resisting the video also showed zartorski's striking Hornback four times on the legs with
his flashlight right hit horned back twice in the back with his right 4 forearm and appeared to have
his left knee on hornback's neck pushing his face into the floor Hornback did not suffer any serious
injuries only one of these state troopers would continue to be a State Trooper after this but
let's hear from Chris give me a recap of this sartorski case that you've been litigating for
so long well we we litigated that up to I mean it was like a week or two before trial and I wanted
to try the case my co-counsel wanted to try the case it's been reported now in the news they put
you know 135 000 on the table and the clients wanted to take it and you know I know we talked
about this before could you just briefly explain again the in the sartorski case the video you know
what happened well Dad had the basement video the other side did not require a production of
what we had in our files prior to taking positions under oath um and I got early depositions of these
Troopers and they lied about it not knowing that we had video at the incident because they thought
that they had deleted it off of Dad's phone so they thought they were clear and they thought
they had successfully covered it up and turned out they didn't so clients make settlement decisions
and and the Hornback family did and uh you know it got settled for what it got settled for so
um I thought it would have been a really fun case to try for from my perspective but you know
clients make settlement decisions not lawyers so well it's got to be a fun case to try where
the defendant has been charged with perjury yes and when I thought it was you know there
were some other aspects of that I mean there were two Troopers who were part and parcel with all of
it and they were scapegoating the guy that got charged with perjury and I felt like the other
two had just as much culpability in it and you know weren't being charged with perjury and that
guy the guy that was being perjury was being scapegoated because they were all kind of In
Cahoots they tried to exclude prior incidence of use of force from these same three there was sort
of a pattern in the month prior and the judge was going to let that in so there was some eliminary
practice on that we got eliminate rulings mom you know you know mom's claims got tossed she
was unlawfully detained outside we were going to take that up on appeal they were going to let
in parts of the client's criminal record which you know gets into the he had a coming defense
um which they were going to try and use so you know all of them it's typical use of force case
I have yet to do a use of force case in which to some degree the client through their conduct did
not in some way have some involvement with it right because if you just roll over generally
and you're just you know there's absolutely no pushback they'll come in they might wrap you
up a little bit but it doesn't really you know usually there's always something either words
or something else that precipitates these folks to like lose their cool and engage in the excessive
use of force in my experience and so I you know to some degree he had he had a coming defense
you know it was going to be a play in Hornback I have yet to do a use of force case where there's
not some of some attempt by the defense to argue he had a coming why why did the judge allow you
know some some of your clients criminal history to come before the jury is that because the cops
were aware of it at the time the incident occurred yeah that was it the cops said they were aware of
it and that factored into their apprehension about the client was there what was what they said and
why is that did it have to do with potential violence against police officers no you know
what was interesting I mean she tossed so he had like some drug stuff she tossed all that
she said that's not coming in um he had a prior fleeing and evading not a conviction but a charge
that he denied and she was gonna let that in and I'm like how in the world are you gonna do
that I mean but you know we were I I think the conviction for fleeing invading would have been
um you know that would have been probably valid but she was going to let a charge
in that was dismissed and I'm like judge so how many defendants were there in in this case three
three and so the the one who could be seen in the video hitting the guy with the flashlight that's
the one who got charged with perjury and fire right that's Tom zortorski yep and that was he
was fired while the while your case was spending before trial right so did he get thrown completely
under the bus as far as insurance coverage goes so you know that's interesting there is no insurance
that any of these guys have the state it's whether or not the state's going to indemnify him there's
a there's an Indemnity statute on whether or not you know the state judgment fund is going to be
used to satisfy those claims and in this case you know um I mean they were always that was
why I think we got the case settled for what it settled for because the defense was always sort of
rattling the saber of no Indemnity no Indemnity no Indemnity good luck collecting your judgment which
you know to which I said that's fine these guys make a paycheck I'll take a quarter out at a time
um you know because you could take a quarter of their paycheck out every pay period
um you know and and uh that you know that's always an issue sometimes with suing the
state police versus a Municipal Police because there's usually not private insurance coverage
it's always just a state Indemnity fund and you know here so after that guy was fired I
mean did they provide his defense lawyer they did provide a defense they were saying they were not
going to provide Indemnity actual sort of payout of the Judgment or attorney fees and costs and
that kind of stuff so in the media report that I saw it it said what the case settled for 130
000 and then 5 000 of that was to be paid by saratorski no it was 135 I thought it
was 130 plus five out of his pocket Kentucky State Police will pay 130 000 of the 135 000
settlement the remaining five thousand to be paid by Thomas zartorski right Wi-Fi thousand from him
how'd that come up well we demanded that he come out of pocket for it because I said he's going
to come out of pocket for it when I hit him with punitive something's coming out of his
pocket so they said we're not putting any more State money in other than 130 and I said well
I'm going to send a message and the message is five grand out of his own pocket and what about
I know there were a couple other videos right of sartorski hitting some other people yes was any
of that going to be allowed to go to the jury well we could use it yes she said we could get
those prior incidents in yes what was the legal basis for that pattern and practice lack a mistake
um yeah I mean we argued all of the exceptions to the prior you know where you can't say you did
it before he did it again but uh so we argued he they argued it should come out under 404 A and B
um we said we're not going to use it in terms of accident Conformity we're going to use it
under 404 B2 to prove motive opportunity intent knowledge absence of mistake and lack of accident
and um which are all four of rule 404b um and then we said all this goes to the heart of the punitive
damages case namely that these guys were motivated by an evil motive or intent or at a minimum acted
in Reckless the difference of um the protected rights and so um you know she said we got to get
it in so well that's a I mean that's a big win because I know they always fight me hard on that
trying to keep out any of that you know any of those prior allegations so I think that the timing
mattered a lot the fact that this was done in the month prior and at the time he was under a use of
force investigation for those prior incidents at the time they did this and at the time they
deleted the footage and what I argued in part was look this is why they ordered the footage deleted
because he was already under investigation so we have to be able to talk about it and she agreed
now the other the other two defendants are they were are they still employed at this Kentucky
State Police they are were they disciplined at all do you know well I don't believe so and presumably
they didn't have to pay any portion of that settlement correct how how close did you guys
come up to trial we're about a week away I had booked I mean we had expert travel Arrangements
um we had booked hotels um we were prepared I you know we were prepared I mean we were
prepared to try it that we had done I had my opening statement ready we had
our cross-examinations ready we had our witness hotlines ready we were ready to try the case
and did they I mean did they just wait to the very end to really come to the table I think they no so
they started to put real money on the table in about a month out and we're like it's not enough
it's not going to get it done and there was some back and forth where they went back to go get more
Authority and that didn't get it done and then um when they realized we were really serious and
we were going to try it then they you know then we got over over six figures and then you know
there was just a matter of you know seeing where you know how close we were going to get and I
um I would say it was probably a couple weeks out I thought it was probably going to settle
I started prepping about a month out like once I get my eliminate rulings I know it's coming in
and what's not coming in that's when I start my prep for trial I think one of the most confusing
things about these these types of section 1983 excessive force cases is how are they valued
you know negotiating back and forth where you have the insurance adjusters on the other side
that they're they're only interested in or are there any medical bills and things like that and
obviously we're looking at it from a different point of view I mean what how do you argue for
you know evaluation of a case like this where a guy has been beaten but he doesn't have any severe
injuries so you know I don't over value that um if there's not I mean he we had photos of bruising
um here and and I put a number on that and you know the 10 to 15 000 range and
then I you know I I thought wow it's probably going to be another 15 to 25
000 in punitive exposure I thought was probably where we would end up on the punitive exposure
but you know what drives these settlements particularly at the 11th hour is the fact
they know that we I mean we had um lodestar time for for the people that are watching this channel
that's the attorney fee time and there's attorney fee shifting where they have to pay the other
side's attorney fees and we've got my co-counsel and I and I know you do in West Virginia we have
fairly well established rates that you know because we do enough of this work where courts
are awarding fees with some regularity so we know what our hourly rate is we know what courts have
approved for that hourly rate you know it's a matter of the number of hours we had in the
case and I will tell you like we had our attorney fee time was going to be substantially higher than
what we settled this case for and I I felt like we were going to get a verdict on the underlying
liability and the attorney fee award itself was going to exceed it now from the client's
perspective goes to trial we get an attorney fee award we have the option in our fee agreement of
keeping the attorney fee award they keep what the jury gives them so they were going to not make as
much money on the case and you know they kind of made some money off of our attorney fee time and
I think that was a huge driver um in this case and you know that sometimes unfortunately is on
some of these where you've got like a soft tissue injury and you don't have hospital bills and I
think they the other side fully appreciated the attorney fee exposure um I had a case
in 2019 client you know gave a State Trooper a one-finger salute um and um you can imagine what
um entailed after that which was a wrongful arrest a wrongful stop wrongful charge ended
up getting tossed in state court at a preliminary hearing of all things you know alleged allegedly
assaulting the officer because he was trying to record the interaction by pulling the phone away
it was just you know kind of a bad deal the jury gave the client 800 and the defense attorneys were
like high-fiving each other on the way out and I'm like well that's a bold move cotton wait till you
see the fee award and um you know it was almost like 100 Grand in fees that the judge awarded and
you know attorney fees and costs now you know the client didn't get that we got that and uh you know
I think I think the state police had been on this road with us before and I think they knew you know
I don't think they were particularly afraid of the client's damages I think they were afraid of
getting hit with the six-figure attorney fee a word and it would have been every bit of that
now was there a claim made related to them deleting the the video I mean we argue yeah
so that we argue the unlawful seizure of Dad's phone and the unlawful deletion of the video which
was the fourth amendment seizure reclaimed and the judge agreed that that could go to the jury
um we also asked for spoliation instruction and uh that was I think likely to be instructed to
the jury too you know the whole you can assume you know because they deleted the evidence would have
been highly unfavorable to them you should make that assumption you know I'm instructing you to do
that because they spoilated evidence and so uh we asked for that instruction as well did any of the
other uh defendant officers get caught lying under oath in this case I you know zardorski obviously I
think was the most blatant I Cameron Wright said that he didn't use any force on um Hornback and
obviously you know you saw that that strike to the to the back of the head or neck um so that was not
truthful um he was not charged for it um but you know I obviously his testimony was inconsistent
with the video so and nothing's happened to him as a consequence of that did the feds ever show
any interest can you say in investigating these guys I am not allowed to I would not be allowed
to comment about things that I might understand or act still active Federal investigations and
just let me leave it at that so there you have it accountability has been achieved it wasn't perfect
and it never is but it's the remedy available to us it was actually pretty successful in this case
the best thing you can do is share this footage in this news far and wide so that as many as people
as possible see it and hear about it that is what the government fears the most as always thanks for
watching it's always a fantastic opportunity for all of us to hear Chris explain what he's been up
to in these cases and again if you search past videos on this channel you'll see some of our
prior conversations including several videos about this one I believe now Chris practices
both in Kentucky and Ohio so if you're in need of a civil rights lawyer in those States that's who
I would try first I'll put his contact information in the description you know I get a steady stream
of calls for people all over the country searching for a civil rights lawyer as I said in the last
video I only handle cases in West Virginia and if you watch my channel you know that I have
my hands really busy here in West Virginia I am working on compiling a referral database for all
50 states so if you're a civil rights lawyer in a different state or you you know of one please let
me know and I'll include you or them on the list and if you have a West Virginia matter that you
actually want to speak to me about and I can handle for you I do have a limited number of
consultations available each week that I tried to do sometimes I can so if you're interested in that
I do have an actual office with people answering the phones who can set you up please be polite
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000 and I really appreciate it remember freedom is scary deal with it I'll see you next time
thank you yeah