It is our privilege to announce that Bolek Besser Glesius has obtained a $2.5 million settlement from the City of Ashtabula in an excessive force case brought on behalf of the parents of David L. Ward, Jr., a young man whom an Ashtabula police sniper shot and killed during a mental-health crisis. The settlement also requires the police department to implement significant policy changes intended to make the City of Ashtabula a safer place to live, work, and police.
After the Ashtabula police needlessly shoot David Ward Jr. during a mental-health crisis, Bolek Besser brings an excessive force and wrongful death lawsuit
In the early hours of April 13, 2022, Ashtabula police sniper Daniel Gillespie shot and killed 23-year-old David L. Ward, Jr., a young man he knew to be intoxicated and suicidal. When he opened fire, Gillespie was 482 feet away from David—more than a football-field-and-a-half away. At that moment, David was standing all alone in the middle of a 1,000-foot-long bridge high above the Ashtabula River. In Gillespie’s words, the man had “the whole bridge to himself.” Suffering from a mental-health crisis, David had an unloaded shotgun, which even Gillespie admitted he never so much as pointed at anyone. In fact, when Gillespie killed him, David was holding a cell phone in his right hand and his left was nowhere near the trigger of the two-handed shotgun.
Nevertheless, from a prone position hidden from view, and with near-total cover, Gillespie shot David with a .308 caliber sniper rifle at a distance so far away that Gillespie had his rifle’s scope at 16x magnification. Indeed, Gillespie was far outside of what he later wrote was the shotgun’s “effective range out to 100 yards.” None of the other ten officers on scene fired a single shot, including the two others who had rifles pointed at David.
By then, Gillespie already had a reputation within the Ashtabula police department for being prone to use deadly force. Just before 1:24 a.m. on the night of the shooting, an Ashtabula officer on scene remarked that by walking toward the end of the bridge where Gillespie was, David was “walking the wrong way.” The officer then chuckled, adding “Dan’s not the person you want to be walking to.” Sure enough, Gillespie shot David about one minute and thirty-eight seconds later.
The settlement requires the City to make meaningful changes to its use-of-force policy
David’s parents retained us to bring excessive force and wrongful death claims under the U.S. Constitution and Ohio law against the City and Gillespie. After lengthy negotiations, Bolek Besser Glesius obtained a $2.5 million settlement. More than that, the settlement requires policy changes that will make Ashtabula a safer place for all.
Civil rights cases often end with the payment of money and the parties going their separate ways. This settlement, however, benefits the public as a whole. With the support and courage of David’s parents, we fought for and obtained meaningful reform to the Ashtabula police department’s policies regarding the use of force. These sorts of policy changes are far from the norm in excessive-force cases and are designed to avoid another senseless tragedy. The major changes include:
- Creating a de-escalation policy. Before this case, the Ashtabula police department had no de-escalation policy, either within or separate from its use-of-force policy. The new policy created as a result of the settlement requires Ashtabula officers to use de-escalation where feasible, so as to avoid unnecessary uses of force and protect the safety of both citizens and officers.
- Requiring officers, where feasible, to give a warning before using force, particularly deadly force. This obligation is both a constitutional requirement and a standard part of modern police policies, and such warnings can be the difference between whether or not deadly force is used. They are especially vital in situations where citizens are dealing with a behavioral-health crisis and/or are inebriated. Yet before this settlement, Ashtabula’s police department had no such requirement for its officers. The officers here did not warn David of their intent to use deadly force.
An excessive force settlement that will protect the public in Ashtabula, Ohio
We at Bolek Besser Glesius were honored to represent David’s parents in this case and get David some measure of justice. Although nothing can bring him back, we and David’s parents hope that this settlement will help ensure Ashtabula is a safer place for both citizens and officers alike.
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