A Black mother and her two daughters were detained at a Starbucks in California in September 2019.
Bodycam footage shows the family were handcuffed after the mother refused to show her ID.
A California jury awarded the family more than $8 million on Wednesday, court documents show.
“Loggervale did not want to engage further with Defendants because, as a Black person, she feared that the encounter could result in serious physical harm or death to her and/or her daughter,”
the complaint said.
Bodycam footage has revealed the moment a Black family was unlawfully arrested at a California Starbucks while taking a break on their way to a college math test.
A California jury granted AasyleiLoggervale and her two teenage daughters $8.25 million in compensation Wednesday for the event that took place in September 2019, court documents show.
It comes after the family claimed they were being targeted for their race when they were approached by Alameda County sheriff’s deputies in the car park of a Starbucks in Castro Valley, California, a complaint says.
The family were driving overnight from Las Vegas to California’s Berkeley City College in time for Loggervale’s older daughter to take a statistics exam and had stopped at the Starbucks to rest, grab a coffee, and go to the toilet.
But shortly after arriving, they were approached by two Alameda County deputies, Steven Holland, and Monica Pope, who told them they were searching for suspects in a series of car thefts and asked for their identification, the complaint says. Pope and Holland are both white.
Bodycam footage of the incident, which spans 20 minutes, shows Loggervale refusing to give her identification, asking the officer: “What kind of crime did I commit?”
After an altercation, Holland ordered all three family members out of the car and detained them, the video shows.
The jury ruled that the officer’s conduct was “unlawful” and that Holland and Alameda County together must pay $2.75 million to the mother and $2 million to each daughter, while Pope and the county must pay $750,000 to each daughter, according to the final order.
