SOUTHFIELD, Mich. (WXMI) — Last Tuesday marked one year since the shooting death of 26-year-old Patrick Lyoya. Since then, his family has filed a $100 million civil lawsuit against the city of Grand Rapids.
On Monday during a press conference at the Westin Hotel in Southfield, their attorneys Ven Johnson and Ben Crump gave an update in the civil case, stating that two police experts have concluded that excessive deadly force was used.
Johnson pointed to a motion filed by Christopher Schurr, the officer charged with Lyoya's death.
“A number of different things that come into play, but one of the ones that’s important for today is why Schurr filed a motion," he said. "Schurr filed a motion asking Judge Maloney, who is a U.S. federal judge in Kalamazoo, where this case is pending, to throw this out of court, this case, our case against him because he has a constitutional right to shoot our client in the back of the head."
Johnson continued, “And that there was no known constitutional deprivation, meaning, I didn’t know that it was against the law for me to do that, OK. That’s the motion that they filed. We for the last month and especially for the last couple of weeks have filed a response.”
Johnson said they’d like the civil case to move forward to bring the Lyoya family justice.
Lyoya was shot and killed during a traffic stop near the intersection of Nelson and Griggs back on April 4, 2022. Since then, former GRPD officer Schurr has been charged with second-degree murder.
Peter Lyoya speaks on pain of losing his son Patrick, after attorneys Ven Johnson and Ben Crump give an update on the civil case. // @FOX17 pic.twitter.com/k9yWJ0b0sm
— Lauren Edwards (@LaurenEdwardsTV) April 10, 2023
Johnson and Crump said they believe the shooting was unjustifiable.
Monday, they said two police experts they’ve hired — Ken Katsaris and Thomas Tiderington — have concluded that excessive force was used.
“Two different ones that have opined in their affidavits that what we saw here was not only gross derivation, not just complete ignorance and refusal to follow Schurr’s own training,” Johnson said. “But even more importantly for us in terms of what we’re going to talk about that this deadly force was unnecessary and therefore under the law, illegal and excessive.”
The experts, who have a combined police experience of 70 years, stated in the affidavit that one of main reasons was because of Schurr’s improper use of the taser.
“What should happen, Tiderington said this and so did Katsaris’ affidavit, the training is, Chris O’Neil will tell you, back up at least 7 feet,” Johnson said with video of the shooting playing on and off behind him.
“You then warn, I’m going to tase you if you don’t do what I tell you to do, maybe use a few other choice words. But he said ‘taser, taser, taser.’ Why did he do that?
Johnson gave two reasons.
"If people are in the background, and we know there were two people watching outside by the way, and if you miss and you hit them with a taser, you want to give them fair warning," he said. "No. 2, people often when they hear a taser sound they think it's a gun shot. And therefore, some people will fire back.”
Johnson added that Patrick didn’t know how to use the taser, so he didn’t know how physically harmful it could be.
Many times, both Johnson and Crump emphasized that they were reading from the affidavit.
“Ken Katsaris, in the state of Florida and probably all over the East Coast of the United States, is the training officer for police departments. And understand, he normally doesn’t agree with us on cases,” Crump said. “He’s normally testifying for the police department. So, when expert Ken Katsaris and I agree on the use of force against a person, you know it’s pretty clear.”
Peter Lyoya, Patrick's father, was also in attendance, with Swahili translator Israel Siku translating for him. He described the pain he continues to feel for the loss of his son, as well as for the justice they’d like to see.
“The way that I know this country and the law and the justice in this country, I never thought it can be for an entire year, for Patrick not receiving the justice that he deserves,” Peter Lyoya said.
FOX 17, WXYZ's Grand Rapids sister station, reached out to the city of Grand Rapids for a comment. They replied via email saying, “Out of respect for the legal proceedings, we have nothing additional to add at this time.”
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