By Paul Krueger
Before the City Council on Tuesday, Dec. 9, approved a $30 million settlement to the family of a teen fatally shot by a San Diego Police officer, Councilmembers Henry Foster III and Sean Elo-Rivera offered their perspective on the shooting and the payment.
The preventable death of 16 year-old Konoa Wilson and subsequent lawsuit against the city and officer Daniel Gold has drawn national attention, including a New York Times story that highlighted the $30 million settlement as one of the largest — if not the largest — payout to date by a local government for a wrongful death caused by law enforcement negligence or abuse.
But there have been no organized, public demands for answers about how and why the January 28th shooting happened, what discipline — if any — was imposed by SDPD on Officer Gold, and what changes — if any — have been made in officer training as a result of that fatal interaction.
Konoa Wilson was half-black, and Council Member Foster — who is the city’s only black council member — spent considerable time addressing issues of race and the minority community’s history of mistrust and strained relations with law enforcement.
But Foster’s deeply emotional statements were highly personal.
After offering his “condolences to the Wilson family for the loss of their beloved son”, Foster noted that five years after George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police, “we find ourselves right back in another terrifying predicament where the life of a Black child has been taken at the hands of police.”
“Where’s the progress?” he asked, his voice rising. “Where’s the protect and serve? Better yet, where’s the accountability?”
His voice faltering and near tears, Foster told his council colleagues:
“As the father of a young black man, this hurts. This could be my son. If only you could begin to understand the fear I have when my son leaves the house.
I must say, it’s a true fear, and I truly believe it’s warranted. I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again. This is the black experience in America.”
Foster also made demands of the Mayor, who was not at the council meeting, and has declined requests for comment on the settlement.
“Mayor Gloria, there needs to be change. And there needs to be serious change. And I have to ask, will you step up, or will we see what we always see: business as usual?”
“This is not a time for excuses,” Foster pronounced. “Missteps were made here, and we must own that and do everything we can to ensure this does not happen again.”
In closing, Foster asked his colleagues:
“Is this public safety? Is this how we want our communities policed? Are these the actions that we want to continue to see? And I do ask the public: keep asking questions. I think they’re much needed questions. And to the Mayor, and to the (police) chief, my ask and expectation is that you stand up and answer those questions, and bring the change that we need to the city of San Diego.We cannot continue to have this happen in our city. We just cannot.”
For his part, Elo-Rivera expressed his “most sincere and deepest apologies for what is the worst nightmare of any parent.”
The Council Member said we should recognize that “there is no amount of money in the world that can ever replace the loss of a child,” and that the Council’s willingness to settle the lawsuit quickly and not dispute the amount of damages at trial was a “noble” act which recognized “there is no dollar amount that can fill the hole created by this tragedy.”
Elo-Rivera also said it’s fair for the public to ask what the city and SDPD are doing now to prevent more of these negligent shootings. And he acknowledged the financial strain on taxpayers caused by these and other lawsuit settlements.
(The first $5 million of the Wilson settlement is paid by the city; the remaining $25 million is covered by an insurance pool funded by government agencies)
Note: You can listen to Council Member Foster’s comments by clicking on the link to video of the December 9 City Council meeting, and scrolling to 1:14:45.
Having watched the bodycam footage, the same thing would have happened if the kid had been any ethnicity. The officer shot immediately without any recognition of who he was shooting at. It was a very bad situation with a huge mistake by the officer resulting in the death of child who didn’t see that coming so very very sad. They should pick this one apart to make sure it never happens again. But I don’t think it had anything to do with race. The officer didn’t shoot a kid because he was black (or half black). He shot him because he reacted to someone running. In the body cam footage, you can’t tell anything about the kid in that short moment. It was a very poor response to the situation. Henry Foster’s comments made it seem that this happened because the boy was black. I don’t think that’s the case at all.