NORTHAMPTON — The city has reached a $75,000 legal settlement with a man who accused Northampton police officers of violating his civil rights during a 2019 arrest.
In a lawsuit filed last year, Amherst resident Jenison Retzlaff had alleged that in 2019, he was in the Meadows section of Northampton when somebody called police to say he looked “kind of out of it.” Retzlaff said that the Fire Department and EMTs first arrived on scene and determined he didn’t need medical assistance. But after they left, the police showed up. He alleged that when he tried to get his ID back from them so he could leave, the officers tackled him to the ground, kicked him, beat him with a baton, pepper-sprayed and arrested him.
In a court filing on Sept. 9, Retzlaff and the city agreed to settle the case rather than proceed to a jury trial. And although the agreement does not specify the total settlement amount, city attorney Alan Seewald informed The Shoestring that the amount was $75,000.
Retzlaff’s attorney, Michael Heineman, declined to comment on the settlement. So, too, did Mayor Gina-Louise Sciarra.
Like many municipalities, Northampton handles such lawsuits through its insurance provider, the Massachusetts Interlocal Insurance Association. That means that settlement money doesn’t come directly out of the city’s coffers. However, such settlements could result in taxpayers having to pay higher insurance premiums going forward.
For this fiscal year, which began on July 1, Northampton budgeted $107,484 for general liability insurance and $277,046 for public employees liability insurance, according to city budget documents. Those figures represented 15% and 40% increases, respectively, over the previous fiscal year.
Retzlaff’s lawsuit against Northampton police isn’t the only one the city is dealing with.
In September, a Hampshire Superior Court judge ruled that a civil-rights lawsuit brought by Eric Matlock, who police pepper-sprayed and arrested on City Hall’s steps in 2017, can proceed to trial. Northampton police arrested Matlock on charges that he was blocking the doors of City Hall as he held up a sign in an act of protest, and that he resisted arrest and hit an officer. However, in 2018, a jury acquitted Matlock on all of those charges.
The city also faces a possible lawsuit over a violent arrest that police made of a 60-year-old Holyoke woman in April.
Police had pulled over Marisol Driouech, who was making a delivery through an online food-ordering platform, for a broken headlight. Within five minutes, they had pulled her out of the car, wrestled her to the ground, pepper-sprayed and arrested her. Police initially charged her with assault and battery on a police officer, attempting to disarm a police officer, resisting arrest and refusing to identify herself. However, prosecutors immediately dropped those charges after she admitted to the broken-headlight charge.
Driouech’s lawyer, Dana Goldblatt, has presented a claim for damages to the city — the first step toward possibly filing a lawsuit.
In Retzlaff’s case, he had alleged that when he stood up and asked for his ID back, police pushed him back and then claimed that he struck an officer’s hand away.
“At this point both officers grabbed onto Mr. Retzlaff’s arms and Mr. Retzlaff ended up on the ground,” Retzlaff’s attorney wrote in a 2021 letter to the city, going on to claim that the officers rolled Retzlaff onto his chest. “Officers claim Mr. Retzlaff was uncooperative while two officers kneeled on his body, holding him down. While Mr. Retzlaff lie face-down on the ground the officers administered knee strikes, used a baton on Mr. Retzlaff, and blasted ‘O.C.’ spray in Mr. Retzlaff’s face.”
Because the city’s insurance company handles such lawsuits, it means that city officials are typically unaware of the specifics of how those cases proceed.
When reached by telephone Friday, Ward 7 Councilor Rachel Maiore, who chairs the City Council’s Committee on Finance, said she was unaware that the city had settled Retzlaff’s lawsuit in September.
“We are not informed of things like that,” Maiore said. “That does not come before us.”
Maiore noted that in September, Northampton opened its new Division of Community Care — a civilian-responder agency that the city created in 2021 to remove some types of calls from the police department. Division of Community Care responders are now attending calls for wellness checks, like the one that initiated the police department’s interaction with Retzlaff in 2019.
“I’m glad the Division of Community Care is now up and running and, moving forward, can prevent situations like this from escalating,” Maiore said. “The case is just further proof that our new division with its responder team is a wise investment for our city.”
The Division of Community Care emerged from a recommendation by the city’s Policing Review Commission, which in its final report released in March 2021 called for reducing the footprint of the police department. The division is housed under the city’s Health and Human Services Department, which had its funding increased by 1.18% under Sciarra’s FY24 budget. That included $358,234 for the division’s personnel. The city also relied on a $450,000 state grant to create the division.
The FY24 budget allocated $6.83 million to the Northampton Police Department, representing a 5.62% increase over the previous fiscal year.
Dusty Christensen is an independent investigative reporter based in western Massachusetts. He can be reached at dusty.christensen@protonmail.com. Follow him on Twitter: @dustyc123.
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