City pushing for new trial, planning appeal in $30M CHOP wrongful death case

The City of Seattle has asked for a new trial and is prepared to appeal a $30 million jury verdict in the wrongful death lawsuit over the 2020 deadly shooting of a San Diego teenager during the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest.

A King County Superior Court judge is considering the motion. If Judge Sean O’Donnell denies a new trial, City Attorney Erika Evans’s office has already started its filings for a state appeal.

CHS reported in January on the verdict in the case over the deadly shooting of 16-year-old Antonio Mays Jr. as the jury arrived at compensatory damages totaling more than $30 million for the teen’s father and family.

The case centered on the Seattle Police Department’s abandonment of the East Precinct and the failures in the police and Seattle Fire response to the 12th Ave shooting scene.

In her filings, the City Attorney argues that the jury demonstrated “passion and prejudice” in its award, that Mays was likely to have died with or without treatment from Seattle Fire, and that the jury should have been instructed to consider the shooter in determining blame for the teen’s death.

No suspects in the June 29th, 2020 killing have been publicly identified. SPD says the investigation of the Mays Jr. killing remains an open case.

The January verdict pushed the city’s cumulative legal costs from its response to CHOP and the Black Lives Matter demonstrations beyond some $45 million in settlements and awards.

Evan Oshan of Oshan & Associates, the lawyer representing the Mays family, is also preparing a case for Robert West who was 14 at the time he suffered injuries that left him permanently disabled in the same CHOP shooting.

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