A federal jury awarded $3.25 million on Monday to the family of Cordale Handy, who was fatally shot by St. Paul police officers in 2017.

Handy’s mother filed a federal lawsuit and, in a trial in summer 2023, a jury found one of two officers who shot the 29-year-old used excessive force. That jury decided the city of St. Paul should pay Handy’s family $1.5 million in punitive damages and $10 million in compensatory damages.

The city objected to the amount of compensatory damages and U.S. District Judge David Doty, who presided over the original case, wrote in a February order that the $10 million civil award was “patently excessive.” Handy’s mother, Kimberly Handy-Jones, opted for another trial to decide compensatory damages.The case was a rare occasion of a lawsuit against the city of St. Paul in a shooting by an officer being heard by a jury — and it’s the largest amount that’s been awarded in St. Paul. Other lawsuits have been dismissed before trial or ended in settlements negotiated between attorneys.

A $2 million settlement approved by the St. Paul City Council in 2017 had been the largest the city had agreed to. It was for a man who was hospitalized for two weeks after he was bit by a police dog and kicked by a St. Paul officer while he was unarmed and not the suspect police were looking for.

During Friday’s closing arguments in the Handy case, Assistant City Attorney Tony Edwards asked the jury to award Handy’s family about $100,000-$400,000 in compensatory damages. Kevin O’Connor, an attorney for Handy-Jones, told the jury the amount should be $17 million.

The jury deliberated for about 3½ hours between Friday afternoon and Monday before returning with their verdict Monday morning.

“We were here for a human life,” Handy-Jones said outside the courtroom Monday. “… My son had life. St. Paul policemen took it from him.”

St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry wrote a Monday email to the department’s staff after the jury’s decision, saying: “Although I sympathize with the loss of any life, I also struggle with the fact that a decision like this can be taken as a sign that Mr. Handy’s actions didn’t also contribute to this outcome.”

Shooting in 2017

St. Paul Police officers Nathaniel Younce and Mikko Norman responded about 2:20 a.m. on March 15, 2017, to a 911 call about a female screaming in an apartment building in the 700 block of East Sixth Street. Handy lived there with Markeeta Johnson-Blakney, his girlfriend of 10 years.

Younce and Norman didn’t know before they shot Handy that he’d fired 16 gunshots at a couch in his apartment. He was seeing people who weren’t there and thought they were hiding in the apartment, Johnson-Blakney testified during the first trial.

A toxicology report showed Handy had a stimulant drug in his system known by the street name of “bath salts.” O’Connor told the jury on Wednesday that Handy had used marijuana or “Molly” and it was apparently laced with another drug, which caused him to not be “in his right state of mind.”

The officers encountered Handy outside the building. They reported they saw Handy fall down backward, lower his gun and raise it briefly toward Norman. The officers said Handy raised the gun toward Norman a second time, and the officers fired. The incident occurred out of view of security cameras, and the police department hadn’t yet rolled out body-worn cameras.

“Two competing stories were considered by the jury,” Handy-Jones’ attorneys wrote in a November 2023 memo to the court. “The officers testified that Handy pointed a gun.” Handy’s girlfriend and a neighbor testified he did not.

A forensic pathologist testifying for Handy-Jones said during the trial that Handy’s injuries indicated he was on the ground with his knees bent up when he was shot — there were gunshot wounds to his back, lower leg, the bottom of his foot and his right forearm. Officers said Handy had held the gun in his right hand. The pathologist testified that Handy could not hold a gun after he sustained the gunshot to the forearm.

The previous jury concluded Younce violated Handy’s constitutional rights and wrongfully caused his death. Norman fired just after Younce and jurors found him not civilly liable. Both officers have left the police department — Norman in 2021 and Younce last summer.

In Henry’s email to the police department, he wrote: “The investigation and civil trial both stated Mr. Handy raised his firearm at one of our officers during the encounter. Our officers were cleared of any criminal wrongdoing.”

Possible appeal

The jurors’ decision Monday was for $1 million to compensate Handy’s family for damages and harm from the time of his death to trial, and $2.25 million for damages and harm into the future based upon life expectancy. O’Connor said he plans to file an appeal.

O’Connor said the city’s attorney was “able to poison the jury by trying to make up a story that he’s a gang member.” St. Paul City Attorney Lyndsey Olson said they asked witnesses about Handy’s gang affiliation based on federal law enforcement press releases in a past case.

In an October 2023 filing, the city asked Judge Doty to order compensatory damages be reduced to $1 million at most or to order a new trial.

The city wrote that the $10 million initially awarded by the jury “bear no reasonable relationship to the evidence introduced at trial,” and added that the only testimony related to money damages was provided by Handy-Jones, who said her son didn’t provide her with financial support, but periodically sent her gifts.

Handy worked at the Salvation Army. He did not have children he needed to provide for, the city noted. O’Connor asked jurors to consider the comfort and companionship that Handy offered his family and would have continued to. The compensation is for Handy’s mother, sister and three brothers.

Doty wrote in February’s decision that given “the meager evidence presented regarding quantifiable monetary loss, it appears that the jury was impermissibly swayed by (Handy-Jones’) understandable mental anguish and grief.” He wrote that after reviewing other cases and based on the evidence at trial, the maximum amount the jury could have awarded in compensatory damages was $2.5 million.

Speaking outside the courtroom, O’Connor said the jury’s decision Monday shows that Doty was wrong “because this verdict came back even higher than what he said would be the maximum allowed.”

U.S. District Judge John Tunheim, who presided over the most recent case, told jurors last week that they should consider factors, including Handy’s past contributions, his life expectancy and what he would have provided to his next of kin if he’d lived. He said they should not consider an amount that would punish Younce or the city, or for the “pain and suffering” of Handy before his death.

The $1.5 million in punitive damages awarded by the original jury hasn’t changed.