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Austin City Council approves $425,000 settlement in Breaion King case

The arrest of Austin teacher Breaion King received national attention and sparked reforms in the Austin Police Department.

AUSTIN -- The Austin City Council on Thursday unanimously approved a $425,000 settlement for Breaion King.

Her violent arrest by an Austin police officer in 2015 received national attention, including inspiring an Oscar-nominated documentary, and sparked reforms in the police department.

“This was not our city at its best," said Mayor Steve Adler. "In reading the federal judge's recitation in the most recent hearing, he discussed not only this incident but prior incidents that he said needed to go to a jury to discuss the institutional issues in the city because of those prior issues. That was, in reading that, that was a real concern to me and reflected what we were hearing from many parts of the community.”

During the meeting, Adler asked City Manager Spencer Cronk to take note of this significance as he moves forward with his discussions with interim Police Chief Brian Manley.

“Any kind of settlement in these cases doesn’t fix things. But I think in this case it's a recognition from the city that we can and need to do better," Adler said.

KVUE found that the city has been sued nearly 40 times for use-of-force cases that did not involve shootings since 2011. Of those, the highest amount the city has settled for is $150,000.

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The lowest amount is $6,000.

The City has spent a little more than $500,000 to settle lawsuits involving police use of force in the past five years. None of those cases involved lethal force.

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