POLICE BRUTALITY LEGAL FUNDING

Let us help you stand up to abuse

According to the Prison Policy Initiative, police officers kill an average of 1,100 Americans per year. That works out to 33.5 police killings per 10 million citizens, which is 3.5 times higher than the number of per capita police killings in Canada, the next highest country. The United States has the sad distinction of having more annual police killings than all of the rest of the world’s industrialized countries combined.

Police killings aren’t the only way that officers can abuse their authority. The Prison Policy Initiative estimates that police officers threaten the use of force and use force against nearly 1 million people in the US annually. Sometimes the use of force is justified, but often police officers hurt people for no better reason than because it makes them feel powerful. Defenders will point to the difficulty of the job to try to rationalize away the excessive use of force, but we have all seen the viral videos showing police officers acting atrociously because they feel that violence is their prerogative.

For victims or for the families of victims of police brutality, a lawsuit may be the only way to ensure that justice is served and that restitution is paid. But police departments have the weight of governments behind them, and they have attorneys to spare. It’s no easy feat to win a lawsuit against the police.

A long legal slog

Lawsuits against police departments are notoriously complicated, and they can take upwards of half a decade to settle. Part of the reason that they are so long-lived is because it can take quite a while for your attorney to build a case, but it’s also in the best interests of police departments to drag out their cases as long as possible. The longer they can force you to pay attorney’s fees, the less likely you are to see your case through to the end.

It’s often worth sticking it out, however. According to The Wall Street Journal, the ten largest US cities paid out nearly $250 million to settle police brutality cases in 2014. All that money is cold comfort to a person or a family whose lives have been shattered by an abusive police officer, but the money can help victims rebuild their lives.

We can help you fight for justice

Police officers are meant to protect and serve the people who live in their cities, but too often they themselves are perpetrators of crimes against those people. If you need financial support to litigate your case against an abusive police officer, Argental Legal Funding can help.

At Argenta, we don’t offer conventional loans. We make pre-settlement advances that you only have to repay if you settle or win your case. Because we take all the risk, you can focus on rebuilding your life.