A man who says he was shot in the back of the head with a rubber bullet by Los Angeles police during a 2020 protest against the killing of George Floyd lost a round in court Monday when a judge ruled his attorneys cannot further depose the officer who fired the weapon.
According to plaintiff Randall Stewart’s attorneys’ court papers, a lawyer for LAPD Officer Bryan Dameworth blocked key questions during the first session in July. But in his ruling Monday, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Daniel S. Murphy said Dameworth was not evasive.
“Having reviewed the deposition transcript, the court agrees with (Dameworth) that the questions were asked and answered multiple times,” Murphy wrote.
According to the plaintiff’s attorneys, during the first deposition session on July 19, Dameworth’s counsel directed him not to answer questions posed to him about whether his actions conformed with his training in the use of the 40mm launcher, nor whether the protest started out peacefully.
But the judge noted that Dameworth said he was trained to be aware of the background and foreground before discharging a weapon and that he did not know whether the protest began peacefully.
” There is no good cause to further depose Officer Dameworth for the purpose of repeating questions that he has already answered,” Murphy said.
According to Stewart’s attorneys, on May 30, 2020, the plaintiff and other protesters marched down Gardner Street, turned west on Third Street, and eventually stopped near Fairfax Avenue. When the protesters refused to vacate as the officers demanded, Dameworth allegedly began telling them to “leave the (expletive) area” while shooting rubber bullets into the crowd, one of which struck Stewart in the head, causing him severe and permanent injuries.
The allegations in the suit were originally filed in March 2021 and later expanded with additional claims, include assault, battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress and civil rights violations.
Stewart’s attorneys maintained in their court papers that during Dameworth’s deposition, there were unnecessary interruptions as well as “testimonial statements by defendant’s counsel and coaching of the witness.”
Rather than continue with the deposition and continue to be interrupted, Stewart’s attorney suspended the questioning after more than three hours in order to seek an instruction limiting the defense attorney’s interruptions, according to the plaintiff’s lawyers court papers.
Former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin was convicted in April 2021 of murder in Floyd’s May 25, 2020, death and was sentenced in June 2021 to more than 22 years in prison.