Rather see a guilty verdict: Son of man killed by Harnett deputy says settlement bittersweet
Tags: officer-involved shooting, Harnett County Sheriff's Office, use of force, lawsuit
Posted June 17, 2021 5:31 p.m. EDT
Updated June 18, 2021 6:23 p.m. EDT
https://www.wral.com/harnett-county...-with-6-families-for-6-million/19731354/

SPRING LAKE, N.C. — The son of a man killed in November 2015 by a Harnett County deputy said the $6 million settlement his family will share in is bittersweet.

John Livingston Jr. is the namesake of John David Livingston, who was 33 when Deputy Nicholas Kehagias fatally shot him on his front porch.

Witnesses said Kehagias barged into the home that night after Livingston told him the person he was looking for didn't live there, and the deputy then yanked him out of a chair, threw him to the ground, repeatedly used a stun gun and pepper spray on him and even put a gun to his head.

Kehagias, who resigned from the force seven months later, said he was forced to shoot Livingston when Livingston grabbed his stun gun and tried to use it on him. Witnesses said Livingston never had control of the stun gun, but a grand jury declined to indict Kehagias on any criminal charge.

Livingston Jr. spoke exclusively to WRAL News after the settlement was reached in a lawsuit filed by his family and five other plaintiffs against six current or former members of the Harnett County Sheriff's Office.

"In my opinion, I'd rather, honestly, get to where Kehagias is guilty," he said.

"That money ain't going to buy my dad back. There's a lot of things I wish I could have done with my dad in the past five, six years that I wasn't able to do because of Kehagias.

"It's honestly just the little things, just talking to him. Every day, I think about him," Livingston Jr. said, getting choked up as he did so.

Livingston said he believes there was a culture of corruption in the sheriff's office that led to his father's death.

"There's a lot of corrupt cops out there, and it's sad to say," he said.

Raleigh-based attorney Robert Zaytoun, who represented Livingston's family and the other plaintiffs, said the case was about rogue law enforcement.

"This went all the way up to the top. It was condoned, it was enabled, by the highest reaches of the Harnett County Sheriff's Department," he said.

Kehagias now works as a sheriff’s deputy in Pender County. "That's super-scary to me," Livingston Jr. said.

WRAL News reached out to the attorney who represented Kehagias and the rest of the defendants from the sheriff’s office. He declined to comment on their behalf.

Only on WRAL: Son of man killed by deputy opens up to WRAL following six-figure settlement Attorney: Harnett County Sheriff's Office insurer will pay $6 million to 6 families to settle excessive force suit
Zaytoun said he hopes the case and the costs send a message to other law enforcement agencies.

"We need better training of officers. We need psychological training of officers. And in this case, it's absolutely clear that the three officers involved had no clue of the basic constitutional rights of citizens in their home.

"It's not about getting rid of policing. It is just that we can police better. We can do it better, and it needs to be better, not just for one segment of our society, but all citizens deserve good policing," Zaytoun said.

Deputy said he was forced to kill him....because the deputy went there and attacked him. Another instance of people being perfectly fine until a cop is present. But at least the deputy got to do whatever he needed to to make it home safely that night.

Version of the story for people able to read news critically: https://thefreethoughtproject.com/c...8nT52KQU_9buIACAM3_gruCFxYajlh2FeYOl4zMo

This cop needs to be in prison thinking about the life he took every day as Bubba is boofooing him and NOT working in the neighboring county.

From the description above of what happened, I'd have to agree.

Let me guess. The victim was a White guy. Had he been black, we'd have another national holiday for the date of his death, and the cop would be in prison for 20 years. In this case, however (unlike in the George Floyd case, which was a drug overdosed criminal dying from heart failure in the context of fighting with cops who were making a legitimate arrest of a violent felon), that would be a lot closer to appropriate.

I wish I knew the solution to a bad cop moving on to cause carnage somewhere else. Defunding the police isn't the answer, but neither is multi-million settlements at taxpayer expense.

The solution is easy...accountability. It's not happening. Paying a big amount out and letting the bastard continue his evil isn't an answer. The taxpayers were held accountable, not the perp.

Cop was a POS, no doubt.

What about the one (or many) that were fugking your wife? Good guys or bad?

I agree on the solution. In my opinion, legislation and implementation aren't as easily achieved.

Qualified immunity shouldn't be absolute immunity.

The thing is there's so much funding there are more positions available than can be filled. You've got to spend your budget to get it again. They'll take anyone they can get. If someone has already done all the training and is ready to go on the street they'll hire him and tell him do whatever you have to do to get home safely ad we'll cover you. They have to do this to stayed staffed at the level the over-blown budget allows. The alternative is to give up funding and reduce the agency, which is something no bureaucrat can face.

Root cause is your taxes are too high. Under the guise of Republican small government, which isn't, they throw money at a single thing in the form of law enforcement to service all needs. It doesn't work. Cops will tell you it doesn't work. They can't do everything that is expected of them.

Qualified immunity should not exist.