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LEANORA MINAIThe wrongful-death lawsuit in a 1996 police shooting is likely to revive race relations questions.
ST. PETERSBURG - It began with a traffic stop almost eight years ago.
TyRon Lewis, 18, was shot dead after he refused to get out of a stolen Pontiac LeMans and bumped a police officer several times with it. The shooting sparked two nights of civil disturbances.
Now, after years of legal maneuvers, a wrongful-death lawsuit against the city is set for trial today in St. Petersburg.
Lewis' family is seeking undisclosed compensatory damages in excess of $15,000.
"It's not about the money," said Lewis' sister, Deanne Lewis Dinkins, 31. "It's never been about the money because money can't replace TyRon. If we had a choice, we would have him. It's about justice."
Among the issues a jury will ponder are whether Officer Jim Knight "negligently operated" his firearm and whether Lewis contributed to his own death by not obeying police commands during the 55-second confrontation.
The civil trial, expected to last 41/2 days, promises to revive questions over race relations in a city shaken by the street violence in 1996. It comes only a week after Pinellas sheriff's deputies fatally shot a 17-year-old St. Petersburg motorist suspected of dealing drugs.
"The mood is many folk are angry," said the Rev. Louis Murphy of Mount Zion Progressive Missionary Baptist Church in St. Petersburg.
Mayor Rick Baker said he plans to keep a careful eye on the community during the Lewis trial.
"We are aware of the trial, and the police department is aware of the trial," he said, declining to elaborate. "We're monitoring it."
On Oct. 24, 1996, Officers Jim Knight and Sandra Minor, both white, were together in a squad car. Parked at 18th Avenue S and 21st Street, they saw a gold Pontiac LeMans zoom by.
Knight was behind the wheel of the squad car and estimated Lewis was driving 70 mph. He pulled onto 18th Avenue S to stop Lewis.
At a red light at 16th Street S, Knight flipped on his emergency lights, climbed out of the car and walked to the driver's door. Minor called for backup.
Knight said he couldn't see through the Pontiac's darkly tinted windows.
"I knocked on the window, asked him to roll down the window," Knight said in court documents. "There was no reply."
He tried to open the driver's door, but it was locked. Minor tried the passenger's door. It was locked, too.
Knight, in a move that later got him in trouble with his department, stepped in front of the Pontiac to see inside and drew his gun.
"I don't know what their intentions are," Knight said. "I don't know why they're not complying. I don't know if they're armed or not."
Knight told Lewis to shut the engine and show his hands. Instead, Knight said, Lewis bumped him six times with the car during the confrontation.
"I felt that he was trying to intimidate me," Knight said.
Knight told Minor, who stood at Lewis' door, to break the driver's side window with her police baton. She broke a hole in a back window, then hit Lewis' window, but it did not break.
"That's when he takes off, cuts the wheel," Knight said. "I get hit up onto the car."
Knight said he fired three times from the hood.
"I was just aiming at where I thought the driver would be," he said.
Lewis was shot twice in the arm and once in the chest. His 17-year-old passenger, Eugene Young, also black, was not injured.
A grand jury said the shooting was justified because Knight had reasonable fear for his life.
But the police department suspended Knight for two months. Supervisors said he put himself in danger by standing in front of the car. An arbitrator overturned the discipline. Knight was exonerated.
The lawsuit over Lewis' death originally was filed in state court in 1997 by his mother, Pamela Lewis.
The case moved in and out of state and federal court as the family claimed the city violated Lewis' civil rights and was negligent in its training and use of excessive force. Those claims were dismissed.
The remaining piece of litigation is whether Knight negligently handled his firearm.
"The question is, did the cop act properly in firing his gun or should he have not fired?" said Ernest R. Steigman, an attorney in the New York firm that secured a settlement in the fatal police shooting of Amadou Diallo in the Bronx.
Attorneys for the Lewis family, Michael Lewis (no relation to TyRon Lewis) and Jean Laws Scott, of Stuart, did not respond to requests for an interview.
"All this really goes to is the heart of the police officer's character," Steigman said. "When he takes the stand, it's whether the jury believes him."
When Knight was disciplined after the shooting, then police Chief Darrel Stephens and Maj. Cedric Gordon, among others on the command staff, said Knight did not exercise the option of backing away from the car as he was bumped.
They said he violated policy that says officers may discharge a firearm to protect lives and "when other reasonable means to avoid the danger have failed."
City attorneys declined to comment for this story. They will likely say Knight was in fear of his life.
Lewis' character may also come into question. He began a life of crime at age 9 and at the time of his death, he had a felony warrant out for his arrest and 1.8 grams of cocaine in his pocket. Autopsy findings show he had marijuana and cocaine in his system.
"I would think the judge would dismiss the lawsuit without merit," said Officer Mark Deasaro, president of the Police Benevolent Association. "I believe Mr. Lewis attempted to kill a police officer, and the police officer had to take whatever action he took to save his life."
In a court deposition in 1999, an attorney asked Knight if he and Lewis were intimidating each other.
Knight replied, "I would say that intimidation on both levels was possible, sure."
The upcoming trial appears to have hit many in neighborhoods by surprise.
"It's like an old wound," said Melvin Hall, 53, owner of Connie's Barbecue, which is at the intersection where Lewis was shot. "Once it starts to heal, you want to move on. You don't want to open it back up and relive days gone by."
Mayor Baker said the city has come a long way since 1996, but progress still needs to be made.
"It took a long time for the city to get to the point where the conditions were such that something like that would happen," Baker said. "And it will take a long time until you can affirmatively say that there are no problems with race relations in this city."
Some residents and city officials said they are not worried about street violence should the trial verdict go against the Lewis family.
"If it stirs up any bad feelings, it will be among the Uhurus if their side loses," said Council member Rene Flowers, whose district includes part of Midtown.
The Uhurus, a black activist group known for its anti-police platform, has been demonstrating and passing out fliers, comparing the Lewis incident to the May 2 fatal shooting of Marquell McCullough by two Pinellas sheriff's deputies.
Murphy, pastor of Mount Zion Progressive Missionary Baptist Church, is concerned.
"You have blacks that are very passive who are going to try to obey the law and let the court take its course," he said. "You have others that are very aggressive, very militant, and if it doesn't come out favorable, they are going to act out on it, and you just stirred coals by killing another black person."
- Times researcher Kitty Bennett and staff writers Waveney Ann Moore, Carrie Johnson and Jon Wilson contributed to this report.