Man loses legally awarded millions and received only 100-dollar bill instead

Darryl Barnes, who was shot and paralyzed by a police officer 20 years ago will receive only $100 in court costs instead of $76.4 million. The multi-million-dollar award was supposed to be paid to the paralyzed man fro the budget of New York, where the incident happened. The awards were reversed by a midlevel appeals court.

Photo: Man loses legally awarded millions and received only 100-dollar bill instead

The Court of Appeals refused to entertain Barnes’ arguments and ended the case.

The case of Darryl Barnes began on August 22, 1988, when a police officer saw Barnes running with a pistol. The officer, named as Franz Jerome, asked Barnes to stop. The police officer began to chase the man, Barnes fired his pistol and the officer fired back, hitting Barnes. The latter received severe spinal injuries because of the shot.

Darryl Barnes subsequently said that the officer had shot him in the back at point-blank range. In addition, Barnes said that he had dropped his gun before Jerome fired his weapon at him. The man also said that he had found the gun during a nearby fight with two young men.

The first trial, which was held in April of 1998, the jury ruled to award $76.4 million to Barnes, which the trial judge reduced to $8.9 million.

The city appealed against such a decision claiming that the trial court had omitted the proof of Barnes’ affiliation to an anti-white and anti-police group that advocates violent resistance to arrest.

Darryl Barnes did not attend the second trial held in March of 2003. The man claimed that he was physically and mentally ill to attend the hearings. The jury awarded him $51 million, which the trial judge reduced to $10.75 million.

However, the appeals judges stated that they had dismissed the case because Barnes did not attend the hearing to prove that he was weak indeed. Darryl Barnes is currently 42.

Robert Simels, Barnes’ lawyer, stated that he would try to investigate an opportunity to bring the case of his client to federal court. The decision, which the Court of Appeals upheld, was 1,000 percent wrong, Simels believes.