VANCOUVER, Wash. — The family of Carlos Hunter, who was shot and killed by Vancouver Police and Washington Department of Corrections officers in 2019, has filed a wrongful death and civil rights lawsuit against the City of Vancouver, the Washington Department of Corrections and multiple officers involved in the incident.
Detectives conducting a drug trafficking investigation stopped the 43-year-old Hunter in his vehicle in order to execute a search warrant on March 7. Police later said Hunter was armed and uncooperative, and resisted when they tried to physically remove him from the car, prompting them to use tasers on him.
Police said Hunter continued to struggle and eventually appeared to reach for a gun in the right pocket of his pants, at which point two officers standing on opposite sides of his vehicle opened fire, shooting him multiple times.
Police also described Hunter as a gang member, a characterization which Hunter's sister disputed after the shooting. She said her brother had a troubled past including prison time, but had put it behind him and was on his way to pick up his son from school on the day of the shooting.
The lawsuit was filed in Clark County Superior Court by two Seattle-based law firms, Corr Cronin and Schroeter Goldmark & Bender, on behalf of Hunter's estate and six children.
The lawsuit alleges that the officers acted improperly and recklessly during the traffic stop, unnecessarily escalating the situation and thereby creating the circumstances that led to Hunter's death.
It also disputes the claim that Hunter reached for the gun, arguing that officers had instructed him to unbuckle his seatbelt and photos taken after the shooting showed the gun still secured in his pocket. It also alleges that the officers did not provide any first aid after dragging Hunter out of the car following the shooting.
The Washington Department of Corrections declined to comment on the lawsuit. The City of Vancouver responded to a request for comment from the Vancouver Police Department (VPD) with the following statement:
"The City of Vancouver has not been provided a copy of any lawsuit that has been or will be filed by the family of Carlos Hunter. With that said, the Chief Deputy Prosecuting Attorney reviewed the incident involving Mr. Hunter and the Vancouver Police Department and concluded the actions of Vancouver’s officers 'were in response to a fear of deadly assault.' The investigation revealed that the officer-involved shooting occurred when Mr. Hunter resisted and reached for a handgun in his pocket instead of cooperating with the officers who were attempting to serve a search warrant authorized by a judge. While the loss of any life is tragic, the City agrees with the conclusion of the Prosecuting Attorney and intends to defend its officers in this litigation accordingly."
Craig Sims, an attorney at Schroeter Goldmark & Bender, said filing the lawsuit "levels the playing field" in terms of the information made available to Hunter's family and providing accountability for the officers in the incident.
"When we began our investigation, it was very clear that the police department had control over all the information and consistently presented information that would be in their own best interests," he said, "often leaving the families — in this instance the Hunter family — wanting for answers."
The lawsuit also heavily references the findings of a 2020 review of the VPD by the nonprofit Police Executive Research Forum, commissioned by the City of Vancouver after a four-week period in which VPD officers were involved in four separate shootings, the last of which was the shooting of Hunter.
The report found that the VPD's use-of-force policy lacked definitions for key terms like less-lethal force and de-escalation, and did not direct officers to only use force proportional to a given threat.
"The PERF report had some stark revelations that we cite in our complaint," said John Bender, an attorney at Corr Cronin, "one of which being that use of force incidents involving VPD increased by 65% between 2017 and 2019, and that over 11% of the people subjected to use of force were Black Americans, even though Black Americans make up 3% of Vancouver's population."
The lawsuit alleges that systematic training and oversight failures at the VPD led to "a pattern or practice of conduct by VPD officers that deprives persons of their rights and protections," and seeks both damages and an order compelling the VPD to improve its policies.
Sims and Bender both stressed that they did not want the lawsuit to be perceived as being part of an anti-police movement.
"I have an amazing amount of respect for the men and women who swear to uphold public safety," Sims said. "However, with taking that oath, there is also a responsibility to act responsibly and within the bounds of the law. And that's what our job is and what we're attempting to do here, is to determine whether or not the officers acted within the bounds of the law when they killed Mr. Hunter."