Austin, TX

The Austin Police Department (APD) has paid $100 million in documented police misconduct settlements between 2013 and 2025, according to a Kroll review of 112 lawsuits commissioned by the City of Austin and subsequent reporting by the Austin Monitor, Texas Tribune, and KUT. The dataset is dominated by settlements arising from the 2020 racial justice protests - the largest single-event protest liability in Texas history - and reflects a department that has faced sustained legal pressure without a federal consent decree.

The 2020 protest settlements are the defining feature of the Austin dataset. Following the murder of George Floyd, Austin police deployed shotguns loaded with lead-pellet bags (marketed as 'less-lethal' ammunition) against demonstrators outside APD headquarters in May 2020. The resulting injuries were severe and permanent. Justin Howell, 20, was shot in the head and nearly killed; he settled his lawsuit for $8 million in February 2022 - the largest excessive force settlement in Austin history at the time. Anthony Evans settled for $2 million the same month. Brad Ayala had his skull fractured and settled for $2.95 million in 2024. Sam Kirsch was shot in the face, suffered permanent nerve damage, and had an eye removed; he settled for $4.5 million in May 2025. As of May 2025, Austin had paid $27 million to 27 people injured during the protests.

In February 2022, a Travis County grand jury indicted 19 Austin police officers for excessive force during the 2020 protests - one of the largest mass indictments of police officers in Texas history. Most of those charges were subsequently dropped. The city also began implementing the Austin Police Oversight Act, a voter-approved measure from 2023 that gives civilians greater access to police complaint files, though implementation has been delayed by state laws protecting police employment documents.

A Fox7 investigation published in January 2026 found that Austin had settled 78 civil lawsuits involving APD officers in the prior five years, with settlements ranging from $2,000 to $8 million. The Kroll review of 112 lawsuits from 2013 to 2022 found $73 million in total exposure - a figure that has grown by an additional $27 million in protest-related settlements since the review was completed.

For insurance underwriters, the Austin dataset illustrates the actuarial risk of mass civil liability events: a single protest response decision generated $27 million in settlements across 27 claimants, with individual awards ranging from $2 million to $8 million. The department's use of less-lethal ammunition in crowd control contexts - and the permanent injuries that resulted - represents a category of exposure that standard use-of-force models may not adequately price.