Wounded cops awarded more than $5M in suit against gun shop
Two Milwaukee police officers were awarded more than $5 million on Tuesday in their civil suit against a gun store accused of ignoring red flags when it sold a weapon used to shoot and wound them in 2009.
Milwaukee County jurors deliberated nine hours before awarding about $3.5 million to former officer Graham Kunisch and $1.5 million to former officer Bryan Norberg, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. Jurors also ordered the store, Badger Guns, to pay $730,000 in punitive damages. Coverage by the New York Times says jurors awarded Kunisch about $3.2 million and awarded Norberg about $1.2 million.
A 2005 federal law gives gun dealers immunity from lawsuits unless the sellers knew or should have known the sale was illegal or likely to pose a danger. The suit against Badger Guns is the second suit against a gun shop to reach a jury since the law passed. Jurors refused to award damages against an Alaska gun store in the first.
Badger Guns had sold the gun used in the crime despite indications it was going to a straw purchaser, lawyers for the officers had alleged. The buyer initially marked on a form that he wasn’t the actual buyer of the gun, but he was allowed to change his answer and his address.
Jury foreperson Brett Heaton Juarez told the Journal Sentinel that jurors agreed that Badger Guns had poor business practices. He cited testimony that the owners didn’t train workers, had not read federal regulations and were unaware of all the requirements on federal forms for gun sales.
Badger Guns plans to appeal. Its lawyer had argued it was far from clear that the gun sale was illegal.
