$5.2M settlement for family of man fatally shot by LASD deputy

Los Angeles County will pay a family more than $5 million over the death of a loved one shot by sheriff's deputies in Altadena early last year .

KNX News' Karen Adams reports the deputies say they shot Charlie Towns, 47, from Pasadena after seeing him stabbing people with scissors near a gas station on Fair Oaks Avenue, but the family's attorney, Caree Harper, said they did nothing to de-escalate the situation.

"If they were adequately trained, maybe there would have been a better result,"  Harper said. "...but you know what? You can't teach someone to look at other humans as their equals or as fellow humans. Everybody knows you don't kick a man when a man is down, and you definitely don't shoot the man repeatedly."

Harper said the deputy just kept shooting, only stopping once a fellow officer intervened, "She decided to be judge and juror that day."

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Town's family says he was suffering a mental health crisis during the incident. They would like to see the deputies involved indicted for civil rights violations by the US Justice Department and hope the $5.2 million settlement will lead to reform in the L.A. Sheriff's Department.

"We want Sheriff Luna to do the right thing," Harper said. "He cannot keep ignoring the fact that black folks are killed at a rate that's disproportionately higher than our white brothers and sisters, and that has to stop immediately."

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