Judge awards $23.5 million to undercover St. Louis officer beaten by colleagues during protest
ST. LOUIS — A St. Louis judge on Monday awarded nearly $23.5 million to a former police officer who was beaten by colleagues while working undercover during a protest.
Luther Hall was seriously injured in the 2017 attack during one of several protests that followed the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a former St. Louis officer, on murder charges stemming from the shooting of a Black man.
Hall previously settled a separate lawsuit with the city for $5 million. In 2022, he charged three former colleagues – Randy Hays, Dustin Boone and Christopher Myers – for their roles in the attack.
Hays never responded to the lawsuit, despite being served while in prison for civil rights violations, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. A judge entered a default judgment in Hall’s favor in February and heard testimony Monday about why Hall should receive damages.
Hall’s claims against Boone and Myers are still pending.
Hall spoke in court on Monday about the serious physical and emotional damage that followed the assault. He suffered several hernias and a jaw injury that left him unable to eat. He developed gallstones with complications, requiring surgery.
“Mr. Hall had to endure this severe assault and while it was happening, he knew it was being administered by his colleagues who were sworn to serve and protect,” Circuit Judge Joseph Whyte said.
Hays was not present at the hearing. He was sentenced in 2021 to more than four years in prison and is in the custody of the St. Louis Residential Reentry Management Office, which oversees people released from prison and in home confinement or in halfway houses. He has one year to appeal the verdict.
The attack occurred on September 17, 2017, days after Stockley was acquitted in the fatal shooting of 24-year-old Anthony Lamar Smith on December 20, 2011. Hall was walking back to police headquarters when his uniformed colleagues ordered him to put his hands up and lie on the ground and then hit him.
Hays, Boone, Myers and another officer, Bailey Colletta, were charged in 2018 in connection with Hall’s injuries. A fifth officer, Steven Korte, was indicted on civil rights charges and again for lying to the FBI.
Boone was convicted of the civil rights charge and sentenced to one year and one day in prison. Meyers was placed on probation after pleading guilty to one misdemeanor charge. Colletta was placed on probation for lying to the FBI and a grand jury about the attack. Korte was acquitted.
In addition to the settlement with Hall, the city of St. Louis paid nearly $5.2 million last year over allegations that police violated the rights of dozens of people by trapping and arresting them. Some said they were beaten, pepper-sprayed and attacked with stun guns during several downtown protests following the Stockley verdict.