A white lawyer caught spitting in the face of a Black Lives Matter protest leader in 2020 has won a $750,000 settlement from local villages before her arrest.
Stephanie Rapkin was convicted of disorderly conduct last year for spitting on Eric Patrick Lucas III as he led a march through the streets of Shorewood, Wisconsin on June 6, 2020.
She ultimately served 60 days in jail, after which she filed a federal lawsuit against the Village of Sherwood, the Village of Whitefish and eight police officers for their actions the day after the spitting incident. reports the Atlanta Black Star.
Protesters showed up outside her home on June 7, 2020, to confront Rapkin about the spitting incident, when she was filmed apparently pushing one of the protesters, Joe Friedman, after the two got into an argument over what happened the day before.
Rapkin had claimed at the time that she was defending herself and that she spat in response to an attack by Lucas – although the claims were not supported by the video – and attempted to demonstrate the alleged attack by approaching Friedman and pushing him in the chest.
Another protester then called Sherwood police, who entered her home without a warrant, according to Rapkin.
She argued in her lawsuit that after police reviewed Friedman’s cellphone footage, they knocked on her door for about 30 minutes while they discussed their plan to arrest her for disorderly conduct.
These claims were supported by police-worn body camera footage obtained by TMJ 4in which one officer tells another, “If she comes out, arrest her.”
Stephanie Rapkin won a $750,000 settlement from local villages for her 2020 arrest
She was caught on camera spitting on Eric Patrick Lucas III in The Village of Shorewood during a Black Lives Matter protest on June 6, 2020
But police then allegedly “conspired to create a justification to burglarize her home” without ever considering obtaining a warrant, according to the federal lawsuit Rapkin filed in May 2023 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin had filed.
She claimed officers eventually found a false pretext to enter the house after speaking to a neighbor who told them she had taken a sleeping pill.
“I know she took a dose this morning and probably a couple more doses after that because she couldn’t get to sleep,” the neighbor said in the police-worn body camera footage.
When police then asked if Rapkin was taking “multiple doses of sleeping medication,” the neighbor said they weren’t sure.
That’s when officers from the Village of Sherwood and the Village of Whitefish devised a plan to conduct a welfare check on her, the lawsuit alleges.
However, footage of the arrest shows officers breaking down the front door and entering Rapkin’s home with their weapons and Tasers drawn.
Police were seen standing at the bottom of her stairs ordering her to come down so they could “check on her.”
“Gentlemen, do you have a warrant?” shot back the wily lawyer.
The next day, she was accused of pushing a protester who had gathered outside her home
“We’re here to see a community manager, okay?” the officers then assured her.
Rapkin responded that she was “totally fine” and sleeping, noting that she had not taken any sleep medication as the neighbor suggested and that she just wanted to go back to sleep.
Still, officers placed Rapkin under arrest in her dining room, where one officer could be heard telling her she was accused of “assaulting an individual, revealing their true motivation for entering Rapkin’s home without a warrant,” according to her lawsuit.
A scuffle ensued, with one officer claiming Rapkin kneed him in the groin – although Rapkin later claimed police threw her against a wall while shouting in her face.
They then escorted her from her home, to the applause of protesters outside, and searched her home for evidence that Rapkin was abusing sleeping pills — leaving them empty-handed, according to the complaint.
In a federal lawsuit filed in May 2023, Rapkin alleged that officers from the Village of Sherwood and the Village of Whitefish created a false reason to enter her home that day and arrest her without a warrant.
Police escorted her from her home to applause from protesters outside
An assault charge against Rapkin for allegedly kneeling one of the officers was later dropped, and when a federal judge granted a motion to suppress evidence collected during the search, she called the search “outrageous police conduct.”
Judge Laura Crivello ruled that a “reasonable officer would have concluded that you should either get a warrant or wait for her attorney to take her to the police station to talk.”
Rapkin ultimately alleged that police officers violated her Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures and alleged that the Village of Sherwood Police Department had a policy of “falsely invoking the community trustee doctrine to intrude on the houses of private citizens’.
She sought compensatory and punitive damages against the villages and the officers involved, all of whom denied the allegations, as police departments claimed qualified immunity from liability for their officers.
Sherwood Village Manager Rebecca Ewald has since told Fox6 that the settlement is not an admission of wrongdoing, but rather a decision by village officials to avoid the cost and risk of a lawsuit.
She also said residents of the village will not have to pay the hefty settlement, which is covered by insurance.