This archive report was first published on 14 December 2019.
$625,000 Settlement for Woman Whose Child Was Torn From Her Arms ¶
On December 8, 2018, Jazmine Headley, a 24-year-old mother, took her 1-year-old son to a public benefits office in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn, to find out why the city had stopped paying for his day care.
Unable to find a seat in the crowded waiting room, Ms. Headley sat on the floor next to her son's stroller. When security guards told her to leave, she asked to speak with a supervisor. However, when she walked away from the guards, they and police officers who had been called in grabbed her, arrested her, and charged her with resisting arrest, acting in a manner injurious to a child, obstructing governmental administration, and trespassing.
Ms. Headley's lawsuit, filed in 2018, alleged that the guards and police officers should have been trained in how to defuse such situations. The city's Department of Social Services established an Office of Constituent Services to handle complaints from benefits recipients and is now required to issue quarterly reports on use-of-force incidents.
On Friday, the de Blasio administration announced that it would pay $625,000 to settle the suit. Olivia Lapeyrolerie, a spokeswoman for Mayor Bill de Blasio, said in a statement, 'Ms. Headley came to the city seeking help, and we failed to treat her with the dignity and respect she deserved.'
Ms. Headley testified tearfully about her experience before the City Council in February 2019 in support of a package of bills meant to improve how city employees, especially security guards, interact with those seeking public benefits.
As a result of the incident, the city introduced mandatory training in how to de-escalate tensions for security guards who work in public benefits offices. Twenty-two security guards at the city's welfare agency resigned or were fired. The city also began wearing body cameras that will capture their encounters with the public.
Steven Banks, the social services commissioner, said in an interview on Friday, 'The steps that we said we would take that would mitigate the horrible things that happened to Ms. Headley have been taken.'
