City insurer settles for $3 million in 2021 Waterloo officer-involved shooting lawsuit

JEFF REINITZ, Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier, IowaWaterloo-Cedar Falls Courier

WATERLOO — The insurance carrier for the city of Waterloo has reached a $3 million settlement in a 2021 officer-involved shooting that claimed the life of a Waterloo man.

Attorneys for the estate of Brent Lee Boggess unveiled the details of the agreement Tuesday.

Under the arrangement, Traveler's insurance will pay $3 million with each side handling its own court costs and fees, and the estate will drop the remains of the suit against the city and Officer Kenneth Schaff.

"It's been a long road, but the family is glad that it's over and there is some level of justice for Brent Boggess," said Dave O’Brien, Iowa civil rights attorney, who represented the family. "The dollar values speak loudly. We live in a capitalist system. They're not paying $3 million if they don't think they owe it. ... It tells you the extent of exposure they believed they had.”

The settlement didn't require City Council approval, according to court records.

“This settlement is important because it helps to ensure that other families will not have to suffer through the loss of a loved one based upon unjustified use of deadly force by a law enforcement officer,” said family attorney Connor Mulholland of the Mueller, Schmidt, Mulholland and Cooling Law Firm.

Officials at the Waterloo Police Department declined to comment on the settlement.

According to the settlement agreement, Lisa Boggess, his wife, will get $140,000 for loss of past and future support.

Two minor children will each receive a structured settlement annuity for $495,000; and a third child will receive a structured settlement annuity totaling $380,000 and an additional cash lump sum of $115,000.

Brent Boggess' mother, Kim Buttshaw, will receive a structured settlement annuity of $100,000 and an additional cash lump sum of $40,000.

Lisa Boggess and Buttshaw were directed to pay law firms Johnson, Mulholland, Cochrane, Cochrane, Yung and Engler.; Mueller, Schmidt, Mulholland and Cooling; and Dave O’Brien Law P.C., a total of $1,225,542 for attorneys’ fees and costs.

O'Brien said Boggess, a 42-year-old father of three, was having an emotional breakdown when police attempted to stop him in the early morning hours of Nov. 16, 2021. He led officers on a nine-minute pursuit.

He eventually stopped after officers placed Stop Sticks in front of his pickup truck in an alley behind his Madison Street home.

Boggess briefly spoke with officers on foot who attempted to get him to exit his truck.

Another squad car pulled in front of the truck, an apparent effort to box it in.

Boggess then drove forward, striking the squad car, and Schaff, on foot, opened fire on the truck with his handgun.

Boggess said, “Dude, I’m unarmed,” as he exited his truck and collapsed. He was later pronounced dead at the hospital.

The suit said the situation didn’t meet the criteria for deadly force. The estate characterized the crash as a low-speed collision that didn't trigger the airbags. O'Brien likened it to using deadly force in a fender bender.

A review by the Black Hawk County Attorney’s Office released in April 2022 cleared the officers involved of any criminal charges.

And a U.S. District Court judge dismissed the wrongful death claim at the federal level on qualified immunity grounds after ruling the use of force was objectively reasonable under the circumstances.

The decision sent the lawsuit back down to Iowa district court where a state judge threw out the matter in a ruling that mirrored the federal opinion.

But part of the case was re-instated in state court after an Iowa Supreme Court ruling cited fresh case law that qualified immunity can't be applied to common law assault claims in the suit.