Cell Phones Don't Look Like Guns From [HERE] More than six years ago, officers with the LAPD shot a Latino man they believed to be armed and left him a near quadriplegic. A jury Friday ordered the city of Los Angeles to pay $5.7 million to a Robert Contreras who was shot and paralyzed from the waist down by police after he fled the scene of a shooting. Although the payout, which could reach about $6.5 million if the city is ordered to pay attorney’s fees, was far less than what city officials had been told to expect, it was more than what the city needed to pay in the case: In April, the City Council rejected a proposed settlement deal that would have paid Contreras  $4.5 million.

The jury’s decision compensates the 26-year-old Robert Contreras for injuries he suffered one night in September 2005, when several officers on patrol in South L.A. responded to a report of a nearby shooting. As they arrived, witnesses pointed to a white van speeding away and said people inside the vehicle had let off a volley of gunfire while driving by. After a brief pursuit, the three men in the van jumped out and scattered.

Two officers ran after Contreras, then 19, and followed him down a dark driveway he had ducked into. Officers claimed they opened fire when he turned towards them and had a dark object in his hand. Officers unloaded on him - shooting him multiple times in the side and back. Police claim Contreras had been holding a cellphone. The officers told investigators afterward they had seen a gun in Contreras' hand as he bolted, but an extensive search of the area found no weapon. Because there was none. The jury obviously did not find the officers to be credible.