Greeley City Council agrees to $100K settlement in officer chokehold case

GREELEY — The Greeley City Council this week quietly resolved a 3-year-old officer chokehold case in which a city police officer put a suspect in a chokehold while detaining him in a public building.

The city council agreed to settle the resulting lawsuit against the officer for $100,000 and approved the settlement without discussion under its consent agenda at its regular meeting this week.

The settlement comes after Matthew Wilson sued former Greeley police officer Ken Amick. According to his complaint, Wilson was at the city’s municipal building on June 7, 2021, “where he was attempting to solicit his services and products for fire suppression systems,” when Amick and other officers were dispatched to the scene. The lawsuit states that officers spoke with Wilson for several minutes, during which they learned Wilson had a warrant out for his arrest.

“Officer Amick placed Plaintiff in handcuffs, stating that he was doing so in order to search him for officer safety. Officer Amick did not tell Plaintiff that he was under arrest. As Officer Amick was moving Plaintiff out of the municipal building, he pushed him toward the door and then put Plaintiff in a choke hold, leading to Plaintiff passing out and falling to his knees. Other responding officers intervened and forced Officer Amick to release the chokehold. Only at this time was Plaintiff advised that he had a warrant for his arrest,” the lawsuit stated.

Chokeholds are illegal for officers to use on suspects in Colorado, and the lawsuit states that Amick had recently attended training to that effect.

While bringing Wilson to the patrol car, however, the lawsuit states that Amick “began striking Plaintiff with his knees and threw Plaintiff to the ground, shoving his head into the cement while angrily berating Plaintiff.”

Amick was terminated from the Greeley Police Department and was charged criminally in the incident. Amick later pleaded guilty to reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor.

As a part of the settlement, Wilson agreed to drop the case against Amick in U.S. District Court.