NEWS Charmaine Lawson is hugged by supporters at a 2019 vigil for her son, David Josiah Lawson. Mark Mckenna
‘Blood Money’
Charmaine Lawson: Settlement means ‘nothing,’ focus is on justice By Thadeus Greenson and Kimberly Wear thad@northcoastjournal.com kim@northcoastjournal.com
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harmaine Lawson still hasn’t cashed the $200,000 check that came as a part of her settlement agreement with the city of Arcata. She says it took her four days to even open the envelope it was mailed in and it has now sat for weeks atop her son’s urn. Filed in November of 2018, the lawsuit alleged the city and its officials violated Charmaine Lawson’s equal protection rights by inadequately and incompetently investigating the April 15, 2017, stabbing death of her son, 19-year-old David Josiah Lawson, with racism and bias contributing to what the suit described as the city’s “deliberately indifferent” treatment of the case. The settlement agreement — which in addition to the $200,000 payment includes the city making a $25,000 donation to the David Josiah Lawson Memorial Scholarship fund and agreeing to the painting of a memorial mural — was reached in April but announced by the city July 7, about a week after a federal judge officially dismissed the case. Speaking to the Journal, Charmaine Lawson said the settlement isn’t about the money but her desire for all parties involved to focus squarely on bringing
her son’s killer to justice without the distraction of a trial that was scheduled to begin later this year. “Money means absolutely nothing to me. Absolutely nothing,” she said. “I just want to move on from this settlement and focus on getting the person who is responsible for my son’s murder behind bars. They need to be held accountable and justice needs to be served. It has been way too long. That is really my focus. No amount of money is going to bring him back. I don’t care if it’s $100 million, it’s not going to bring him back. I don’t care if it’s $5,000, it’s not going to bring him back.” While the settlement agreement — a copy of which the Journal obtained through a request under the California Public Records Act — describes the $200,000 payment as “compensatory damages,” the city does not admit any wrongdoing and specifies that liability for the “incident is disputed,” describing the agreement as a “compromise.” Arcata City Manager Karen Diemer told the Journal the $200,000 will be paid by the Redwood Municipal Insurance Fund, the city’s insurer, while the donation to the scholarship fund will be paid by the city directly.
As to the mural, the settlement stipulates that the city has granted approval for one to be created but states it will work with Charmaine Lawson to figure out the details moving forward, including where it will be located, how big it will be and how it will be funded. More than four years have passed since David Josiah Lawson was found bleeding from fatal stab wounds outside a house party in Arcata shortly after 3 a.m. after several fights broke out. His killing remains unsolved. A then-23-yearold McKinleyville man, Kyle Zoellner, was arrested at the scene and charged with Lawson’s murder, but a judge dismissed the case several weeks later, finding police hadn’t collected sufficient evidence to justify the charge. Charmaine Lawson, who lives in Riverside County, has been a regular presence in Humboldt County in the years since her son’s death — holding coat and food drives, vigils and, most recently, a commemorative run — as she continues to call for justice, joined by other community members. But the investigation into the HSU sophomore’s fatal stabbing has been troubled from the start, plagued by a series of crucial initial missteps in con-
trolling and processing the crime scene and securing potential witnesses, and subsequent trouble getting witnesses to come forward and cooperate. A February 2020 report from the National Police Foundation found that while the emergency response did everything possible to try to save Lawson’s life, “many basic tenets of crime scene security and management” were not followed. The report cited a systemic failure by the police department’s then leadership to provide adequate training on crime scene management and command skills, which severely hindered the ensuing investigation. The report also noted that while it found no evidence the chaotic crime scene interfered with first responders’ efforts to save Lawson’s life, a public “perception” that the emergency response was indifferent or racially biased (Lawson was Black and Zoellner is white) “provided fertile ground for false narratives” and may have created an environment that “discouraged witnesses.” That National Police Foundation report was followed a few months later by another by the Humboldt County Civil Grand Jury, which found “failures, Continued on next page »
northcoastjournal.com • Thursday, July 15, 2021 • NORTH COAST JOURNAL
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