PITTSBURGH — The family of a man who was pulled away from his dead stepson in an emergency room by police settled a pair of lawsuits stemming from the incident Tuesday.
Last September, Rev. Earl Baldwin Jr. told Channel 11 that when his stepson, Mileek Grissom, died in UPMC Mercy Hospital’s emergency room after being shot, police crossed the line.
Video from the ER that day in 2012 shows Baldwin being ripped away from Grissom by a group of police officers. One of the officers is also seen using a Taser on Baldwin, who required hospital treatment after the encounter.
According to police, officers didn’t want Baldwin in the ER because it was a crime scene due to the fact that Grissom had a significant amount of cash in his pocket.
Baldwin said he tried to tell the officers that he just wanted to whisper into his stepson’s ear and say goodbye to him.
The Baldwins’ lawyer, Joel Sansone, worked out the undisclosed agreement with UPMC.
“In this case, I fault the officer for using what I thought was bad judgment in tasering my client under such terrible circumstances,” said Sansone.
The city of Pittsburgh also settled its lawsuit with the Baldwins, paying them $50,000.
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