Boise Will Foot Bill For Officers’ Legal Fees Recent Shootings By Police Could Cost The City Thousands

Taxpayers will pay thousands of dollars to represent police officers involved in shootings.

State law requires the city to pay attorney fees to represent officers involved in FBI investigations, such as one into the Sept. 20 shootings of brothers Craig and Doug Brodrick.

The city also will pay to represent detective Dave Smith, who was named in a $20 million wrongful death suit in the Nov. 6 shooting of Ryan Hennessey.

And Randy Atkinson, whose son Justin was shot and killed by officer Christopher Rogers, said he went to the local FBI office last week and filled out paperwork requesting a civil rights investigation.

Frank Stoppello, counsel for Local 486 of the International Brotherhood of Police Officers, is representing three of the six officers involved in the Brodrick shootings.

Officers involved are union president Cpl. Dale Rogers and officers Ron Winegar, Bryan Hagler, Robert Berrier, Stephan Van Doren and Gary Wiggins.

“The officers I represent welcome it with open arms,” said Stoppello, who was hired privately to represent the three officers. He would not name them.

Stoppello said it is impossible to speculate how much the legal fees will be in the Brodrick case because he does not know what other attorneys charge or how much time the case will take.

But in general, civil attorneys charge anywhere from $85 to $150 an hour for their services, said Jay Rosenthal, deputy prosecuting attorney for Ada County.

Suzanne Burton, special assistant to Mayor Brent Coles, said she does not know how much the Hennessey case has cost the city or what the expected bill will be from the FBI investigation into the Brodrick case.

The city’s 1998 budget includes $2,488,095 for total legal fees for lawsuits, legal work for all departments and traffic court operations.