Murphy – A $10 million settlement has been reached in the federal civil lawsuit over the Dec. 13, 2022, SWAT raid that nearly killed an unarmed man as he attempted to comply with commands from SWAT team members.
The lawsuit, J. Harley Kloepfer and Allison Mahler vs. Sheriff Dustin Smith, et al., was settled with $5 million to be paid by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, whose SWAT team conducted the raid, and $5 million from Cherokee County, whose sheriff’s office requested the SWAT team’s assistance.
Cherokee County’s insurance carrier is covering its portion of the settlement, less a $5,000 deductible the county paid shortly after the case was filed, according to a statement from Cherokee County government. Commissioners were informed of the settlement by litigation counsel Sean Perrin in closed session during the board’s May 20 meeting.
Since the settlement did not involve the expenditure of further county funds, the board of commissioners was not required to approve it, according to the statement. The settlement will be reported to the U.S. District Court in Asheville, where the suit was filed, within 45 days.
The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians did not respond to the Cherokee Scout’s request for comment about the settlement. Tribal officials have stayed publicly silent on the incident.
The incident
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Kloepfer, 41 at the time, was shot in the early morning hours of Dec. 13, 2022, by the Cherokee Tribal Police SWAT team at his home in Bear Paw. Kloepfer was gravely injured and hospitalized. The Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office claimed in a release that Kloepfer engaged in a “verbal altercation with officers” and “confronted officers.”
Kloepfer was charged with communicating threats and resist, obstruct and delay, but charges were dropped by March 2023.
Mahler was taken to the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office, where she remained for several hours until she was released later that morning. No charges were filed against her.
While Kloepfer was recovering from his injuries, in January 2023 he released surveillance video recorded inside his home that showed events differing from law enforcement’s accounts of the shooting.
The video showed that Kloepfer was stirred from bed when he found a wheeled drone the SWAT team tossed through a window rolling around on the floor inside his home, and as officers outside commanded him to come outside.
Shirtless and unarmed, he picked up the drone and followed police instructions. But as he opened his front door, Kloepfer was met by a volley of fire from some SWAT team members, severely wounding him. Mahler was also in the line of fire but escaped injury.
The evidence
The incident was another severe black eye for Cherokee County institutions, following multiple lawsuits against the Department of Social Services. In that situation, social workers were removing children from their homes and placed into foster care after the parents were compelled to sign placement orders that judges have called illegal.
The lawsuits, most of which were settled out of court, have cost Cherokee County taxpayers millions of dollars and will affect local property tax rates until around 2030. Three DSS employees, including its director and lawyer, were later convicted of felonies, but none of them were required to serve time.
The Bear Paw SWAT raid occurred just days after Dustin Smith took office as Cherokee County sheriff and has cast a shadow over his administration ever since. From a SWAT raid gone awry and a release that completely misrepresented what happened at the scene, to video that showed the SWAT shooting to be unjustified, more evidence came to light as the civil lawsuit made its way through court.
The consequences
District Attorney Ashley Welch recused herself office from prosecuting the case, saying there was a possibility she could be called as a witness. That turned out to be true, and she wound up filing a damning declaration in which she said she was misled by then-sheriff’s Lt. Milton “Sport” Teasdale.
More than a year after the incident, the DA’s office issued a so-called Giglio order, which refers to the legal obligation of the prosecution to disclose any information to the defense that could potentially undermine the credibility of a prosecution witness, particularly law enforcement officers.
Meanwhile, Superior Court Judge Tessa Sellers, responding to a filing by Welch, ordered the sheriff’s office’s evidence room sealed and placed off limits to Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office employees – including the sheriff. The order was related to missing evidence following audits, but whether that action was related to the SWAT raid has not been revealed in court orders.
Requests for comment to Kloepfer were referred to his lawyer, Beverly Cook, who has not yet responded to a message left with her office by the Scout. Kloepfer wrote on a post on the Scout’s Facebook page, “To the good people of Murphy, thank you for your kind words.”