Arthur McDuffie

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Arthur McDuffie (died 1979) was an African American, whose death at the hands of Miami, Florida police caused one of the worst riots in United States history: the 1980 Liberty City riots.

McDuffie was an insurance salesman, and had previously been a United States Marine, and a military police officer. He had two daughters and planned to remarry his former wife at the time of the incident. In the early morning hours of December 17, 1979, police officers pursued McDuffie, in a high-speed chase of his motorcycle. McDuffie had accumulated traffic citations and was driving with a suspended license.

The four white officers involved filed a report claiming that McDuffie had run through a red light and led police on an eight-minute chase. After then losing control of his vehicle while making a left turn, McDuffie allegedly then attempted to flee on foot, but was subdued by the officers. Afterwards, William Hanlon, one of the officers indicted, became a witness. According to Hanlon, he physically restrained Arthur McDuffie with his baton around McDuffie's neck. He handcuffed McDuffie. He stood by while other officers beat McDuffie on the head with a flashlight, eventually cracking his skull "like an egg," the prosecutor at the trial said.

Hanlon carried out the orders of his supervisor, who told the officers to make it appear that McDuffie had died during an accident. He joked to the other officers about where McDuffie's legs could be broken to make the injuries look accidental. He drove a squad car over McDuffie's bike, used a tire iron to gouge the road and tossed McDuffie's watch down a gutter.

The end result was that McDuffie was taken unconscious to a nearby hospital, where he died four days later. The coroner's report concluded that he had suffered multiple skull fractures after being hit by a blunt object. The Hanlon testimony could be referred in his Bar application.

The four officers were indicted for manslaughter, as well as tampering with or fabricating physical evidence, with one charge later elevated to second degree murder. The acting director of the Dade County Public Safety Department suspended them, noting that the four officers had been cited in 47 citizen complaints and 13 internal affairs probes since 1973. All of the officers were fired less than a month later.

At trial, one officer was acquitted by the judge's ruling that the state had failed to prove their case. Nine days later, an all-white six-man jury acquitted the remaining officers on all 13 counts of the indictment after less than three hours of deliberation.

This verdict sparked the Liberty City riots in which 18 people died. Property damage was estimated at $100 million.

Dade County commissioners later agreed to a $1.1 million settlement with McDuffie's family in exchange for dropping their $25 million lawsuit.

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