A San Diego jury has awarded a city firefighter more than 400-thousand dollars, after finding a police officer falsely arrested and beat him.
Firefighter Thomas McHale says he was bicycling home when officer Robert Wills sideswiped him.
McHale says Wills then put him in a chokehold and wrote him a ticket after they exchanged words.
Wills argues McHale sparked the 1999 incident by being profane and uncooperative.
City layers had earlier rejected an offer to settle the case for six-thousand dollars.
Prosecutors call the jury award excessive and say they´ll ask the judge to reduce it.
This post was last modified on 01/31/2009 5:56 pm