Police Brutality / Individual record
Ron Settles
Ron Settles, a 21-year-old Black college football player, died in a Signal Hill, California jail hours after a traffic stop on June 2, 1981.
- Record ID
- PB-009
- Incident date
- June 2, 1981
- Date of death
- June 2, 1981
- Outcome
- Fatal
- Location
- Signal Hill, CA
- Category
- Death in police custody
What happened
Police arrested Settles on traffic-related and other allegations and later said he had hanged himself in his cell. His relatives rejected the suicide claim and contended police had choked or beaten him. A coroner's inquest reviewed the disputed death, and a wave of community opposition exposed longstanding concerns about the Signal Hill police department.
Investigation & findings
The coroner's inquest concluded he died 'at the hands of another.' No officer was criminally charged. The family reached a reported $760,000 civil settlement; the controversy led to major changes in the local police department.
Source record details
- Source incident ID
- Historical source-derived record, pre-2015
Sources & records
- Primary source
- Additional source
- Methodology and national police killings trackingMapping Police Violence · Dataset/methodology
- Published historical compilation of Black people killed in police custody (1999–2014)SAGE journal / cited NAACP LDF memorial listing · 2016 · Secondary scholarly source