Family of a pregnant woman fatally shot by Colorado police reaches $2 million settlement

DENVER — The family of a pregnant woman whom police in Arvada, Colorado, shot and killed after they mistook her for a shoplifter has reached a $2 million settlement with the city, officials said Tuesday.

Destinee Thompson, a mother of three from Denver, was killed on Aug. 17, 2021, as she tried to drive away from officers who had surrounded her car as she was leaving an Arvada motel.

The lawsuit filed by Thompson’s family was settled in July and the settlement was announced this week, said Dave Snelling, a spokesman for the Arvada Police Department.

The shooting occurred as officers were searching for a Latina who had brandished a knife while she was stealing a cart full of merchandise from a Target store, according to the lawsuit filed in Denver County District Court.

The actual suspect, who also had stolen items from the store two days previously, had a chest tattoo and was wearing a white tank top, and she was believed to have gone to the motel, the lawsuit said.

Thompson, who was wearing a white tank top but did not have a chest tattoo, was leaving the motel to eat lunch as officers arrived, it said.

After Thompson got into her minivan, she was blocked in by a police vehicle and officers surrounded her, yelling and eventually shattering a passenger window, the lawsuit said.

Thompson was scared and tried to back out of the parking space before she drove over the curb and toward the road without posing a risk to officers, it said.

She drove about 25 yards before Arvada Police Officer Anthony Benallo fired eight shots, one of which killed Thompson and her unborn child, the suit said.

Neither Benallo nor the family’s attorney, Siddhartha Rathod, could be reached for comment. 

District Attorney Alexis D. King declined to press charges against officers in April 2022.

“I find that the officer’s use of deadly physical force was legally justified to defend himself and others from the threat posed,” King wrote in a statement.

Thompson’s father, Francis Thompson, said in 2023 that the police department tried to downplay the killing by waiting more than a year to release the incident report. 

“This is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to deal with,” he said. “I want justice. I don’t think it’s fair that the officers are still working without punishment.

“I wish I could tell her one more time that I love her, and I’ll never stop fighting for her. I’m not going to let go.”