Lewis Hatch prepares to search Gregory Zullo during a traffic stop in March 2014. Still image from police footage.
The state of Vermont has reached a $50,000 settlement in a lawsuit challenging the legality of a traffic by a Vermont State Police trooper of a black man in Rutland County more than five years ago.
The settlement with Gregory Zullo was announced late Thursday night in a release from the Vermont State Police.
It’s a case that has been winding its way through the court system for years, with the Vermont Supreme Court issuing a ruling earlier this year holding that police can be liable for discriminatory searches and seizures.
In its ruling, the high court did not specifically find that the trooper engaged in racial profiling, but, instead sent the case back to the lower court where those claims can be explored.
According to the release issued Thursday, the settlement followed a lengthy mediation session Thursday in Burlington.
“Under terms of the agreement, Mr. Zullo will receive $50,000 plus mediation costs,” according to the statement from state police, “while acknowledging the Vermont State Police’s longstanding commitment to fair and impartial policing.”
Zullo, of Rutland, was represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont. The ACLU of Vermont contended in its lawsuit that Zullo’s rights under Vermont’s constitution against unlawful search and seizure were violated.
The case was appealed to the Vermont Supreme Court after Rutland Superior Court Judge Helen Toor granted judgment to the state, effectively throwing the case out.
Toor ruled that Trooper Lewis Hatch’s stop of Zullo’s vehicle was not a violation his state constitutional rights regarding searches and seizures.
The case highlighted issues of whether the trooper who pulled Zullo over, then searched and seized his vehicle, was engaging in racial profiling. It also raised the legal question of whether catching a whiff of pot justified the trooper’s actions.
The ACLU, in its appeal, challenged police authority to keep using the “sniff test” in light of the 2013 state law decriminalizing possession of an ounce or less of marijuana. Decriminalization reduced the penalty for possession to a civil fine.
Lia Ernst, a lawyer with the Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. Photo by Alan J. Keays/VTDigger
Since the filing of the case, a new state law went into effect last year legalizing possession of up to an ounce of marijuana, as well as possession of a small number of marijuana plants.
Zullo was never charged with a crime stemming from the traffic stop.
Hatch, the state trooper who made the traffic stop, had a history of questionable searches often involving black men, according to a Seven Days report. He was fired from his job in 2016.
According to court filings, Zullo, then 21, had left work on March 6, 2014, at Pico Ski Resort in Killington. He was traveling to Wallingford to visit a friend when he was pulled over by Hatch as a result of snow that allegedly covered the vehicle’s registration sticker on the license plate, according to a filing.
Lia Ernst, a staff attorney with the ACLU of Vermont who represented Zullo, had alleged that in choosing to pull over Zullo’s car, the trooper was engaging in racial profiling.
After being pulled over, the ACLU stated in its appeal brief, Hatch ordered Mr. Zullo to exit his car based on the alleged faint odor of burnt marijuana.
“Hatch seized Mr. Zullo unnecessarily for an hour and had Mr. Zullo’s car towed to the barracks for a search, which revealed no contraband,” the ACLU attorneys wrote.
“To retrieve his car,” the filing stated, “Mr. Zullo walked and hitch-hiked eight miles home through sub-freezing temperatures, waited several hours at the barracks, and was forced to pay a $150 fee.”
Ernst could not immediately be reached Friday morning for comment. State police referred questions about the case to the Vermont Attorney General’s Office, which also couldn’t be reached Friday morning for comment.
This story will be updated.
Read the story on VTDigger here: State settles Zullo lawsuit involving claims of racial bias traffic stop for $50,000.