St. Paul poised to pay out $385,000 in taxpayer funds to pay for illegal driver's license accesses by 61 cops

MinnPost reports that the St. Paul City Council will vote on October 17 on a $385,000 payout to Anne Marie Rasmussen to settle claims that 61 of the city's police officers illegally accessed her driver's license photo and record. If approved, the payout will be made out of the city's own funds generated, of course, by taxpayers.

The payouts would address 226 separate accesses of Rasmussen's records by St. Paul cops or more than $1,700 per incident, which is less than the statutory minimum per incident of $2,500. At that rate, the city will be paying about $70,000 for more than 40 accesses by one officer, Candice Jones, alone.

According to the story, St. Paul police will not divulge information about disciplinary action, if any, taken against the officers. However, it's safe to assume that such discipline has not included, at least not yet, filing criminal charges against the officers as has already occurred in the case of two Minneapolis housing inspectors. If more than 40 violations aren't enough to warrant charges, it's difficult to imagine what it might take.