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Minneapolis Settles With Seven Zombies for $165k

By Tanya Roth, Esq. on August 26, 2010 | Last updated on March 21, 2019

How do you get rid of zombies? Pay them cold, hard cash. At least that is what the city of Minneapolis did to make a suit by seven zombies lay down and die, for good.

The story of the undead, zero probable cause and one scary appellate court decision begins in the summer of 2006, according to the Wall Street Journal. Seven citizens, dressed up like zombies, lurched down the streets of downtown Minneapolis allegedly to protest "mindless consumerism." Or, did they mean mind-eating consumerism? Never mind. The zombies carried with them an iPod and four sacks containing sound amplification equipment. However, to police called to the scene, the sound equipment somehow resembled "weapons of mass destruction." Add to that equation no identification for any of the un-dead and you get two days in jail without any charges ever filed. Cut to lawsuit against city.

In 2008, the U.S. District Court buried the case, according to the Journal, but it was resuscitated by the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals. The city of Minneapolis must have been a bit frightened at the prospect of the trial scheduled for this fall, because they finally settled with the seven zombies and their presumably lively attorney for $165,000.

"I feel great that the city is being held accountable for the actions of their police," Raphi Rechitsky, 27, one of the Zombie Seven, told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Rechitsky went on to say that the attack of the undead was just he and his friends performing street theater. The consumerism-protesting, weapons-of-mass-destruction-toting Rechitsky is a Ph.D. candidate in sociology at the University of Minnesota.

The Star-Tribune reported Minneapolis City Attorney Susan L. Segal said it was in the best interests of the city to settle. "We believe the police acted reasonably, but you never know what a jury is going to do with a case," she said. True, you never know when they might stagger out of the jury box and attack the city budget, just because some zombies got their constitutional rights stomped on. The End.

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