A lawsuit has been filed on behalf of an Overland Park resident who said he was denied access to several public records in connection to a police shooting that killed a teenager in 2018.
The lawsuit, filed in Johnson County District Court Wednesday, names the city of Overland Park and District Attorney Stephen Howe as defendants.
According to the suit, Mark Schmid began requesting documents last May under the Kansas Open Records Act in regard to the shooting of 17-year-old John Albers.
Schmid lives in Overland Park. He’s also part of JOCO United and a member of Albers’ extended family by marriage. Albers was killed in January 2018 outside his family’s home in the 9300 block of West 149th Terrace as he was backing out of the garage in his family’s minivan.
Schmid’s records requests started a few months after the police shooting of Albers and after the district attorney ruled the officer was justified in firing into the moving minivan, saying he had reasonable fear his life was in danger.
The officer, Clayton Jenison, resigned after the shooting.
“The lawsuit was filed in order to give my client, and by extension the public, the opportunity to challenge or verify the reasons the government gave in deciding not to bring charges against the officer who killed John Albers and in deciding to allow the officer to resign without any otherwise negative employment consequences,” said Max Kautsch, the Lawrence-based attorney representing Schmid.
(Read more: KC Star Local News)