Family of Toddler Disfigured During Botched Drug Raid Settle With Cops
The family of a Georgia toddler left mangled after SWAT police tossed a flash-bang grenade into his crib last spring have received a settlement of nearly $1 million.
Bounkham ‘Bou Bou’ Phonesavanh suffered serious burns to his face and had his nipple blown off in the May incident. His family says the medical bills have surpassed $1 million.
While the settlement isn’t enough to cover the continued medical care Bou Bou will require as he gets older, BuzzFeed reports that the family’s settlement does not preclude continued litigation.
The Phonesavanh family came to the settlement with Habersham County, Georgia late last month and announced it this week.
The $964,000 breaks down as follows:
$538,000 to Bou Bou’s parents, Alecia and Bounkham Phonesavanh, for his medical expenses.
$200,000 will be set aside ‘for future periodic payments of damages,’ which will be paid to Bou Bou after he reaches 18.
$137,000 to Bou Bou’s father for his personal injuries.
$62,000 to Bou Bou’s mother for suffering and emotional distress as a result of witnessing the baby’s maiming.
$9,000 to each of Bou Bou’s three siblings, Emma, Malee, and Bounly.
Prior to the boy’s 10th surgery this year, his mother told BuzzFeed surgeons would be trying to ‘scrape away the gunpowder.’
‘His nerve endings are dead around his mouth and chest, so they will not be able to properly develop as they are supposed to, so they will have to go in and do stretching and grafts,’ she said.
The incident occurred while Bou Bou’s mom Alecia Phonesavanh was staying with her husband, their three daughters and their baby son in the living room of her sister-in-law’s home just outside of Atlanta.
They were living with relatives after their Wisconsin home burned down earlier that year.
The Habersham SWAT team executed a no-knock warrant on the property while searching for a relative they believed was a drug dealer and had a cache of weapons inside, The Atlanta-Journal Constitution reported.
The suspect, a relative of the child, was not in the house during the raid but was later arrested nearby at a home where police knocked on the door. He surrendered without incident.
Bou Bou spent five weeks being treated at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta before returning home in July.
