Man sues TV station, security companies over 2020 protest killing
DENVER CO Sept 18 2022 A friend of the protester shot and killed by an unlicensed security guard hired by a Denver TV station has filed a lawsuit.
The plaintiff, Steven Wright, claims that he witnessed the shooting and has since suffered “severe emotional distress.”
The lawsuit claims 9News and the two security companies behind the contracted guard were negligent and seeks to hold them liable for the man’s suffering.
The October 2020 shooting was caught on camera and showed the altercation between the man killed, Lee Keltner, and the guard, Matthew Dolloff.
Dolloff was working for a company called Isborn Security Services, a subcontractor for the security company Pinkerton. The TV station hired Dolloff to protect its news crew during the protest.
Images included in the lawsuit show Wright standing between Keltner and another person as the two argued. According to the lawsuit, Dolloff and a 9News reporter stood nearby during the argument.
Keltner ultimately pulled out and fired pepper spray, and Dolloff then fired the shot that killed him.
The plaintiff claims that after the shooting, he thought the security guard “was a private citizen with no connection to the media or to security services” because he and the news crew were in plain clothes with no identification. The lawsuit claims Wright “feared that more people would be shot” and that “he also was going to die.”
After the shooting, it was revealed that Dolloff was unlicensed. He was charged with murder, but the Denver district attorney ultimately dismissed the case.
