Aerial of the finished Prive at Island Estates condominium in Aventura/courtesy photo

An attorney and two Aventura police officers have settled a lawsuit claiming excessive force when they arrested her during a protest against sidewalk construction tied to a disputed luxury condominium development.

Dara Clarke, who opposed the sidewalk being built in front of her house in preparation for the nearby Prive at Island Estates, signed an agreement Friday to drop her claims against Sgt. Terry Scott and Officer Joseph Craig in exchange for $200,000. The funds were paid Tuesday.

This likely is what a jury would have awarded had it sided with Clarke, although this outcome also is a “vindication” of Clarke, said her attorney, Matt Leto.

“From Ms. Clarke's point of view, this case was never only about the money,” said Leto, a partner at Hall, Lamb, Hall & Leto in Miami. “What happened to her should not have happened. The officers shouldn't have arrested her. They shouldn't have touched her. They shouldn't have physically abused her in the way that they did on that evening.”

The Aventura Police Department said Scott and Craig had no comment, and the officers' attorney,  Johnson, Anselmo, Murdoch, Burke, Piper & Hochman partner Michael Burke in Fort Lauderdale, didn't return a request for comment by deadline.

The officers admit no guilt in the settlement.

Clarke accused the officers of “forcefully” twisting her arms behind her back, “violently” lifting her off the ground and digging their knees into her calves when they arrested her Feb. 26, 2015, despite her being calm while trying to provide them with information on why she called them, according to her amended federal complaint.

Clarke accused Scott of stomping her foot with his boot while she was wearing flip-flops and keeping it there until she was thrown in a patrol car. She said her foot, calf, shoulder, elbow and arm were injured.

Scott and Terry in legal filings disputed Clarke's claim she was calm and have argued they used minimal force.

This is one of many legal cases stemming from the twin-tower, 16-story Prive condominium that opened last year on the private eight-acre North Island, which can be reached by bridge from South Island, an enclave of single-family homes where Clarke lives.

The Prive developer was required by the city to build the sidewalk, but Clarke and some other South Island residents protested the location, saying it was being built on their properties. Clarke's complaint said she was arrested while trying to show the officers a survey on her phone as proof the sidewalk was on her property.

The lawsuit claimed the department has an unofficial “pattern and custom” of using excessive force and failing to discipline offending officers, citing at least 20 incidents from 2012 to 2017 and a separate nine incidents involving Terry and Scott.

U.S. District Judge Robert Scola granted the city's motion for summary judgment and similar motions by the Prive developer and related affiliates. He refused the release the officers from the case, and a federal appeals court agreed, concluding they lacked qualified immunity.

Clarke was arrested for disorderly conduct and later charged with criminal mischief and resisting arrest without violence but wasn't prosecuted. She was an Aventura City Commission candidate in 2018 but withdrew from the race to focus on her lawsuit.

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