Proposed $296K settlement for Palm Beach mass shooting survivor clears first House hurdle

Lydia Smith, sister-in-law of shooting victim Natasha Whyte-Dell, reacts outside site of bloodbath. Image via AP.

Legislation is again advancing in the House that would pay the survivor of a 2010 shooting that left six dead in Palm Beach County after a state investigator failed to respond to an escalating “pattern of abuse.”

Members of the House Civil Justice Subcommittee voted unanimously for HB 6015, which would provide $296,400 to Michael Barnett and his son, Ryan, as part of a settlement between them and the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF).

The Barnetts reached an agreement with DCF in 2020 after a Supreme Court ruling over a mass murder-suicide incident about a decade prior.

HB 6015 and its Senate twin (SB 16) are classified as claims bills or “relief acts” and are meant to compensate people or entities for injury or loss due to the negligence or error of a public officer or agency.

Claims bills arise when appropriate damages exceed what is allowable under Florida’s sovereign immunity law, which protects governments and their agencies from costly lawsuits. Statutes today cap government payouts to claimants at $200,000 per person and $300,000 per incident.

The Sept. 27, 2010, shooting that wounded Ryan Barnett and resulted in the death of four of his siblings was, by many accounts, preventable. On that day, 41-year-old Patrick Dell entered the Riviera Beach home of his estranged wife, 36-year-old Natasha Whyte-Dell, and opened fire on her and five of her children.

He succeeded in killing Whyte-Dell and four of the children. Barnett survived a gunshot to the neck. After leaving two of his biological children unharmed and leaving the premises, Dell turned the gun on himself.

In the years leading up to the bloodbath, police responded to 34 disturbances at the home, a third of which were for domestic violence. Eight months before, DCF received a call through its abuse hotline about a December 2009 incident that, coupled with information available to the agency, should have set off alarm bells.

Whyte-Dell was visiting with a friend when Dell, notorious in the neighborhood for his hot temper and paranoia, threatened to kill her, charging at her with a knife before going outside to flatten all four tires on her vehicle, according to police records.

Quoting the report in 2012, the Palm Beach Post said Whyte-Dell claimed Dell told her through a door she and her friend barricaded themselves behind, “You will be going to the morgue.” He also told her, “Your family is going to cry today.”

Police arrested Dell later that morning on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and criminal mischief.

DCF investigated the case, closing it on Feb. 25, 2010, with the conclusion that the children were not at “significant risk” of harm. Dell attacked Whyte-Dell again three months later, after which she obtained a restraining order against him. In her petition, one of two she filed before her murder, Whyte-Dell said she heard he was trying to buy a gun and worried he’d use it against her and her children.

The DCF investigator assigned to Whyte-Dell’s case, George Shahood, did not speak with any neighbors or anyone outside the Whyte-Dell house. He recommended that she and her children call 911 “should any further incidents occur.”

DCF fired Shahood after just five months on the job, when it was revealed he himself was facing pending domestic violence charges. But DCF “failed to perform any secondary review or reinvestigation after (Shahood’s) charges were made public,” the bill says.

North Fort Myers Republican Rep. Spencer Roach, the bill’s sponsor and a lawyer by training, said DCF is at fault because it hired a person who “probably was not qualified to do the job.”

“It’s not a stretch to believe that had Mr. Shahood reviewed even just the police records, he would have had evidence demonstrating a pattern of abuse and an increase in threatening and abusive behavior by (Dell),” Roach said, reading from an analysis of the case by a state special master on claims bills.

“As such, he would have and should have continued the investigation, which may likely have resulted in protective measures necessary for the safety and well-being of the Barnett children.”

Riverview Republican Rep. Mike Beltran, also a lawyer, said he was not convinced the tragedy’s cause was negligence “so much as it’s government stupidity.” He noted that under common law, the government does not have a duty to protect citizens outside of certain circumstances, such as when a person is in police custody or when children are in school.

“I’m saying this being … a big fan of getting rid of sovereign immunity altogether. I realize the irony,” he said, adding that it might be time to change the law so issues like the one on which HB 6015 centers are less opaque.

“If we’re going to make compensable government stupidity … we should pass a statute and say, ‘You call the police 10 times and somebody’s robbing your house and they don’t come in, then that’s compensable. We should just make that generally applicable for everyone rather than paying out on claim bills, where I don’t think there’s a common law (to provide for that).”

Roach said there is a fine line between government stupidity and illegal negligence and pointed to the special master’s opinion supporting a claim of negligence.

“That is enough for me,” he said. “I hope that’s enough for you.”

In March 2012, Michael Barnett, as the natural father and guardian of Ryan Barnett and the personal representative of the estates of three of the murdered children — Diane Barnett, Daniel Barnett and Bryan Barnett — sued DCF for wrongful death and negligence. Leroy Nelson Jr., the father of the fourth deceased child, Javon Nelson, filed a separate wrongful death action against the department.

Both complaints alleged DCF breached multiple, nondelegable duties and failed to protect children from “unreasonable risk of harm.” DCF raised several defenses, including that Florida’s limited waiver of sovereign immunity limited the aggregate recovery to a low six-figure sum.

Years of legal proceedings followed before the 4th District Court of Appeal ruled in October 2018 that the murders of Whyte-Dell’s children represented “a single claim of negligence against (DCF) in the failure to properly investigate the family and stepfather before closing its file.” As such, Barnett and Nelson could only seek damages for a single incident, payable by up to $300,000, rather than $200,000 per person, which would put DCF on the line for far more.

The case reached the Florida Supreme Court, which unanimously upheld the lower court’s decision on Sept. 24, 2020. Shortly thereafter, Barnett entered into a settlement agreement with the state for $296,400.

For a time, the Supreme Court’s ruling on the case marked a major setback for survivors and families of the 2018 Valentine’s Day shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School whose compensation claims involving 17 people killed and 17 wounded hinged on the Whyte-Dell matter.

That proved impermanent. In December 2021, the Broward County school district agreed to pay more than $26 million to the families of those killed and injured in the school shooting. Three months later, the U.S. Department of Justice agreed to a $127.5 million settlement with the victims and their families after the lodged 40 civil cases alleging the Federal Bureau of Investigation acted negligently by declining to act on tips that could have prevented the massacre.

HB 6015 and SB 16, the latter of which Miami Republican Sen. Alexis Calatayud is sponsoring, follow prior attempts by Indian Rocks Republican Sen. Nick DiCeglie, who tried twice to deliver relief to the Barnetts for what he called a “tragic lapse” in responsibility.

DiCeglie’s last attempt during the 2023 Session died without a hearing. Its House analogue, sponsored by Jacksonville Republican Rep. Wyman Duggan, fared better, advancing through one of three committees to which House Speaker Paul Renner referred it before stalling out.

HB 6015 has two more committee stops before reaching the House floor. SB 16 awaits its first of three Senate committee hearings.