Wisconsin gun shop ordered to pay nearly $6 million to injured police officers

MILWAUKEE – Jurors ordered a Wisconsin gun store to pay nearly $6 million on Tuesday to two Milwaukee police officers who were shot and seriously wounded by a gun purchased at the store.

The ruling came in a negligence lawsuit filed by the officers against Badger Guns, a shop in suburban Milwaukee that authorities have linked to hundreds of firearms found at crime scenes. The lawsuit alleges the shop ignored several warning signs that the gun used to shoot the officers was being sold to a "straw buyer," or someone who was buying the gun for someone who couldn't legally do so.

Jurors sided with the officers, ruling that the store was negligent in selling the gun.

Officer Bryan Norberg and retired Officer Graham Kunisch were both shot in the face after they stopped Julius Burton for riding his bike on the sidewalk in the summer of 2009. Surveillance video shows that the officers scuffled with Burton and slammed him into a wall before he shot both officers.

Investigators said Burton got the weapon a month before the confrontation, after giving $40 to another man, Jacob Collins, to make the purchase at the store in West Milwaukee.

One bullet shattered eight of Norberg's teeth, blew through his cheek and lodged into his shoulder. He remains on the force but said his wounds have made his work difficult. Kunisch was shot several times, resulting in him losing an eye and part of the frontal lobe of his brain. He said the wounds forced him to retire.

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