What began as an act of courage inside a late-night taqueria may soon end with an $8 million reckoning for the city of San Jose.
Nearly three years after college football player K’aun Green was shot four times by a San Jose police officer, city officials are poised to approve a settlement that would rank as the second-largest police payout in San Jose history. The recommendation, expected to go before the City Council on Jan. 13, reflects both the severity of Green’s injuries and the troubling conduct later uncovered about the officer who shot him.
“This is a young man that deserves every penny that San Jose is finally coughing up,” said Green’s civil rights attorney, Adante Pointer, who called the case a stark example of how even doing the right thing can end in tragedy when police arrive with guns drawn.
The shooting happened on March 27, 2022, on the steps of La Victoria Taqueria. Police were responding to reports of a nearby homicide when former officer Mark McNamara encountered Green exiting the restaurant with a gun in his hand. Body-worn and surveillance video later showed Green had taken the weapon from another man during a brawl inside the taqueria and was attempting to leave with it.
McNamara fired four times, striking the then-20-year-old in the stomach, arm, and knee. While none of the bullets shattered bones or tore through critical muscles, Green suffered serious injuries. Police later acknowledged the homicide that prompted their response had nothing to do with the incident at La Vic.
Despite six other officers being nearby, McNamara was the only one who fired.
“Sometimes you’re doing nothing more than being a good guy,” Pointer said. “And you can still wind up being shot by a police officer, no matter what you do.”
The legal case stretched on for years, with the city repeatedly refusing to settle. Attorneys for McNamara and the city argued in federal court that the officer was protected by qualified immunity, even pressing that argument before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals as recently as March 2025.
Then came a revelation that shifted the case’s trajectory.
In 2023, San Jose’s police chief disclosed that McNamara had sent racist text messages—some referencing Green—prompting the officer’s resignation and the dismissal of several cases he had worked on. According to the city attorney, those messages would have been nearly impossible for a jury to overlook.
In a statement explaining the proposed settlement, City Attorney Susana Alcala Wood said the payment reflects the “inherent risks of litigation,” particularly given the officer’s “reprehensible statements evidencing racial animus,” Green’s injuries, and the city’s obligation to cover attorney’s fees if a jury ruled in his favor.
A settlement conference was held in mid-November, and last week a federal judge dismissed Green’s excessive force lawsuit, clearing the way for the agreement. The San Jose Police Department declined to comment.
If approved, the $8 million settlement would trail only one other police payout in city history: the $11.3 million paid to Hung Lam, who was paralyzed after being shot by police in 2014.
For Green, now 24, the money represents more than compensation—it marks the end of a long fight to clear his name. He has since earned a full scholarship to the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff and is on track to become the first college graduate in his family.
“I am surprised that it took this long,” Pointer said. “They shouldn’t have made this young man fight for all these years to first clear his good name.”
The city has never apologized. But with an $8 million check on the table, San Jose appears ready—at last—to acknowledge the cost of a split-second decision that changed a young man’s life forever.
