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Wrongful death lawsuit against city, officers dismissed

Worsfold

A judge has ordered that the wrongful death lawsuit filed against the city, a police officer and a former officer, should be dismissed.

On Tuesday, Marshall County District Court Judge John Haney, made his ruling after reviewing the suit filed late last year by Jeannette Heil, the mother of Andrew Worsfold, who was killed during an officer-involved shooting in December of 2014.

In his ruling, Haney noted a number of reasons why the case should be dropped, but primarily focused on the fact that Heil “crossed the forbidden line of engaging in the unauthorized practice of law when she filed the wrongful death claim as representative of her son’s estate without counsel. As such, the law requires her petition dismissed as null and void.”

In the early morning hours of Dec. 17, 2014, Marshalltown Police Officers Ramon Maxey and Benjamin Scheevel stopped Worsfold, 25, for suspicious behavior while being in the vicinity of a robbery the previous night at the Jiffy Mart convenience store in the 100 block of South Third Avenue In Marshalltown.

The officers had been on routine patrol when they encountered Worsfold.

“Our officers saw this individual and got out to talk to him. At some point they were talking with him when he produced a handgun. Commands were given by the officers to drop the weapon,” said MPD Chief Mike Tupper at the time of the incident.

Worsfold fired one shot from a .45 caliber Glock at the officers. Maxey and Scheevel returned fire. Worsfold was hit twice. The two officers were not injured.

He was critically wounded, and transported to the Marshalltown hospital where he died shortly thereafter as a result of gunshot wounds, according to autopsy reports cited in Marshall County Attorney Jennifer Miller’s legal opinion about the incident issued in January of 2015.

At the time, Miller said the officers were legally justified in their actions.

Maxey, a veteran officer with the MPD, remains with the department; Scheevel departed the department shortly after the incident.

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