sued the city for $5,000 (roughly $125,000 in 2018), as did the family of William Donnegan. The families of four other black people who were killed, were denied the right to file suits, as the city attributed the cause of their deaths, not to the attacks, but to an uncontrollable force majeure. As lawsuits began mounting up against the city, it refused to pay anything. The city shifted the blame for the attacks and failure to protect its citizens to the state. Springfield filed a lawsuit against the state claiming that the militia failed to stop the attacks as it lacked ammunition supplies, was forbidden from charging into the mob, and that the damages that happened in Springfield occurred after the state took charge the situation. The city ended up denying payment to all claimants seeking damages, with exception to the families of Burton and Donnegan, citing Section 5 of the Illinois Criminal Code, "Suppression of Mob Violence": Ballard's wife, and two minor daughters, filed what was described by a local paper as "one of the most peculiar suits ever filed" at the time. Under the Dram Shop Act, they filed a $10,000 (about $250,000 in 2018) suit against Edward White and James Smith, the owners of Dandy Jim's saloon, where Joe James had been drinking, and also against Jacob B. Olean, who owned the building where Dandy Jim's operated. As one of the first civil suits of its kind, the case was "watched with great interest by the legal profession." The family alleged that the three men cited were liable for Clergy Ballard's death because they served James alcohol. They said that if the men had not served James alcohol, he would not have become drunk and would not have allegedly killed Ballard. Racial atmosphere Newspapers were filled with reports of hostility and violence against black people. For example, the same day the Springfield riot began, in Pensacola, Florida, "large crowds" were reported waiting outside the jailhouse with "excitement" to lynch a black man accused of assaulting a white woman. That same night, in Media, Pennsylvania, a black man committed suicide rather than let himself be captured by a mob hunting him for, allegedly, threatening a white woman. And, at 1:00 a.m. on August 15, a mob of 300 men showed up at the Norfolk, Virginia county jail, planning to lynch two black men accused of "criminally assaulting" a