A federal judge this week raised the payout in an otherwise small verdict against two Huntsville police officers, ordering them to pay $146,000 in attorney fees and legal expenses.

A federal jury in December had ordered two city police officers to pay $2,000 apiece for repeatedly pepper-spraying a handcuffed student from Oakwood College. But the decision left neither side happy.

After a four-day trial, the jury found that Officer Jennifer Watkins and Officer Hunter Aldridge did indeed use excessive force. Yet the $4,000 verdict was a mere fraction of the half a million the complainant had sought.

U.S. District Judge Abdul Kallon this week cited the public benefit of the trial when awarding $138,160 in attorney fees to Hank Sherrod of Florence. Sherrod was also awarded $8,334 in expenses.

Kallon wrote that the trial brought to light that police policy, training and internal affairs investigators all sanctioned a use of pepper spray that the jury found unconstitutional.

"Consequently," wrote the judge, "the jury's repudiation of this acceptable practice and its verdict should shape future HPD training and procedures and its award of punitive damages should deter misuse of OC spray by HPD officers."

Silvadnie Quainoo, now a graduate student at Alabama A&M, was a passenger in a Mustang pulled over near Madison Square Mall on Feb. 6, 2008. Officers said the driver did not stop fast enough. Police asked both Quainoo and the driver to step out of the car, and the driver agreed to let police search the vehicle. There was no contraband in the car.

Quainoo, who repeatedly asked why they were being searched, became agitated. Quainoo has said that's because a female officer put her hand down the back of Quainoo's pants. Police then placed Quainoo in handcuffs. When she did not calm down, a male officer sprayed her twice in the face at close range.

The confrontation was captured on police cameras. Police charged Quainoo with obstructing government operations, meaning she interfered with the search of her person. She spent a night in jail. The city later dropped the charge.

The jury rejected claims of unlawful search and false arrest, but agreed with the claim of excessive force in regard to the pepper spray.

The judge's order on June 2 also denied the officers' motion for a new trial based on the facts of the case.

"In a nutshell, Officers Watkins and Aldridge argue that the evidence Quainoo introduced was insufficient to support the jury's findings," wrote the judge. "The court disagrees. The traffic stop, search, use of force, and arrest that gave rise to this matter were captured on videotape, which the jury watched ad nauseam. The videotape, coupled with the rest of the evidence presented, was sufficient to support the verdict the jury reached."

Quainoo also asked for a new trial, arguing Watkins had exceeded the standards for a search by reaching inside her pants. That motion was also denied.

"The jury heard both Quainoo's and Officer Watkins' account of the search, watched the video footage of it, and decided to credit Officer Watkins' account of the search," wrote Judge Kallon. "The court will not disturb that determination."