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Attorney Ben Crump meets with a client in the Netflix documentary Civil: Ben Crump, which premieres on Netflix on Sunday, June 19. Photo: Netflix

He seems to be everywhere whenever a Black person is killed during a police shooting, hes there to help. Attorney Ben Crumps nickname is Americas Black attorney general, and in a new Netflix documentary, we get to know a little about him.

For Civil: Ben Crump, filmmaker Nadia Hallgren (director of the Michelle Obama documentary Becoming) followed Crump for a year of busy traveling the man is constantly on the road as he pursued a record settlement in the wrongful death of George Floyd. Crump was the Floyd familys first call after Floyds death while in the custody of four Minneapolis police officers.

But the Floyd case is not the sole focus of Hallgrens film. Crumps law firm, Ben Crump Law, based in Tallahassee, Fla., fields around 500 phone calls a day. The quest for social justice comes in many forms, from Black farmers who may have been poisoned by Monsanto fertilizers to banking while Black cases his firm has collected some $200 million for banking victims.

Theres no ambiguity about it, Crump says in the film. I know who I am, and whose I am. I have been given influence for a reason. And shame on me if I dont use that influence. We are stronger than they ever perceived us to be.

Crump, now 52, was also a dashing young man. He went to Florida State University, earning his law degree in the mid-1990s. Theres great footage from his wedding to Genae, whom he met in law school (she also has a law degree), and she and their daughter, Brooklyn, are the light in Crumps life.

Most of the general public first became aware of Crump when he represented the family of Trayvon Martin, who was killed in 2012 by George Zimmerman, a member of a community watch in his neighborhood in Sanford, Fla. Since then, he has taken high-profile case after high-profile case, gaining millions of dollars in compensation for families in civil cases.

Crump contends that since the United States is the ultimate capitalist society, one road to equality is through the pocketbook, and that has brought some heat. During a 2021 interview with CBS Sunday Morning, Ted Koppel said Crump thrives on media attention and asked him, its made you a lot of money, hasnt it?

One wonders if Koppel might ask the same question to other non-Black high-profile lawyers fighting for social justice, such as womens rights advocate Gloria Allred.

Also shown in the film is, of course, Fox News, whose indignant anchors accuse him of playing the race card.

But thats the whole point in a discrimination case, isnt it?

Civil compensation often has to stand in for legal justice. Yet its clear that to Crump, nothing can substitute for a criminal conviction. He got Floyds family a record $27 million, but when Hallgrens camera catches Crump in real time listening to the verdict read in the murder trial of Derek Chauvin the man convicted of killing Floyd his unburdened emotion shows whats truly important.

MCivil: Ben Crump: Documentary. Directed by Nadia Halgren. (PG-13. 101 minutes.) Available to stream Sunday, June 19, on Netflix

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Review: Netflixs Civil follows a momentous year in the life of Americas Black attorney general - SF Chronicle Datebook