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HomeMy WebLinkAboutStaff Report 130-08City of Palo Alto C ty Manager’s Report TO:HONORABLE CITY COUNCIL FROM:CITY MANAGER DEPARTMENT: POLICE DATE:FEBRUARY 4, 2008 CMR: 130:08 SUBJECT:TASER QUARTE~Y ~PORT This is an informationa! report and no Council action is needed at this time. DISCUSSION: On May 7, 2007, City Council approved the expenditure of Citizens Options for Public Safety (COPS) funds (CMR:234:07) for the purchase of electronic control devices (TASERS), supplies, and training in accordance with the TASER Task Force study. At that time, staff committed to providing quarterly reports on the use of TASERS. This is the first report. In July 2007, staff purchased 100 TASER X-26s equipped with the TASER-CAM system. The TASER-CAM is a digital audio/visual recording device which is affixed to the TASER X-26 and allows for ~eater accountability as it records the activation of the device. Data from the TASER- CAM is downloaded to a secure computer which stores deployments and activations. Trainin~ In September 2007, staff finalized the TASER policy (CMR:368:07) according to the models of the International Chiefs of Police, Police Executive Research Forum, the California Police Chiefs’ Association and current case law. The City Attorney and Independent Police Auditor reviewed the TASER policy and concurred with the contents. Also in September, several of the Department’s Defensive Tactics Instructors attended the TASER instructor course as well as a number of other use-of-force courses. These instructors developed a course curriculum that all Palo Alto police officers attended and successfully completed prior to carrying the TASER. Topics included: nomenclature; TASER capabilities; Police Department TASER policy; use of force; excited delirium; crisis intervention techniques; and In-Custody death incident response. Additionally, officers ,,vent through a series of decision-making scenarios. Officers were evaluated in the performance of these scenarios and were required to complete and pass all phases of the training and written tests in order to be certified to carry the TASER. In all, the TASER training consisted of 17 hours of lecture, demonstration, exercise and scenario. Eight-five officers attended. Members of the City Council and the Human Relations Commission, as well as the Independent Police Auditor attended portions of this training. CMR:130:08 Page 1 of 4 Defensive tactics instructors provided comprehensive training to Palo Alto Fire Department paramedics and emergency medical technicians on the TASER, Police Department procedures and possible injuries that could result after a TASER application. Defensive tactics instructors also met with physicians and staff at Stanford Medical Center Emergency Room. Deployments On September 27, 2007, officers began carrying TASERS in the field. As a part of the reporting and accountability system, the Department tracks ~vhenever a TASER is drawn and pointed at a subject (TASER deployment) as well as when a TASER is actually used (TASER activation). Any time that a TASER is deployed or activated, the officer is required to advise his/her .supervisor and an entry is made into the Department’s Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) system. Additionally, each officer’s TASER-CAM is inspected quarterly and the TASER data is reviewed quarterly to ensure all deployments and activations are reported. From September 27, 2007 through December 31, 2007, there were a total of seven TASER deployments and one TASER activation. In the lone TASER activation, officers responded to a residence at the request of a mental health nurse from the Veteran’s Administration Hospital who was having difficulty placing a subject (white male, 66 years of age) on a mental hold. The subject had been deemed a "danger to others" and had made comments to ~vitnesses that he wanted officers to shoot him. After the subject physically attacked one of the officers, the TASER was activated and the subject was subdued. He ~vas then medically cleared at Stanford Emergency Room and transported to the VA Hospital for treatment for his mental health issues. The subject suffered no long-term physical effects from the TASER activation. A review of the incident revealed that the use of the TASER was appropriate and consistent with Department policy and case law. The Police Auditor reviewed the Department findings and TASER video and concurred with the Department’s conclusions In all other TASER deployments, the subjects complied with officers’ commands as soon as the TASER was pulled and pointed at them. This is exactly what staff had hoped for. The following are summaries of the TASER deployments that occurred between September 27, 2007 and December 31, 2007. 1.) Officers assisted the Mountain View Police Department in an attempt to take a violent parolee at-large into custody at a local motel. The officers deployed the TASER when the subject (Hispanic male adult) was taken into custody at a local hotel. The subject complied and was taken into custody. 2.) Officers responded to a call of a subject (White male adult) who was believed to be under the influence of a controlled substance who was walking down the middle of a street, shirtless with his pants down around his ankles. Officers arrived and gave the subject commands but he was non- compliant. The officers displayed the TASER and then took him into custody. CMR:130:08 Page 2 of 4 3.) Officers responded to a call of a subject (White male adult) who was annoying students at Palo Alto High School. Officers responded and located the subject. When officers gave the subject arrest commands, he refused to comply. An officer deployed the TASER ~covering" another officer as he ~abbed the suspect and took him into custody. 4.) An officer observed a subject (African-American male adult) weaving as he rode his bicycle down the street. Another officer attempted to detain the bicyclist but the subject refused to comply with the officers and began running away. After approximately two hundred yards, the subject changed direction and began running back toward the officer chasing him. The officer deployed her TASER and the subject immediately surrendered. He was taken into custody and charged with DUI on a bike. 5.) Officers responded to a person who was reportedly intoxicated. Officers arrived to find the subject (Asian male adult) staggering down the street and unable to care for himself. When the officers gave the subject commands, he refused to obey them. An officer deployed his TASER and the subject surrendered. 6.) A subject (White male adult) was being brought to the Stanford Emergency Room for a psychiatric evaluation as he was a danger to himself. Officers responded to the area after it was learned that the subject escaped as he ~vas being brought to the ER. An officer observed the subject and gave him arrest commands. The subject refused to obey the commands and the officer deployed his TASER. Another officer arrived and the subject ~vas taken into custody. 7.) Officers responded to a call of eight to nine subjects fighting at a hotel. Upon arrival the officers observed two subjects (Asian male adult and Hispanic male adult) engaged in a physical fight. An officer deployed his TASER and the subjects ceased attacking one another. Staff will continue to monitor TASER deployments and activations and report to Council on a quarterly basis. Council has received a number of newspaper articles from a few citizens that put the use oftasers in a very negative and critical light. Attached are two of numerous articles that demonstrate the value of tasers and ho~v they actually save many lives. ATTACHMENTS ATTACHMENT: Two Newspaper Articles CMR:130:08 Page 3 of 4 PREPARED BY: DEPARTMENT HEAD: CITY MANAGER APPROVAL: DENNIS BURNS Ass~Police.- .Chief / JOHNSON Police Chief Assistant City Manager CMR:130:08 Page 4 of 4 Pnnt Version > laser used to subdue man during standoff Page 1 of 2 NEWS > LOCAL NEWS Print Page Tom ]oyce Staff Reporter A taser was used Tuesday to subdue a knife-wielding man and end his one-hour standoff with officers in a Mount Airy public-housing area, according to city police. The use of the electroshock weapon allowed Devon Ryan Moncus, 24, to be incapacitated long enough for officers to defuse the situation, in which he had threatened to kill himself, police said. Moncus subsequently was transported to Northern Hospital of Surry County under an emergency commitment. The standoff began after Mount Airy police received a call of a domestic disturbance about 5 a.m. at 1240 Newsome St., to which Officer Jonathan Watson was the first to respond. Police were advised that one of the parties involved possibly was armed with a gun and knife. Watson was able to confirm that Moncus was inside the residence where he lives with his mother, Cathy Williams, 44, whose welfare was unknown at that point. Sgt. Mike Bumgardner and Officer Adam Pardue then arrived at the scene and, due to concerns about the mother’s safety, officers knocked on the door to the apartment several times, producing no response from either Williams or Moncus. Determining that this scenario required immediate action to possibly prevent injury, the officers then entered the residence and found Williams uninjured and her son armed with a kitchen knife. During the resulting standoff, Moncus held the knife to his throat and would not comply with commands from the officers to relinquish the weapon. Sgt. Kyle ]ames of the Mount Airy Police Department also went to the scene to help negotiate with Moncus . for his surrender, in addition to members of the Surry County Sheriff’s Office. In all, about :10 city and county officers were involved, according to Mount Airy police Capt. Dale Watson. Despite ]ames’ attempts to negotiate with Moncus, the situation worsened and officers feared he would kill himself or injure them if quick action were not taken. Mike Wright, one of the county deputies, who was armed with a taser - a device that enables a targeted person to be stunned from a distance - deployed the device against Moncus and he was subdued. Capt. Watson credited the used of the taser in defusing a situation that otherwise could have ended in tragedy. "It gave us another force option before lethal force was utilized," he said. The taser used Tuesday by the county deputy actually was borrowed from the Dobson Police Department. However, the Mount Airy Police Department is applying for a grant from the N.C. Governor’s Crime Commission to add its own taser technology, Watson said. http ://www.mtairynews.com/articles/2007/12/19/news/local_news/localO 1 .prt 1/9/2008 Taser rescues two lives Page 1 or2 Taser rescues two lives BILL NEMITZ January 4, 2008 BRUNSWICK -- He’s been there and done that. Thus, Brunswick police Lt. Shawn O’Leary knows better than most what a police officer goes through after he’s forced to shoot and kilt someone. "It’s like a freight train," O’Leary said this week. "You’ve got the media, you’ve got the AG’s office, you’ve got the investigation. It’s overwhelming." It happened to O’Leary 10 years ago: Responding to a 911 call, he and another officer found themselves in the middle of a fight in a crowded apartment. A man in a wheelchair, who’d told a friend that he planned to "get myself shot," shrugged off a blast of pepper spray and lunged at O’Leary with a butcher knife, forcing him to fatally shoot the man. "I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy," O’Leary, who was later cleared of any wrongdoing, told me at the time. "I just want people to know that I’m not proud of what happened. There’s nothing else I could have done ... and I hope this never happens again." A week ago Thursday, it almost did. Once again, O’Leary found himself facing a man with a butcher knife. Once again, despite orders from O’Leary and three other officers, the man refused to stop. "He wasn’t slowing down at all, " O’Leary said. "He was kind of looking right through us -- he had that crazed look." O’Leary had the man, Victor Perez, in the cross hairs of his patro! rifle. Taking a deep breath, he put his finger against the trigger and, as Perez got too close, began to squeeze. "All right," O’Leary thought to himself, "here it comes." Or not. Moments earlier, O’Leary had told Officer Nehemiah Nattress to get out his Taser. With O’Leary about to fire, Nattress hit Perez with 50,000 volts of electricity -- enough to "immediately drop him," O’Leary said, but not enough to hurt Perez beyond a bump on the head where he fell. Perez, 24, an Iraq war veteran who police say was chasing his wife with the knife when they arrived, is now in the Cumberland http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story pf.php?id=159770&ac=PHnws 1/7/2008 Taser rescues two lives Page 2 o5 v County Jail, charged with attempted murder. Asked this week if he wanted to talk, he declined. O’Leary, meanwhile, is breathing a long sigh of relief. Since the shooting in 1997, he and an informal network of Maine police officers like him have made it a point to contact any officer who gets involved in a shooting to offer their advice and, more importantly, their support. "What they need to hear," he said, "is that you had to do what you had to do." Maybe, had he been forced to shoot Perez, O’Leary would have gotten through it more easily this time. Or maybe the second time you take a life proves even more traumatic than the first. But thanks to the Taser, this is not a life-and-death story. Rather, noted Cmdr. Kevin Schofield, it’s the story of "an effective tool ... used properly" to the benefit of both the officer and the suspect. O’Leary followed Perez to the hospital last week to check on his condition and complete his investigation. He told Perez, by then calm, clear-eyed and cooperative, how close he’d come to getting killed. "He said he was sorry," O’Leary recalled. Then O’Leary called Police Chief Jerry Hinton. "I told him (the Taser) was money well spent," O’Leary said. "It’s the best investment a police department can make." Columnist Bill Nemitz can be contacted at 791-6323 or at: bnemitz@pressherald.com Copyright © 2008 Blethen Maine Newspapers http ://pressherald.mainetoday. com/story_p£php?id= 159770&ac=PHnws 1/7/2008