SHARE THIS SHOW:
RELATED CONVERSATIONS:
RECENTLY ON TOL:
The TOL Blog
TAGS:
Questioning Police Policy
On Wednesday, a grand jury decided not to indict Officer Ronald Frashour for fatally shooting Aaron Campbell in January. But they submitted what amounts to a damning (if unofficial) indictment of Portland Police Bureau policy in a letter (pdf) to Multnomah County District Attorney Michael Schrunk that was released today:
We know that somethng went terribly, terribly wrong at Sand Terrace and that Aaron Campbell should not have died that day. He was not accused of a crime. He police were called to do a "welfare check" because Mr. Campbell was distraught over his brother's death and family members were worried about him. We feel that his death resulted from flawed police policies, incomplete or inappropriate training, incomplete communication, and other issues with the police effort. We feel strongly that something must be done to correct this, and the Portland Police Bureau (PPB) should be held responsible for this tragedy.... We also feel that the recorded Grand Jury testimony should be made public — in particular, that of Officer Frashour. By bringing information to the public, perhaps others will come to understand why there is no indictment. With understanding and a plan for correction, perhaps the community unrest over this case will ease; perhaps the healing process can begin.
We've talked about police departments' uses of force in the past — most recently after a beanbag gun incident and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling on stun guns.
But we've never focused on the kinds of specific training and policy questions that the grand jury raised. (For example, that "Officer Frashour was over-trained to be the shooter, and under-trained to reassess the situation based on changes in the available information.")
What training and communication policy changes would prevent future deaths?
Photo credit: Squid Vicious / Creative Commons
-
I saw an item in this morning's R-G (front page of City-Region) that police officers are allowed to take a blood sample from DUI suspects without a warrant! Does this mean that all police officers are going to have a nurse riding with them, or are the police going to be properly trained to do it themselves, with all the proper precautions that are attendant with such a procedure?
What happened to our Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination? It would seem that a blood sample is just the first step in getting us to be witnesses against ourselves. (This Amendment also seems to apply to the forfeiture laws that convert the real and personal property of accused drug offenders to public ownership. Due process dictates that they be convicted first, not just charged.)
-
In addition to discussing training policies for the police, please address the fact that the public needs to understand that the local police departments are facing severe budget cuts, personel cuts, and other department stressors.
Peace officers responding to calls are authorized to use deadly force. As departments are stretched to the limit, responders may be reacting from stress and a tendency to go to deadly force as a judgement call sooner rather than later.
There may be a resulting stricter standard on citizen behavior in a time of department cutbacks. That will be tough for the civil libertarians to accept, but will be an important factor to consider when interacting with police.
-
retracted
-
Reply to socialjustice Pt II: Police are on patrol all the time, so there is going to be a lag time between when they get there and the "trained mental health professional" gets there, possibly in many cases after being rousted out of bed. So, much of the time it's going to be up to the cops to deal with the situation. Even in situations where the cops make a mistake, such as when a person APPEARS to be reaching for a weapon but has none, that may actually have been done to provoke the police into action. Waiting for a "trained mental health professional" to arrive turns out to be one of those dreamily impractical and silly solutions to line up along with "shoot him in the leg." A person with a gun who's been shot in the leg still probably has a gun. But of course this leads to further silliness like "shoot the gun out of his hand." I think except in cases where cops pretty clearly executed someone, we need to make their job easier rather than harder by stopping all this second guessing.
-
Reply to socialjustice Pt I: A person who doesn't want to live the day out poses a particularly knotty problem because of the phenomenon of "suicide by cop." In other words, one way of committing suicide if you find you don't have the nerve to do it yourself is to force someone else to do it for you. How to do that? Well, you behave so as to bring cops to the scene and then you either begin to harm someone, threaten to harm someone, or APPEAR to begin to harm someone. I seriously doubt if a "properly trained mental health professional" could make the situation safer for the innocent parties involved, which has to be the police's main concern when confronted with someone who doesn't want to see the day out. I have little hope that someone the suicidal individual doesn't know is going to have much effect by reminding them that things might get better, that people love them, and so on. And how to do that without placing people in further potential harm is another interesting question.
-
Based on my knowledge in regards to this matter, why the jury couldn't convict the officer, and then talk about the mishandling of the procedure in away the police should behave. this shows the jury didn't fairly dealt with the case. if the jury knows that the police didn't had training to act to the situation, then why let the officer free, this is contradicting to final decission they made.
-
I worked for 25 years in community mental health, and had several opportunities to observe brilliant and compassionate interventions by police officers with young men who were mentally ill and potentially dangerous. These officers used negotiation and calming skills to talk these people out of dangerous situations. These were each officers in small towns, rural areas, or suburban commununities. Unfortunately, big city police departments seem to take a different approach to these situations, resulting in tragedies like this one. Suicidal people generally want someone to care about them and talk them out of their impulses, or else they'd already have killed themselves. They aren't "decided" as long as they're still alive, folks!
-
I am a 54 year old White male, a law abiding citizen and a respected member of the community. In my life I have had 3 occasions that officers or an officer have drawn their weapon on me. Only one time (I was 14 and lighting bottle rockets in an open field) was this ever deserved. I know that at any time, one trigger happy officer could have ended my life without due cause. This is not acceptable, if they are not trained properly, they have no business carrying a deadly weapon. How many will be dead before they get these menacing officers out? and what must we do to get rid of them??
-
Just how extensive should police training be? Are they supposed to make on-the-spot-diagnoses of mental illnesses and disabilities when coming onto the scene!? They can't know that someone hasn't had their meds or whatever... All they know is how to interpret what they see, and if they see a public danger, or a danger to themselves, they are trained to react accordingly.
It's completely deluded to think that police officers should be able to do that, and still maintain the objective of keeping the peace and minimizing peril to others.
They have to make these really hard decisions, and then be held accountable for them just like everyone else. It's a tough job; it's pretty thankless, and people jump all over them if something like this happens...
-
Training idea; Cops need to get out of their cars...walk around. Choose a coffee shop!
-
I haven't heard the charge against Aaron Campbell besides the fact that he was distraught. Was he waving a gun around (which I suspect), or screaming obscenities, or what? From the little I've heard and read I do not see any reason that would lead someone to shoot him (my wife says he was shot in the back). My experience(s) with the police is that they easily overreact to just about any situation requiring control of people. When I meet them away from those situations my experience is that they are "nice guys". I think they must be in over their heads, with too much responsibility to make rational decisions, when they choose force to control people, especially mentally disturbed people.
-
he was unarmed when he was shot in the back after having a police dog sent to take him down.
-
So far the question of race has not entered into the conversation. I am a white Portland resident and a master's student in Pastoral Counseling. We learned in our training that the percentage of suicide cases for black Americans where the police are called in and end up being killed by police is far far greater than that of white Americans. I was shocked by the statistics. I was devastated hearing of the death of Aaron Campbell right here in Portland.
Ellen in Portland
-
I keep hearing "more money, more money". Do I understand that we need to give the police more money in order to avoid unnecessary deaths? What about good mentoring? I feel the excuse of under funding is a thin one.
-
If the root cause of the need for more training and better mentoring is inadequate funding for training, then I can see how "more money" might help.
I am aware that various professional fields (Accounting, Medicine, Cosmetology -- just to name a few diverse skills) require continuing professional education every year. Why should we think that the police would be any different in that regard? This would mean, however, that the various law enforcement agencies would need to have a certain amount of their budget designated for training, and of that, a specified amount set aside for CPE (continuing professional education). We all know that policing today is much different than it was even 50 years ago. Back then, if you were taken into custody by PD, they did not have to advise you of your rights. That changed in 1966 with the landmark Supreme Court decision Miranda v. Arizona. 100 years ago, if you didn't "come along quietly," the police might beat you senseless with a billy club. Policing is an evolving profession, and as such it seems to me that on-going training is necessary and would be a good thing.
-
I am interested in statistics on fatal shootings or deaths caused by Portland Police over the years. I have been looking for the dates, names, and numbers of these fatalities - from the 1950s to present but have not been able to find this information. Can anyone help me with this?
-
I have done some research on this. It is not readily accessible information and takes a lot of time and research. Usually when doing this, I have gotten frustrated and not continued past a certain point. It is a long term project that I want to work on, but is seemingly intentionally difficult.
-
When "Public Servant" becomes semantically equivalent to "Public Master" things have gone horribly wrong!
I am appalled that Police Officers are Unionized--totally inappropriate. And I am tired of hearing about the daily stresses and risks the Officers face--it is a VOLUNTARY position (there is no police draft).
I am also troubled by the prevalence of Military Veterans in Police Service—they are very different professions.
Without ROBUST civilian supervision of the Police (with real teeth in repercussions for the officers) we are on a frightening path to a tragic loss of civil rights.
For the record: I am not a criminal, I am fully employed in a Professional Capacity, I am a property owner in West Linn, and I am a Veteran.
-
PS
Many people are "undertrained" to be around that uniform! I did see a group of cops at a coffee shop, and when they offerred my daughter a sticker..it was all I could do to hide my fear and TRY to smile. A>C RIP
Go away SAM A.
-
The police, while they make unforgivable mistakes sometimes, are not out to harass your daugter. If you are concerned about people being "undertrained "when it comes to their reactions to the police, would it not also be to the benefit of your child to have had a positive interaction with them? This perhaps will train her to be less irraionally fearful than her mother. Your fear will only instill a fear in your daughter and it seems to be no fault of the police in the situation you described.
-
There are good cops and lousy cops. Some people are just not good at there jobs. Unfortunately there seems to be no way to fire a cop in Portland. The fellow from the police union is a famously strong advocate for all officers regardless if they are good or bad. The fear of being thrown to the political lions if your a cop probably motivates the kind of us them thinking that only insures that lousy cops stay on the force to the detriment of all.
-
You are right about there being good cops and lousy cops. Unfortunately, it is the lousy cops, the "rogues" if you will, that get all the press and thus make the good ones look bad. I, for one, appreciate the EPD officer who followed me into a parking lot one day to advise me that I had a burned-out taillight. We spoke briefly and I agreed to replace it by the end of the day, and he bade me a good day and left without citing me (which he could have done, had he chosen to).
-
In my limited experience interacting with police officers - for the most part when they responded to a call from me in regard to some problems on my street - I have found a great difference in "interpersonal" skills. I have found that some officers are inept and/or insensitive in their communication skills. In one instance, although I registered the complaint and was totally rational in my demeanor, I felt that the officer was agressively interogating ME. His senior partner, noticing this, actually sent him to attend to another task.
I agree totally with the woman who pointed out that yearly training in interpersonal communication is as important as yearly training in weapons use. I feel that many of the instances over the past few years where police have responded too agressively to fellow citizens could have been avoided if officers had more communication skills in general, as well as more training in inter-cultural communication, specifically. I love Portland, with the exception of our police department. And, the union leader, Scott Westerman, only adds to the problem by his overly eager defense of fellow officers regardless of circumstances.
-
In our technologically advanced world police should not have a lethal weapon. Surely a sophisticated weapon that has the same range and velocity as a gun can be developed that would stun or tranquilize a person long enough to deal with and this discussion would then include the victim.
-
I am white, female and no longer young. I am frankly terrified about being stopped by a local police officer. If I reach for my wallet will he pull a gun on me? I can't get on my knees anymore due to arthritis. What will happen if I am asked to get down on the ground and I can't? Do you really want your local citizens to feel this way?
I thought this article was interesting: http://www.policeone.com/health-fitness/articles/1793270-Heart-rate-variability-and-police-performance-The-next-evolution-in-training/
This seems to me to be "hard" training. You would want your officers to be able to respond appropriately regardless of heart rate change.
Also, I have a psychologist friend who says, "If you (the police officer) are that afraid, maybe you should get into another line of work."
-
Well put! And I agree with BOTH you and your psychologist friend!
-
Based on what I saw after years of being a prosecutor's legal assistant and being the adult daughter of a dirty cop it is my opinion that this so-called profession calls to the most thuggish brutal and uncaring sociopathic segment of humanity to participate (I use the term "humanity" advisedly as most of the cops I had direct experience were subhuman at best). In my experience as a paraprofessional and in my additional experience as a business owner I found by and large that law enforcement officers were wilfully stupid, hostile, aggressive, and deeply entrenched in a mindset of victim blaming - that is, far less interested in chasing the bad guys and helping get the bad guys convicted than in trying desperately to find ways to blame the crime victim for being such.
sign me: no use for and utterly terrified of the cops I see these days.
-
Comments are now closed.
I guess my first thoughts are about the fact that this is another piece of straw in the pile. Please check out this article from today Mercury about a young man with an IQ of 55 who was tased on a TriMet bus last month, then had his seziure meds taken away and there seems to be no actual reason for a police interaction AT ALL : http://www.portlandmercury.com/portland/i-just-want-to-go-homeandquot/Content?oid=2159541
And think about the 12 year old girl recently bean-bagged by Humphreys, and Kendra James, and James Chasse and the $175,000 settlement for harassing 3 men in a parking garage on St. Patrick's Day. And think about all the other incidents that you know about that I don't have time to write about. I really want this conversation to be about more than this one incident, but about the fact that this is a common occurence.