Two months after prosecutors reopened the investigation into a Cottonwood Heights officer’s 2018 deadly encounter with a 19-year-old armed robbery suspect, they’ve concluded the officer wasn’t legally justified in hitting the teen with his police car.
The Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office reopened the case in March after receiving new evidence that Officer Casey Davies had rammed Zane James with his car prior to fatally shooting him. It was the first time Sim Gill has formally reopened a police shooting case in his 12-year tenure as Salt Lake County’s top prosecutor.
But Gill said he won’t file charges against Davies, saying he didn’t have enough evidence to show that Davies “intentionally, knowingly or recklessly” wrecked Zane James, who was riding a motorbike, with his police car.
Gill previously found that Davies was justified when he shot and killed James. His Friday announcement concerned the question of whether Davies was justified in using force when he hit James with his vehicle prior to the shooting.
Police officers are allowed to use deadly force, such as shooting at someone or hitting them with their car, if they “reasonably believe” that person is a threat to the officer or someone else. Gill concluded that there was no evidence that showed James was a threat to anyone at the time that Davies made the decision to hit him with his car.
Yet, Gill said he couldn’t bring a criminal charge because there wasn’t enough evidence to support charges against Davies, either.
Attorneys for the James family, as well as the attorney for Davies and Cottonwood Heights police, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday afternoon.
A previously unknown use of force
The fact that Davies had also hit James first came to light because of the James family’s ongoing lawsuits against Davies and the Cottonwood Heights Police Department.
James’ parents received a compelled, internal police department interview where Davies said he “made the decision I’m going to run [James] over” and then hit James with his car before shooting him.
But Gill can’t use that evidence in a courtroom, under a 1967 Supreme Court decision in Garrity v. New Jersey, which says information obtained through such compelled interviews can’t be used in criminal prosecutions because it violates the officers’ Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.
When asked to participate in Gill’s review, Davies asserted his Fifth Amendment rights and didn’t give an interview.
Even though Gill’s office is required by law to investigate all officer uses of deadly force, he had not previously investigated Davies’ decision to hit James — no one had witnessed it, and the only source of information about it was Davies’ internal interview.
The Salt Lake Tribune first reported the details of the crash last August, when James’ family filed an amended lawsuit in federal court as part of their ongoing civil case against Cottonwood Heights Police Department.
James’ family alleges Davies used excessive force when he shot James in 2018 and that the department tried to cover it up, including by destroying video of the shooting. The department has denied these claims and said the only body camera footage from the encounter was recorded after Davies shot James.
Gill reopened his investigation after Cottonwood Heights police updated the report that detailed the shooting. The added material acknowledged Davies’ first deadly use of force with his car.
Lt. Dan Bartlett wrote in the update that Sgt. Ken Dailey had contacted him, asking why he was scheduled for an upcoming deposition in the civil case. Dailey had been the liaison between Cottonwood Heights police and the outside agency investigating the shooting.
During that conversation, Bartlett explained, Dailey told him that Davies had told Dailey about hitting James with his car.
Dailey wrote in the new update: “[Davies] said he forgot his body worn camera. Officer Davies also commented about bumping the motorcycle with his police vehicle and the suspect reaching in his waistband.”
Bartlett wrote that “this information was new to me and I felt that I needed to inquire further.” He said he told police Chief Robby Russo and called the Salt Lake City Police Department and the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office to reopen the investigation.
Not enough evidence?
James was killed May 29, 2018, after police say he robbed a store in Sandy with an airsoft gun. Police started chasing James, who was driving a lightweight minibike, in their cruisers because he matched the description of the robbery suspect.
At some point, James wrecked near an intersection in a residential neighborhood, and got up and began walking away.
Davies eventually fired at James four times, hitting him twice, after he saw what he said he believed was James reaching for a gun. Police found a fake gun in James’ jacket pocket. James died May 31, 2018, at a hospital.
Gill, in his letter, said that since his office originally ruled the shooting justified, the James family has brought prosecutors GPS evidence from Davies’ patrol vehicle, showing where he was and how fast he was driving the day of the shooting. They also gave him interviews with civilian witnesses.
Prosecutors were considering charging Davies with aggravated assault, Gill said. They did uncover evidence that convinced Gill that Davies wasn’t legally justified in hitting James with his police car. But they didn’t have evidence of an intentional, reckless assault to warrant the criminal charge, Gill said.
None of those witnesses saw the crash, just the aftermath.
For instance, Gill wrote, a witness said they saw “a wrecked motorcycle” and James “limping away and crouched over as if injured by the motorcycle crash.” This person didn’t respond to follow up interview requests, he said.
“We can conclude that a collision occurred...,” Gill wrote, “However, without the ability to eliminate a possibly inadvertent or unintentional collision, we cannot prove Officer Davies’s mental state in the collision.”
from The Salt Lake Tribune https://ift.tt/2Dr6zpY
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