Judging from the comments we’re hearing and reading, it sounds as if a lot of people in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and surrounding communities are starting to build a virtual gallows to end the professional career of the Coeur d’Alene police officer who shot Arfee the dog in the parking lot next to Java on Sherman on July 9 in  downtown Coeur d’Alene.

OpenCdA thinks calling for the officer’s dismissal is premature.

As we pointed out in our July 11, 2014, post entitled Careless Composition or Intentional Deception?, there was a very substantial amount of evidence available at the scene and associated with the incident.  That evidence, properly identified, collected, and preserved, would have given a much clearer and more complete picture of not only what happened but why it happened.

But now we learn from the Sunday, July 21 Coeur d’Alene Press article headlined ‘Critical incident’ protocol not followed in dog shooting that some of the perishable contemporaneous evidence was not collected.  Thus the “complete and thorough” internal investigation promised by acting Police Chief Ron Clark is a factual impossibility.

Rather than answering questions, Sunday’s Press article raises others.

The discretionary decision to invoke or not invoke the critical incident protocol was made by whom?  That is not a decision made by the officer who fired the shot.  Who in the Department had the authority to make that decision, and who actually made it on July 9?  At what time on July 9 was the decision made?  It had to have been made very quickly, probably within minutes of the shooting, so the necessary steps could be taken to identify and protect the scene and the evidence associated with it — or abandon the scene quickly as apparently happened in this incident.

Sunday’s Press article extensively quoted John Parmann, Idaho Peace Officer Standards and Training’s Region 1 Training Coordinator.  According to the article, Parmann said, “Credibility is important in this whole thing.   I don’t know what happened out there. I’m relying on a very thorough and objective investigation to find out what happened.”  He also said, “If corrections need to be made in procedures, that will be done.  It’s a learning opportunity for everyone, the public, agency heads and the people who train the officers and supervise the officers. Everybody has the opportunity to learn from this.”

Well, maybe.  There can’t and won’t be a “very thorough and objective investigation to find out what happened” because someone (certainly not the officer who fired the shot) determined there would not be one.  Oh, there will be an investigation, but it will not be thorough –  it can’t be now.  The Coeur d’Alene Police Department abandoned the incident scene before much of the evidence could be identified and preserved.   That was not the fault of the officer who fired the shot.

OpenCdA understands the public’s anger and frustration.

But we conclude by restating what we said in our July 11 OpenCdA post:  The officer who fired the shot did not act in a vacuum.  The action he took on July 9 was a function of the training and supervision he had received up to the moment he pulled the trigger.  To the extent his actions were provably contrary to that training and supervision and departmental policies and practices, he was culpable.  However, to the extent his actions were a function of incomplete and conflicting training and supervision as well as unclear or imprecise policies and practices, his culpability is shared equally by several above him including his field supervisor and watch commander, the department’s training officer, the department’s command staff, the chief, the Mayor and City Council, and the Idaho Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training.

This morning’s Coeur d’Alene Press reported (see:  CoiNuts proceeding delayed) that, “The scheduled arraignment for CoiNuts owner-operator Kevin E. Mitchell didn’t proceed,” as scheduled on Wednesday, July 16, 2014.  

According to the article, public defender Linda Payne, representing defendant Kevin Mitchell, asked for the delay because she had not yet received the 725-page transcript of the grand jury proceeding.

Mitchell was indicted in late March 2014.  When did the public defender request the grand jury transcript?  Who was responsible for ensuring Mitchell’s attorney received it in time to prepare for his scheduled arraignment?  Was the delay in providing the grand jury transcript reasonable or unreasonable?  If it was unreasonable, then who was responsible for the unreasonable delay?

The agenda for tonight’s regularly-scheduled meeting of the Coeur d’Alene City Council indicates that the Public Works Committee will ask the Council to consider Council Bill 14-1012 – Robot Regulation.  Here is the City Attorney’s Staff Report and DRAFT wording of the proposed ordinance as they appeared today on the City’s website.

OpenCdA notes that the proposed ordinance’s definition of “ROBOT” is “… a self-powered, programmable mechanical device capable of operating autonomously or via remote control.”

We think before passing this ordinance as written, the City Council needs to very thoughtfully consider the wide array of devices which that definition includes and which the Council is proposing to regulate in some form or another.  (more…)

The shooting of a two-year old black Labrador mix dog by a Coeur d’Alene police officer last week has attracted deservedly unfavorable nationwide news media attention to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.

In a Saturday skewspaper article headlined Image problem dogs police, the Coeur d’Alene Press reported “Widmyer [Coeur d'Alene Mayor Steve Widmyer] said the CPD [Coeur d'Alene Police Department ] is going to do an internal review of the dog shooting and have it reviewed by a third party before releasing the report.  ‘We want to make sure that we have covered all of our bases,’ he said.”

OpenCdA is not exactly sure how a CPD “internal review” and its report differs from a full investigation of the incident, but we firmly believe that a full investigation and report is not only warranted but essential for the public to understand the shooting incident.

Of one thing we are absolutely certain:  The report prepared by the CPD should not be edited by or on instructions from a third party as Widmyer’s remarks imply it could be.  We don’t know who the “third party” would be, but we believe the public would prefer and is entitled to hear the CPD’s version of what happened.  We believe that the citizens of Coeur d’Alene and Kootenai County are fully capable of determining if the CPD’s version is plausible.

As for Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, Mayor Steve Widmyer’s wanting “… to make sure we have covered all of our bases,” OpenCdA is concerned that it is not “our bases” Mayor Widmyer is interested in covering by not releasing the CPD report before it is reviewed by a third party.

On Wednesday, July 9, around 11 AM a Coeur d’Alene police officer shot and killed a dog inside a lawfully parked van in a coffee shop parking lot in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.  A few hours after the incident, police SGT Jeff Walther issued a press release which according to the Coeur d’Alene Press read:

Coeur D’Alene Police Officers responded to reports of a suspicious van possibly watching young children in the Downtown Area parked in the parking lot behind 821 Sherman Avenue. Upon investigating the van, as the Officer approached along the driver’s side, a vicious Pit Bull dog lunged out the open driver’s side window toward the Officer’s face. The Officer fired one round from his service weapon as the dog lunged, striking the dog in the chest, dispatching it. The Officer was uninjured by the attack. The van was otherwise unoccupied. Officers are currently working to locate the owner of the van.

The Coeur d’Alene Press and the Spokesman-Review skewspapers, considered by many in the area to be little more than dead-tree mouthpieces for whatever fiction the elements of the City of Coeur d’Alene’s Ministry of Disinformation chooses to issue, dutifully printed all or part of the press release apparently before doing any follow-up or fact checking.

But then KREM-TV in Spokane did the unthinkable in the eyes of the CdA Ministry of Disinformation:  KREM went beyond the City’s press release and sought more information for its news story which aired at 5 and 6 PM.  And when it did, the CdA Ministry of Disinformation’s story began to come apart faster than a playful puppy’s chew toy. (more…)

In its 2014 session, the Idaho Legislature took the smallest baby steps it could when it passed S 1369.  The bill was signed into law by the Governor on March 26, 2014, and went into effect on July 1, 2014.  It was not passed to encourage the systematic investigation and prosecution of corrupt public officials in Idaho.  It was passed to make Idaho’s county prosecuting attorneys more comfortable and politically safe.

This is made clear in the bill’s statement of purpose which reads, “This bill eliminates a conflict of interest that currently exists for county prosecutors.  County prosecutors represent county elected officials in their elected capacity, and also have a responsibility to deal with misconduct by those same county elected officials when they are acting in their official capacity.  This bill moves the misconduct authority to the Attorney General.”

The Idaho Attorney General’s homepage has a left-column button labeled “Public Corruption.”  Mouseclicking on that button will offer the reader links to two other webpages.  One of them is entitled, “Explanation of Duties and Responsibilities,” and the other is entitled, “Public Corruption Complaint Form.”

Reading the “Explanation of Duties and Responsibilities” page confirms that this new section of law “…authorizes the Attorney General to conduct ‘a preliminary investigation of any allegation of a violation of state law, criminal or civil, against a county officer occupying an elective office for violation of state law in his official capacity.’ ”

To make this crystal clear, the new law authorizes the Attorney General to conduct a preliminary investigation of allegations of misconduct only against  (1) County Commissioners; (2) County Prosecuting Attorney; (3) County Sheriff; (4) County Clerk; (5) County Assessor; (6) County Treasurer, and (7) County Coroner.

So in Kootenai County, for example, the new section of law authorizes the AG to investigate nine people, no more.   No one else unless the county prosecuting attorney invites the AG to come in.  (more…)