OpenCDA

July 21, 2014

Don’t Start Construction Yet…

Filed under: Probable Cause — Tags: , — Bill @ 9:23 am

gallowsJudging 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.

 

5 Comments

  1. In addition to the observations you have correctly stated about training and supervision, there appears to be an element of panic or mental unsteadiness on the part of the officer. How does the city police department evaluate that element in the training or screening of officers prior to being issued a badge and weapon?

    Comment by Gary Ingram — July 21, 2014 @ 9:49 am

  2. Gary,

    Professional law enforcement agencies include up-to-date preemployment psychological screening before hiring. That’s one part of a very time-consuming and expensive background investigation that also includes things like spousal interviews. Then a trainee’s behavior must be observed by instructors and staff in his pre-service training (academy) and during field training at his department. Finally, an officer’s supervisors are expected to observe his behaviors and performance to try and detect emotional changes before they manifest themselves in dangerous behavior. Those same supervisors are expected to objectively evaluate credible complaints and concerns from citizens who interact with the officer. I don’t know how much of any of this the City of Coeur d’Alene does.

    Comment by Bill — July 21, 2014 @ 11:23 am

  3. Bill,

    So what you are saying is that the testing, training, and evaluations are so detailed–they should all come out the same minus those poor souls that got weeded-out? Could it be that is why the Arfee incident and the rise of a “police state” is so uniform across the USA?

    My favorite professor told me to beware–when peace officers start tinting their windows so they can see you but you can’t see them. That time has come.

    Comment by Old Dog — July 22, 2014 @ 10:16 pm

  4. Old Dog,

    Not exactly. But your two questions point out the quandary every law enforcement officer is placed into.

    One of my professors, though not even close to being my favorite, told us that the selection and retention process should make a department or agency hard to get into and easy to get out of. The selection and retention requirements are supposed to select employees who can perform the required duties and who can also earn the trust and confidence of the public with whom they must interact. If an applicant can’t at least demonstrate an appreciation and understanding that both are required, the applicant is likely not suitable for the job.

    And yet, if an applicant is applying for a city, county, or state police agency (or even a federal one that has a uniformed patrol force), the applicant is immediately subjected to a quasi-military culture of fairly rigid rank and discipline. What a lot of people are seeing as the rise of a “police state” is, in my opinion, more a function of rigid quasi-militarization. Applicant-trainees are taught to think and act in conformity and with uniformity — or else. That’s a concern (for me), because the fundamental function of a military force is to kill people. So the very personal traits that might make a police applicant desirable — the ability to adapt personally and adjust responses to be more appropriate for the situation — are likely to be trained out or at least discouraged during entry level training. Only after the officer gets the protection of some seniority might the officer be allowed the flexibility to try and treat citizens as individuals, not as potential crime statistics.

    Instead of hiring cops with a frame of mind to look for every possible alternative to using a firearm and then giving them the authority to resort to the alternative(s), we insist that they develop nonlethal weapons which they must carry on their Batman utility belt. So in addition to a handgun, their belt may also have a TASER, OC spray, and an extendible baton. That sounds reasonable until you understand that each of those weapons is part of a decision tree of policies and practices that define when a particular weapon could be used, might be used, or must not be used.

    The Coeur d’Alene Police Department had the discretionary authority to invoke the critical incident procedure — or not — when its officer shot Arfee. But to me, that means the Department also has the authority to adapt that very formal procedure, to adopt parts of it to fit circumstances in a particular incident that may not rise to the mandatory invocation requirement. The bottom line for me is that the City and the Department needed to learn all the facts that led up to the officer shooting Arfee. That is far more complex than just asking the officer why he shot Arfee. By not fully finding out what happened and why it happened and sharing that information with the citizens, the City government (not just the Police Department) should not be surprised when a similar incident happens again. Neither should the City government officials be surprised that the public will not tolerate official deception.

    Comment by Bill — July 23, 2014 @ 8:46 am

  5. Thanks Bill,

    Its good to know I can always count on fair and objective responses–this is especially needed when related to such an emotionally charged topic.

    Comment by Old Dog — July 24, 2014 @ 3:10 pm

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