Controversy surrounding the Eugene Police Department’s Taser practices following two highly publicized incidents in the last year and a half has prompted the Eugene City Council to consider stepping in and changing the policy itself.
The Use of Force Committee, a subcommittee of the Eugene Police Commission, has been reviewing EPD’s use of force policies to recommend changes since May. The committee is almost finished with its Taser policy revisions. On Dec. 16, just before its three-week winter break, City Council will hold a work session and hear from the committee members and Police Chief Pete Kerns to determine whether police are moving in the right direction.
EPD’s Taser use has “become a cause of concern in many broad spectrums of the community,” said city councilor George Brown, who sits on the Eugene Police Commission but not on the Use of Force Committee, though he has attended two of the
committee’s meetings.
Taser use in Eugene piqued local citizens’ interest, especially following officer Judd Warden’s Tasering of former University student Ian Van Ornum in May 2008. Van Ornum was with a groupdowntown, protesting pesticide use on freeway roadsides when the incident occurred.
Complaints regarding the incident included allegations that officers pulled Van Ornum’s hair, shoved him against the sidewalk and stunned him twice without reasonable cause. After an internal affairs investigation into the officers’ use of force, police deemed the two stuns within policy earlier this month.
The other incident that has garnered public reaction involved a Chinese University student who barely spoke English and the same officer, Warden, who responded to a call of a suspected break-in at a West 11th Avenue townhouse and found the student inside. Warden tried to ask the student questions and ordered him to keep his hands in view. However, when the student failed to answer or comply, Warden hit him in the left shoulder with a Taser.
The case is now the subject of an internal affairs investigation to determine whether Warden’s actions were justified.
Because of the public’s high interest in EPD Taser policy, Brown said the city council wants to make sure the public’s voice is heard on this particular matter.
“Civilians should set policy, and the council represents civilians,” Brown said. “I think the council’s happy to let the Police Commission and the chief work things out, but with things like this, it’s important for the city council to have a role.”
Upon hearing the committee’s recommendations for changing the current Taser policy, city council will then decide whether it needs to step in. EPD Management Analyst Linda Phelps said city council may also decide to hold another more formal work session with the committee after winter break.
Phelps said the council is “kind of the Police Commission’s boss,” and she understands why they sometimes feel the need to step in when issues involve an entire community.
Committee member and Crest Drive Elementary School principal Joe Alsup said he hopes city council will provide the subcommittee with recommendations; however, he would not want city council to dictate the final changes. Alsup said the committee has done extensive research on Taser policies from all over the country and has examined reports from dozens of cases in which an EPD officer pulled out a Taser, and the committee is therefore far more educated on the issue than council members.
Given the council’s lack of knowledge on the subject, Alsup said, “I would find it really frustrating if the policy itself would be dictated by city council.”
Brown admitted the council members have many long hours of research ahead of them. While the committee has looked over more than 50 recommendations about how best to use Tasers and research from at least a dozen other sources, Brown said he has only grazed the surface. He said he hopes the break will give councilors time to “come up to speed.”
Brown said that whatever the councilors decide, the final verdict will be neither to ban Tasers nor to give police free reign with them — rather, the solution lies somewhere in between these two extremes.
“We’re just not sure what the middle ground is yet,” Brown said.
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Council to review Taser policy
Daily Emerald
November 24, 2009
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