A Eugene police officer deployed a stun gun on Sept. 22, mere hours after two students from China arrived in Eugene to begin English classes at the University, striking one of the students in their West 11th Avenue townhouse.
Now, the student, whose identity has not been released, may be fighting the actions police took more than three months ago.
Just days after Eugene Police Chief Pete Kerns announced that Officer Judd Warden’s use of a Taser on the student was justified, attorney Ilona Koleszar announced she and her client, a University of Oregon Chinese exchange student, disagree with Kerns’ decision.
The student’s English has improved greatly since he arrived in Eugene with limited vocabulary and comprehension, Koleszar said. He has had nearly four months to make sense of the issue, and as a result, he better understands his rights as an exchange student living in the U.S.
“I am glad that he is (exercising his rights) and not seeking to make the matter go away as quickly as possible,” said Claire Syrett, field organizer for American Civil Liberties Union’s Eugene bureau.
Koleszar said the student will file a tort claim notice, an act that will allow him to file a lawsuit within 180 days of the incident if he chooses to do so.
Koleszar said she and her client have not made a decision on whether to file a lawsuit, but she wants it to be known that they disagree with Kerns’ decision.
The Chinese student’s Taser incident came 17 months after Warden shocked then-University student Ian Van Ornum and just four days before the investigation into Van Ornum’s case was concluded. In Van Ornum’s case, the city’s Civilian Review Board decided that the use of the stun gun was justified.
Both cases have raised controversy and public criticism of EPD’s Taser use.
The police department’s current policy allows officers to fire a stun gun at anyone who an officer “reasonably believes creates an immediate, credible threat.”
“Our position is that the current Taser policy is far too broad in terms of when it allows the use of (stun guns),” Syrett said. “We think an unarmed, sitting-on-the-floor person who is not offering any kind of active threat should not be Tasered under any policy.”
A University statement signed by Vice President of Institutional Equity and Diversity Charles Martinez, Vice President of Student Affairs Robin Holmes and Dean of Students Paul Shang shared Syrett’s opinion. The statement said “whether one agrees or disagrees with the (case’s) outcome, we find it unacceptable for any University of Oregon student to be subjected to treatment of this nature.”
The statement called upon EPD “to better train officers about how to engage in interactions with the public in an increasingly culturally diverse and non-English dominant environment.”
Amy Harter, the Chinese Flagship Coordinator at the University’s Center for Applied Second Language Studies, agreed with the statement.
“More what we are concerned about is how students on campus receive this,” Harter said. She said she wants to make sure students coming from other countries and states feel comfortable in the University’s environment, but this Taser case may deter prospective students and make them feel unsure whether they will be treated fairly.
The ACLU has been working to move EPD to adopt policies that would authorize the use of stun guns only in situations that would most likely lead to the use of deadly force, Syrett said. She believes a stun gun would be appropriately used if an officer was faced with someone posing a true physical threat, such as being “armed with a stick or ready to fight,” Syrett said, but not if someone is “sitting on the floor, clutching his sleeping bag to him.”
EPD has been reviewing its current policy on use of force since the summer, Eugene police auditor Mark Gissiner said.
Gissiner said City Council will discuss the matter soon, and he hopes EPD will take into account “the ruling out of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which I think gave good guidance on our Taser policy.”
The ruling by the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which came after a federal appeals court in California made a decision about a questionable stun gun use case, prohibits officers from using stun guns in a variety of situations. If the ruling stands, it will set a precedent that may force agencies across the nation to revisit their use-of-force policies, and will limit officers’ use to situations in which a person poses an obvious danger.
Gissiner added that he believes it is important to address the department’s current warrantless entry policy, too, which allowed Warden to enter the Chinese student’s house when he believed the student to be a trespasser.
“I am not satisfied with the current policies regarding warrantless entries into homes, and it is a top priority for me to revamp those policies within the police department,” Gissiner said.
Currently, police officers are allowed to enter a home if a person of authority has given them reasonable cause to believe their entry will be justified, Gissiner said. The two officers who entered the apartment complex where the Chinese students were living received a phone call from the property manager, who said no one should be inside the apartment. When the officers arrived, a lock box was still on the door, Gissiner said. Additionally, another employee of the apartment complex said she saw someone sleeping on the floor of an apartment that should be empty.
“Those were indicators that confirmed the apartment complex should be vacant,” Gissiner said. “Nevertheless, the policies within the police procedure manual are very weak on this issue.”
It is unknown whether the student and Koleszar will press charges against Warden or the property management company.
Nevertheless, Gissiner said, the case serves as a good lesson for EPD.
“There is a lot of positive changes that can come out of this to lessen the probability that something like this happens again,” he said.
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