Penalty sets key precedent for police
Jim Spencer
Denver Post Staff Columnist.
Denver Post
Jan 11, 2006. pg. B.01
In Denver, holding police accountable for killing civilians comes in baby steps.
On Monday, the city settled with officer Ranjan Ford Jr. for shooting to death an unarmed man lying in bed. The disciplinary cost of victim Frank Lobato's life came to 50 days off without pay.
The city's manager of safety, Al LaCabe, had recommended 90 days off. But the administration of Mayor John Hickenlooper agreed to cut that in exchange for Ford dropping an appeal. The crazy thing is, the deal represents progress.
Denver is a place that has traditionally done little to cops who kill citizens. Killer cops certainly don't get charged with crimes. Neither do they lose their jobs. Sadly, Ford's 50 days off look like a relative kick in the butt.
The last controversial civilian slaying was officer James Turney's killing of Paul Childs, a developmentally disabled teenager who would not drop a knife. LaCabe gave Turney 10 months off for killing Childs and using a cellphone to make threats against his former mother-in-law. A civil service hearing officer ruled that Turney's shooting of Childs did not merit a single day off, according to Denver's personnel rules. Turney's current punishment stands at five days off for misusing his cellphone.
Next month, the city will appeal the Turney case to the full civil service commission. Meanwhile, the Hickenlooper administration seems to have jumped at the chance to wrap up Ford's case.
A couple of months off is less than half a loaf in the police killing of an unarmed civilian. It barely qualifies as a slice. It does, however, establish a precedent. That's important when the city must operate under 'comparative discipline.' Comparative discipline forces managers to limit punishment to what was meted out in similar police shootings.
A city committee is developing a system of specific punishments for specific violations. The committee hopes to overcome a system that now says if you haven't punished anyone in the past, you can't punish anyone in the future.
'That's certainly the argument that gets made, and that's certainly the problem with it,' City Attorney Cole Finegan said of comparative discipline.
When he announced Ford's discipline in August, LaCabe tried to avoid comparative discipline, which he called 'quite problematic.' LaCabe ruled there were no cases similar to the Ford-Lobato incident in the prior three years. LaCabe said Turney shooting Childs 'involved different rule violations.' Clearly, LaCabe wanted no precedent to hamstring him.
'I am writing on a clean slate,' he proclaimed in August.
On Tuesday, Finegan was circumspect. 'I wouldn't say we have a base line (for police discipline),' Finegan said. 'We certainly have another guideline to look at.' No one should conclude that 'the standard of a 50- to 90-day suspension without pay has been set for any future case in which an officer fires his weapon at and kills an unarmed citizen in a manner that violates the use-of-force policy.'
Still, Finegan added, the settlement does make 'incremental progress,' even as 'comparative discipline continues to be an obstacle to reform.'
Reform is critical. Police behavior in the Lobato shooting all but ensures Denver taxpayers will once again pony up hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, to settle a civil suit.
Ford shot Lobato while investigating a domestic violence complaint in which Lobato was not involved.
Ford said he shot Lobato after mistaking a soda can in Lobato's hand for a gun. Police found no fingerprints on a soda can beside Lobato's bed.
Ford said Lobato sat up and yelled as police entered his bedroom. Forensic evidence showed Lobato had risen no more than 30 degrees from his mattress before Ford shot him in the chest.
In settling Ford's case, the city is finally on its way to a new standard for punishing officers who use excessive force. But it is still nowhere close to the finish line.
At 50 or even 90 days off, the value the Denver Police Department attaches to a civilian life remains an embarrassment.