Leaders of Baltimore’s Police Accountability Board called Friday for the suspension of a Baltimore Police detective who pressed his firearm to a restrained man’s temple during an arrest in May, as others weighed in with their own interpretations.
The chair of the board, Joshua Harris, said in a statement that it’s unfortunate in a city under a consent decree with the federal government to address unconstitutional policing practices that “we have officers that would act so recklessly.”
“I am sure that nowhere in the officer training is it justifiable to point a gun at point-blank range at the temple of an already subdued subject,” Harris said.
Police body camera footage of the arrest of Jaemaun Joyner, 24, was shared this week by his defense attorneys , who called the detective’s action “egregious” and “unacceptable.”
In the roughly two-minute clip, four police officers tackle Joyner to the ground when he attempts to flee being handcuffed. While he’s on the ground, officers restrain him by holding his arms, putting their hands on his neck and a knee on his sternum. Toward the end of his restraint, a fifth officer presses his firearm to Joyner’s head for more than five seconds.
Police Commissioner Richard Worley and the president of the Fraternal Order of Police lodge representing Baltimore Police officers saw it differently. Worley defended the officers’ actions Thursday at a news conference.
FOP President Mike Mancuso said in a statement Thursday that “until you are in a situation where you are fighting for your life I think it’s best not to second guess.”
“I have been in this very same position many times when the suspect was able to free their hand(s). Then it’s life and death as the cops and suspect fight for control of the gun,” Mancuso said. “You just can’t let that happen and you must overwhelm the suspect to end this situation quickly.”
Joyner was charged with handgun offenses and drug possession following the arrest, but those charges were dismissed Monday, shortly after his attorneys received the body camera footage. The Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office said Thursday they were dismissed for “further investigation” and said the “matter is currently under review” when asked about officer actions in the body camera footage.
Baltimore Police referred the incident to the State’s Attorney’s Office for review, police spokeswoman Lindsey Eldridge said. She said the department’s Special Investigations Response Team began to investigate “immediately” and an internal investigation also is ongoing.
None of the officers involved were suspended in connection with the incident, Eldridge said Thursday.
The Police Accountability Board’s Harris argued the detective who pressed his firearm to Joyner’s temple, identified by defense attorneys as Connor Johnson, “should be put on leave immediately and receive the necessary training.”
“Mistakes like this have the potential to end lives or negatively impact them forever,” Harries said. “In any city that values police accountability, all leadership from the top down should be calling for suspension of the officer and for him to undergo rigorous training on de-escalation and appropriate use of force and a firearm.”
On Thursday, Worley said he didn’t think the officer should be suspended because he was “out there doing his job.” He said he’d been in similar situations before with an armed subject “trying to free his hands,” and said “you try to do whatever you can to get him in custody.”
“I’ve been in that position the officer was in: You’re scared, you’re fighting for your life because you don’t know what he’s going to do,” Worley said.
One of Joyner’s attorneys, Tony Garcia, disagreed Thursday with the characterization of Johnson fighting for his life. He held up a screenshot of the body camera footage that showed officers’ hands on Joyner’s stomach and throat, a gun to his temple, and said, “I don’t see an officer fighting for his life. I see an officer inflicting a mark of fear.”
“He is informing this individual that he can kill him if he wishes,” Garcia said.
Mayor Brandon Scott, at a Thursday news conference, did not directly address whether he believed the officer should be suspended.
“As I always say, we investigate everything thoroughly and any actions that should be taken will be taken,” he said.
Ian Adams, an assistant professor at the University of South Carolina’s Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, said officers are generally given “quite a bit” of discretion when there is a gun involved in a physical struggle — an officer may have a firearm out to “protect against the possibility that the subject could retrieve the weapon.”
“As we saw in the earlier part of the confrontation, just because an officer has hands on a subject, doesn’t mean that they can’t suddenly move quickly and escape the officer’s grasp (in fact, that does happen here),” Adams said.
Adams agreed, though, that the officer pressing his weapon against Joyner’s temple looks aggressive and could prompt concerns about the possibility of an accidental discharge. On the other hand, he said, asking the officer with his gun drawn to put greater distance between the weapon and Joyner could mean losing the ability to “react quickly enough” if he needed to use it, particularly since other officers could be in the line of fire.
“Like a lot of controversial policing incidents, there’s a lot going on,” Adams said. “Any strong opinion should probably wait for a fuller investigation.”
Ashley Heiberger, a retired police captain from Pennsylvania who works as a consultant and expert witness specializing in use of force, said he understands why the community is angry about the video, but given the circumstances officers may have been permitted to display deadly force.
“When we take into consideration the fact that the officers were dealing with an armed robbery suspect, who they reasonably believed was still armed, not secured, not complying with their instructions and he was physically struggling with them, I believe there was sufficient threat to justify some level of force,” Heiberger said. “We can talk about whether holding the muzzle against his head was the best thing to do. That’s not a preferred or widely trained tactic, but I don’t think it rose to the level of a violation of his rights.”
The police department typically reviews incidents for criminal charges before completing internal administrative investigations into potential policy violations. The matter being shared with the State’s Attorney’s Office suggests they are considering whether criminal charges are warranted.
After that decision, the department will finalize its investigation of the incident for potential policy violations. The department will provide a recommendation for any administrative charges, then share it with the Administrative Charging Committee, a civilian body codified in state law that reviews all police investigations that involve a member of the public. The Police Accountability Board and Administrative Charging Committee were both established in the same 2021 state law.
Jamal Turner, vice chair of the Police Accountability Board, added in a statement that Baltimore “deserves answers.” He pointed to the allegation of “unjustified threats with a service weapon,” as well as “the potential fabrication of information to justify these actions.”
Defense attorneys said Thursday that Joyner did match the suspect description in the reported armed robbery that they said prompted the police interaction. They also raised concerns about the police’s statement of probable cause , saying it had omitted Johnson pressing his service weapon to Joyner’s head and said the armed robbery investigation was ongoing, despite a victim coming to the scene and stating Joyner was not the perpetrator.
Local Baltimore, MD
Most Popular
Comments / 0