2 Ohio officers had prior use-of-force investigations, but experts say recent fatal shooting likely lawful

Two of the five police officers from Columbus, Ohio, involved in the fatal shooting of a Milwaukee man have previously been investigated for uses of force.

Nicholas Mason, who has been with the department since 2007, was cleared of criminal wrongdoing after fatally shooting a driver who accelerated during a traffic stop and dragged Mason along the car in 2017, the Columbus Dispatch first reported.

Adam Groves was one of six officers sued in 2016 on allegations of wrongful arrest and excessive use of force, which resulted in a settlement of $45,000 in 2020, according to the Dispatch.

Mason and Groves were among a group of 13 Columbus officers in a bicycle unit having a briefing at King Park, about a mile outside of the security zone for the Republican National Convention, on Tuesday afternoon when they spotted two men who appeared poised to fight on West Vliet Street, near North 14th Street.

The officers saw one of the men had a knife and ran toward the pair, shouting for the man to drop the knives he held in each hand, body camera footage showed. The armed man continued to move toward the other man and the five officers fired on him, the video showed.

The man who died was identified by family as Samuel Sharpe Jr., who lived in an encampment in the area. The shooting has set off a storm of criticism from his family and activists in Milwaukee, who have condemned the role of out-of-state officers for the RNC.

Under the agreement signed by outside agencies assisting with the RNC, officers must not have been sued in an individual capacity and adjudicated as liable for any constitutional violations or have sustained complaints for the use of excessive, unreasonable or unnecessary force within the last five years.

Those two prior incidents by Columbus officers do not appear to be disqualifying under the terms of the agreement.

Columbus police identified the other officers involved in the shooting as Austin Enos, Canaan Dick and Karl Eiginger. The five officers did not continue to work the RNC after the shooting, according to a Milwaukee police statement on Wednesday.

In the months leading up to the RNC, Milwaukee hosted several meetings with protest groups and provided written responses to questions raised there, including what the vetting process was for officers participating in the RNC.

"The officers assisting with the RNC are full duty and fully trained," the city's response said. "If officers have participated in the January 6th Insurrection, they have been identified and arrested. MPD will be conducting an orientation/training session upon officers’ arrival, establishing expectations for fair and impartial policing/procedural justice."

Outside use-of-force experts say fatal shooting was likely lawful

Milwaukee Police Chief Jeffrey Norman and Mayor Cavalier Johnson have defended the out-of-state officers, saying they had likely saved a life.

Johnson and other public officials have called for a "thorough investigation." The Milwaukee Area Investigative Team, led by the Greenfield Police Department, is investigating the fatal shooting.

Others have questioned the officers' actions, with some suggesting they should have used a Taser or attempted to shoot Sharpe in the arm or leg, only injuring him.

In general, police in Milwaukee and elsewhere are trained that if they perceive a deadly threat, they should respond with deadly force. A Taser does not guarantee the deadly threat will stop, and aiming for a person's limbs is not a trained because it may not stop the threat and it increases the likelihood for bystanders to be hit instead of the intended person, experts say.

Aurelia Ceja, of the Milwaukee Alliance Against Racism and Political Repression, watched the clip of body camera footage released Tuesday and said the officer “instantly” drew a gun and made no attempts to de-escalate the situation.

“I don’t see anything but escalation,” she said.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel asked two outside use-of-force experts to review the 30-second clip of the shooting that was released on Tuesday. Both said the shooting appeared lawful.

The officers "were loud, they were giving commands," said Thaddeus Johnson, an assistant professor at George State University, senior fellow at the Council on Criminal Justice and a former Memphis police officer.

"I know some people say maybe they could de-escalate," he said. "That’s a quick moment. Officers don’t have all the information and it’s an imminent threat.”

Tim Dimoff, a police use-of-force expert based in Ohio and former police officer, said the fact that all five officers fired suggested they "all perceived the same problem, the same level of danger and took action."

“I hate to say it, I believe it is cut and dry. Only because the subject has two knives, only because he started to go towards the other person," Dimoff said.

Some prominent activists have suggested that if Milwaukee police had been involved, the situation would have ended differently.

Andrew Wagner, the president of the Milwaukee Police Association which represents the department's rank-and-file officers, was not so sure.

“They realize there’s a person trying to do great bodily harm to another human being,” he said. “Even if a local officer would’ve recognized him, the threat was still active."

Bailey Gallion and Bethany Bruner of the Columbus Dispatch and Alison Dirr and Jessica Van Egeren of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel contributed to this report.