A8 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
M 2 • Friday • 08.15.2014
Ferguson Police Shooting CHRIS SOMMERS
Ronald s. johnson
Maxine Clark
Antonio French
OWNER OF PI PIZZERIA CHAIN
CAPTAIN, MISSOURI HIGHWAY PATROL
FOUNDER, BUILD-A-BEAR WORKSHOP
ST. LOUIS ALDERMAN
‘I’m grateful that our immediate expansion is not in the St. Louis area.’
‘I understand the anger and fear that the citizens of Ferguson are feeling ...’
‘This is not the STL I know and love. Stop! This behavior is absurd and unnecessary.’
‘It was just a crazy scene. I just started taking pictures. And I’ve been there ever since.’
(From a Tweet)
Backlash on militarization of police “The images from Missouri of stormtrooper-looking police confronting their citizens naturally raises the question: How the hell did we get to this point? When did the normal cops become Navy SEALs? What country is this, anyway?” James Fallows, journalist
“Have no doubt, police in the United States are militarizing, and in many communities, particularly those of color, the message is being received loud and clear: ‘You are the enemy.’” Tom Nolan
Boston Police Department veteran and professor at SUNY Plattsburgh
“At a time when we must seek to rebuild trust between law enforcement and the local community, I am deeply concerned that the deployment of military equipment and vehicles sends a conflicting message.” U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder
“Historians looking back at this period in America’s development will consider it to be profoundly odd that at the exact moment when violent crime hit a 50-year low, the nation’s police departments began to gear up as if the country were expecting invasion — and, on occasion, to behave as if one were underway.” Charles C.W. Cooke The National Review
“You see the police are standing online with bulletproof vests and rifles pointed at people’s chests. That’s not controlling the crowd, that’s intimidating them.”
city police chief is among critics Tactics
•
from A1
officer who shot Michael Brown, 18. As public anger grew, the FBI was brought in. Calls for details — including the Ferguson officer’s name — were rejected. Then came mass protests, looting, an arson and a paramilitary response to crowd control. Finally, the nation winced as officers gassed a reporting crew and dismantled their equipment, arrested two journalists and pulled a St. Louis alderman from his car. A live stream of night-vision images rendered River City to the world as a landscape from the video game “Call of Duty: Black Ops.” Over the chaotic days and nights, police tactics changed the question from whether one police officer violated one man’s civil rights to whether civil rights are systematically violated in St. Louis. President Barack Obama and Sen. Claire McCaskill decried the militarized response. Gov. Jay Nixon installed the Highway Patrol to command the security of Ferguson, taking that responsibility away from the St. Louis County police. Two St. Louis city police commanders, including St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson, will advise him. Nixon hinted at a lack of transparency, calling the release of the officer’s name an “important milestone” that should be reached soon. The heavy-handed police tactics drove a wedge between the two biggest police agencies in the area: the city and county police departments, which work closely on regional policing efforts and increasingly share resources. Dotson said he stopped
Gear from A1
“Had you set out to make matters worse, you couldn’t have done a better job. There’s a real place for dogs in police work, but it is not in the context of a nonviolent protest. In fact, using dogs for crowd control is operationally, substantively, and from an image point-of-view just about the worst thing you can do.”
on the streets near where an unarmed teenager was shot Saturday to U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill and Attorney General Eric Holder. Writing in Time magazine, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul said scenes in Ferguson resembled “war more than traditional police action.” Tactical officers in body armor and ballistic helmets do look far more like soldiers deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan than the police of decades ago, who often managed riots with a miner-style hard hats and wooden batons as their only special gear. Ferguson’s tear gas may be familiar through the generations. But use of armored vehicles, a sonic blaster to disperse crowds with sound and .60-caliber rubber “Stinger” rounds for “pain compliance” are relatively new to the work. Tim Lynch, director of the CATO Institute Project on Criminal Justice, said police use of military weapons and tactics accelerated after the 2001 terrorist attacks, in part because of Homeland Security grants. He complained that federal money is “distorting decisionmaking on the local level” by giving away “M-16s, grenade launchers, armored vehicles.” Otherwise, Lynch said, a police chief faced with limited dollars “is going to be more sensible.” He said departments that perceive a real need would make it a priority for their own money. “The downside is that we are starting to blur the civilian police mission with the military mission and when that happens, there are unnecessary, violent confrontations between the police and citizens such as
Former Seattle police chief
“In some cases, military equipment has a practical use. But there are limitations on the type of equipment, obviously. The idea that state and local police departments need tactical vehicles and MRAPs with gun turrets is excessive.” Duncan Hunter
Republican member of House Armed Services Committee
“People in communities of color have borne the brunt of militarization of policing for several decades.” Kara Dansky
American Civil Liberties Union
“Washington has incentivized the militarization of local police precincts by using federal dollars to help municipal governments build what are essentially small armies.” U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky.
sending officers to help with crowd control on Tuesday. “My gut told me what I was seeing were not tactics that I would use in the city, and I would never put officers in situations that I would not do myself,” he said. Dotson’s comments upset some of the rank-and-file, said Jeff Roorda, business manager for the St. Louis Police Officers Association. “Our membership feels we should be there in every way necessary for the county police and Ferguson officers and anyone else who is in the middle of these tensions,” he said. Mistakes by police in Ferguson will have long-lasting repercussions for St. Louis and for the nation, said David M. Kennedy, a criminologist at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, at the City University of New York. Kennedy developed the Operation Ceasefire, a nationally acclaimed antiviolence program. “Military people will tell you that in military settings, in active war zones, they don’t sit on the top of their trucks pointing live weapons at the populace,” he said. “Under no
circumstances do you begin your deployment with citizens of the United States by pointing live weapons at them.” But Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson defended SWAT units Thursday, saying they are necessary to handle “deadly force” situations. Kennedy said the episode exposed a rift between the police and the public they are supposed to serve. “The community is looking at the incident but in a very real way they’re looking at all the incidents — not just in their community but across the country, where awfully similar things have happened and young black men were killed by the police, and everyone says fundamentally this is OK and it’s the dead guy’s fault and the police are justified in what they did.” Samuel Walker, a professor emeritus at the University of Nebraska, and an expert in police accountability, said statements by county police Chief Jon Belmar in the early hours of the police investigation — when he said the officer shot Brown after a struggle for his weapon — were premature,
FBI SWAT Gear •
Jason Fritz, former Army officer
Norman Stamper
Chris Lee • clee@post-dispatch.com
St. Louis County and Dellwood police detain two people on the 9900 block of West Ferguson Avenue on Wednesday in Ferguson. Both were released after being questioned.
SWAT gear varies by department. An FBI website details the equipment worn or carried by its tactical team members.
• Kevlar helmet • Flame-resistant Nomex fatigues and gloves • Plastic kneepads • Climbing or utility boots • Blast-rated goggles • Armored vest • Pouches for ammunition, other
small gear • Two-way radio with earpiece and microphone • H&K MP5 10mm submachine gun with 30-round magazine, laser sight and flashlight • Springfield .45 caliber
we’re seeing in Ferguson.” He continued, “It’s only when there has been some kind of horrible tragedy, like somebody getting shot or somebody getting killed during one of these paramilitary raids ... that the hard questions start getting asked — the questions that should have been asked since the beginning.” But in a news conference Thursday, the Ferguson police chief, Thomas Jackson, whose department does not have a SWAT team of its own, defended the concept. “The tactical units will be out there if firebombs start getting thrown, property is getting destroyed, shots are being fired, people are being shot at. We have to respond to deadly force,” he said. “The whole picture is being painted a little bit sideways from what’s really happening,” Jackson said. “And it’s not military. It’s tactical operations. It’s SWAT teams. That’s who’s out there. Police. We’re doing this in blue.” Full details of the tactical gear being deployed in Ferguson by the St. Louis County police and other agencies are not available. The Department of Defense’s 1033 Program may have provided some of the equipment, but it isn’t clear how much of this gear was purchased from other federal programs or local
semi-automatic pistol with 8-round magazine • Thigh holster • Metal handcuffs • Nightstick • Gas mask • Medical supplies • Flexible handcuffs
budgets. The 1033 Program has transferred more than $4.3 billion in surplus military equipment to thousands of law enforcement agencies and others. It is intended for “counternarcotics and counterterrorism operations, and to enhance officer safety,” according to the Missouri Department of Public Safety website. The department will not release specific destinations for tactical equipment. According to federal data, various police agencies in St. Louis County received 12 5.56mm rifles and six .45-caliber pistols between Aug. 2, 2010, and Feb. 13, 2013. They also received 15 “reflex” gun sights, four night vision devices and three night sights, as well as an $10,000 explosive ordnance robot, three helicopters, seven Humvees and three cargo trailers. One helicopter alone was originally worth $200,000. State data obtained in 2012 show that St. Louis County police received at least two helicopters, computer equipment, two old SUVs and roughly 20 Kevlar helmets since 2007. Ferguson received medical supplies, computer equipment and dozens of large backpacks and wool blankets through the program, records show, as well as a generator, a trailer and several utility vehicles.
and suggested to the public that the investigation had already drawn conclusions. Among people who were upset by the comment was St. Louis County Executive Charlie Dooley, said Dooley’s chief of staff, Pat Washington. She said Dooley had a meeting with Belmar after the statement to the media, where Belmar clarified that he was relaying only the Ferguson officer’s version of events. Dooley “had a concern about it and that’s why he had a conversation with the chief about it and try to understand what was intended,” she said. “I think (Belmar) understands that people may have taken his comments in a way that he didn’t intend.” Belmar declined to comment Thursday. Walker said he could understand why people wouldn’t trust the police after the early support for the officer’s version. “You can say, ‘No comment at this time. We have not completed the investigation. We haven’t even barely begun the investigation at this point.’” What larger impact St. Louis will feel is unclear. On Thursday, some business owners publicly worried about devastation to the region’s economy. If you ask Bob Cooper, the concerns could be well founded. Cooper, 56, a computer executive who lives in Charlotte, N.C., told a reporter that in two weeks he is taking his wife and two children, 8 and 12, on a road trip to San Francisco. They had booked two nights in St. Louis to visit the Gateway Arch and the brewery. After what happened in Ferguson, they crossed St. Louis off their itinerary. Joel Currier of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.
Ferguson police spokesman Tim Zoll said his agency has no military level weapons or armor, except for two Humvees donated by the Missouri National Guard after a tornado. Despite reports that military “Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected” vehicles, or MRAPs, were used on Ferguson streets, a spokesman for the Missouri Department of Public Safety said none has been supplied to agencies in St. Louis or St. Louis County. Some other Missouri communities have received them, including St. Charles County. Lt. David Tiefenbrunn of the St. Charles County Sheriff’s Department said Thursday his agency has not yet used its MRAP. He said his department’s BearCat, an armored truck bought with Homeland Security funds, is on the streets with the county’s multijurisdictional SWAT team. St. Louis County police also has a BearCat, bought with federal grant money, and its larger cousin, the BEAR, purchased more than a decade ago. BearCats cost up to $275,000, and BEARs up to $350,000, the manufacturer says. Officials confirmed that at least those three armored vehicles were used Wednesday on the streets of Ferguson. Tiefenbrunn said his SWAT officers carry .223-caliber rifles, similar to an AR-15, bought after Los Angeles police were badly outgunned in a dramatic shootout after a bank robbery. The local SWAT officers also have less-lethal TASERs, bean bag rounds for shotguns and a paintball-like gun that shoots pepper balls. As for militarizing the police, Tiefenbrunn said, “Our actions are based on what we’re faced with on the streets. America is becoming more heavily armed.” Chuck Raasch of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.