Sunday, December 23, 2001
Use of force increased as violent crime dropped
Enquirer analysis: Police sprayed chemical irritant almost three times a day last year
By John Byczkowski
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The use of force by Cincinnati police increased 44 percent between 1997 and 2000, a time when the city's violent crime rate dropped more than 9 percent.
In two-thirds of more than 5,500 incidents reviewed, police used force against African-American citizens, who comprise about 43 percent of the city's population.
Police management has neglected to review officers who use force too much. Of the more than 400 officers who exceeded the department's thresholds for using force from 1998 to December 2000, only 72 were called in for review.
These are among the findings of an analysis by The Cincinnati Enquirer on the use of force by the Cincinnati Police Department.
The newspaper found that while the police department investigates officers who shoot their guns, the early-warning system does not track those who fire accidentally or shoot at other targets, such as dogs. Nor does it track how many times officers point their guns at people, a complaint made by some African-Americans this summer during preparations for a racial profiling lawsuit against the city.
The most common type of force used by police is a chemical irritant similar to Mace. Records show police officers sprayed the chemical irritant at someone almost three times a day last year. And no matter whether the officer was white or black, two-thirds of the people sprayed with chemicals were African-American.
The newspaper shared most of its findings with Police Chief Tom Streicher two weeks ago to help facilitate an interview. However, the chief turned down repeated requests to discuss them.
Last week, when a reporter caught up with him at an event, Chief Streicher said he had not reviewed the material and was not prepared to discuss it.
“When we're prepared to do it (and) I think it's worthwhile, we will, but I have to review the information,” he said. When asked for a comment about the rising use of force, the chief said only, “It just depends on how you look at it, is how it is.”
Other police officials say the disproportionate use of force against African-Americans is easy to explain.
“Most of the violent crime in our city is committed by black males,” said Capt. Gregory Snider, who oversees police operations in District 1, which includes downtown and Over-the-Rhine, one of the city's highest crime areas.
During the review period, three of every four people arrested for aggravated assault or homicide were African-American, records show.
“It's been that way for years,” Capt. Snider said. “Murder, rapes, robberies ... disproportionately, black males commit those crimes and are identified by the victims of the crimes.”
Cincinnati Councilwoman Minette Cooper said she was surprised to learn that the use of force had risen while the crime rate had dropped.
“There has to be cause and effect, and I don't see the cause,” she said.
Sheila Adams, president of the Urban League of Greater Cincinnati, wasn't surprised. “For me, it confirms what I have seen (about) the use of force and the acceleration of the use of force.
“I think we have to proceed with whatever measures are necessary and appropriate to reduce the use of force,” she said.
The police department's increased use of force occurred against a backdrop of growing mistrust by many city residents, particularly African-Americans.
“Tensions are very high, patience is very thin, fear is very high, and (police) are resorting to force quicker than in more stable times,” said civil rights lawyer Al Gerhardstein, who is involved in a racial profiling lawsuit against the city.
In that suit, filed in March, African-American businessman Bomani Tyehimba alleges police targeted him for harassment because of the color of his skin. This suit has become the basis for a mediation process to prevent racial profiling by Cincinnati police.
In April, the city erupted in racial unrest after police shot and killed an unarmed black man fleeing to avoid arrest. And in May, federal investigators descended on the city to investigate police policies and practices. The Department of Justice has issued 25 preliminary recommendations, but is continuing to review the police department's use of force.
More confrontations
High-ranking officials in the police department defend their officers' work. Use of force has increased, they said, because more citizens are resisting arrest and defying officers who respond to calls.
“It's hard to put your finger on it, but I think there's just this confrontational mode that people resist the police more, assault the police more,” Capt. Snider said.
Critics don't understand the tough nature of Cincinnati's streets, he added.
“I don't think many of them have experienced trying to control violent people, or people with weapons, or realize how hard it is physically to take someone into custody sometimes,” Capt. Snider said. “If you don't want to be handcuffed and don't want to submit to a lawful arrest and go to jail ... it can be real difficult to subdue you.”
When police meet resistance, they respond with force.
“The people who submit to a lawful arrest don't get hurt,” said District 4 commander Capt. David Ratliff, whose district includes the higher-crime neighborhoods of Avondale and Walnut Hills, both home to large numbers of African-American citizens.
“If you want to fight, the police will fight you,” he said.
Keith Fangman, whose term as president of the Fraternal Order of Police Queen City Lodge 69 ended last week, said officers rack up force incidents because they're active, not because they are racists.
“They're doing their job. They're doing what the taxpayers pay them to do and that's get the criminals off the street,” he said.
Capt. Ratliff agrees.
“If I'm a police officer and I run Avondale and 95 percent of my uses of force are against blacks, does that make me a racist? Absolutely not. A person who says that has blinders on,” he said.
Fight or flight
There's no denying that police must sometimes use force to take someone into custody. However, there is conflicting data on whether people today are more defiant and contentious when dealing with police.
Records show that the number of people charged with assaulting a police officer has dropped to 26 in 2000, from 37 in 1997. And the number of people charged with resisting arrest fell steadily between 1997 and 2000 — from 1,373 to 881.
That drop is due, in part, to court decisions that said suspects who run from police can't be charged with resisting arrest. Rather, they should be charged with obstructing official business. During the review period, arrests for obstruction rose dramatically — from 470 to 2,246.
However, it is unclear how many of those arrests involved people running away from police. And, in 2000, the year that saw the biggest increase in force incidents, obstruction charges fell.
“Forty years ago, policemen were a lot more physical than they are now. People who ran from police usually got hurt,” Capt. Ratliff said.
“Today, they feel like, "If I get out and run and I get away, I've won. If I get out and run and they catch me, they're not going to do a lot to me ...' So they run.”
Included in the rising use of force is the number of people reported injured following arrest.
The number of injury-to-prisoner reports rose 31 percent from 1997 to 2000. And when officers working in pairs used force, two-thirds of those incidents involved injuries to prisoners.
Injury reports are filed whenever a suspect has an injury, whether or not it happened during the arrest. Some people might have been hurt beforehand. Others might have scraped their knees or scratched themselves climbing fences while running from police. Still others might have been injured after officers took them to the ground.
And some die.
In November 2000, Roger Owensby Jr., whom police wanted to question in a drug investigation, died of asphyxiation after a struggle with four officers. The police department categorized the case as an “injury to prisoner.”
Two officers were indicted on charges related to Mr. Owensby's death, but both were acquitted in November. Still, according to available records, it was the first time that an officer had been charged when someone died during an arrest.
Since the controversy over Mr. Owensby's death, police have backed off. They say the threat of prosecutions, protests and lawsuits have spurred them to initiate fewer contacts with people who may be acting suspiciously.
“Cops quite frankly were sick and tired of (being) falsely labeled racist, falsely labeled racial profilers, so yes, there was a reduction in self-initiated activity,” Mr. Fangman said. “And who can blame them?”
Through the first 10 months of the year, city police have written 25,000 fewer parking tickets and 33,000 fewer traffic tickets than last year. They've also made nearly 8,000 fewer arrests for gambling, prostitution and drug abuse.
Likewise, excluding the April riots, use-of-force incidents are down 24 percent compared to the same period in 2000.
Meanwhile, reports of violent crime are up 33 percent.
“A lot of officers feel frustrated in trying to do their jobs,” said Lt. Larry Powell, coordinator of the department's Community Oriented Police program. “A lot of times they feel like, "I'm getting criticized from the community, I'm getting criticized by my bosses when I'm just trying to do my job.'”
Rising ratio
Last year, Cincinnati police responded to more than 300,000 radio calls, wrote 68,000 traffic tickets and initiated an untold number of unreported contacts.
Out of a more than 370,000 citizen contacts — more contacts, in fact, than Cincinnati has citizens — police used force 1,270 times.
That's a “good ratio,” demonstrating that use of force is a rare occurrence, Capt. Ratliff said.
But that ratio had been rising: In 1997, there were 24 force incidents for every 10,000 citizen contacts. In 2000, that ratio rose to 34 out of every 10,000 contacts, a 40 percent increase.
Mike Scott, a police consultant and co-author of Deadly Force: What We Know, agreed use of force in Cincinnati is rare, but said that's true in every city in the country. The rise in Cincinnati's ratio “could be all the difference in the world as far as how the public perceives the police.”
Police department leaders and others in the community say a number of factors have contributed to a rise in the use of force.
The police department is young. More than 200 of the department's 1,026 officers have come onboard since January 1998.
And because of a system that gives senior officers first choice of work shifts, “our younger, newer officers — younger in terms of experience — end up on second, third shift, which traditionally is the busiest in terms of encounters and criminal behavior,” Capt. Snider said.
“It's a problem, but I don't know how to change it,” he said. “I can't change that the city laid off employees and didn't hire for years, and then had a rush of hiring.”
New officers
Through the first 10 months of the year, officers hired since 1998 have been involved in three-quarters of the physical force incidents, three-quarters of cases involving an injury to a prisoner and half of all incidents involving chemical irritants.
This wave of officers joined the force around the time that the department was reeling from the shooting deaths of officers Daniel Pope and Ronald Jeter in December 1997, and the February 1998 shooting of Officer Kathleen Conway.
Before officers Pope and Jeter were killed, the last officer to die in the line of duty was Clifford George in 1987.
“The attitudes of officers definitely changed after Pope and Jeter and Conway,” said City Prosecutor Ernest McAdams Jr., who oversaw the Office of Municipal Investigations at the time of the shootings.
“Officers were much more concerned with their own safety and much more aware of how things can go bad,” he said. “I think (afterward) officers were trained to be a lot more careful with everything that was going on. And in the idea of being careful, they probably are protecting themselves more.”
Mr. Fangman disputes that officers are quicker to use force, but acknowledges they are being more guarded. “Officers are going to be cautious when dealing with individuals knowing that they could be killed in the line of duty as a result of any one encounter,” he said.
Keeping records
Determining why the number of force incidents is rising would be easier if the police department had good information. But what the department records — and what it doesn't — hinders that process.
The department's poor tracking of force was a central criticism by the U.S. Department of Justice in its October preliminary report on the department.
The department has information on more than 5,500 use-of-force incidents and claims to investigate every one. The reports are maintained in a computer database, which police leaders say is their primary tool for tracking force.
“We meticulously scrutinize conduct in uses of force to see what did we do right, what could we have done better,” said Capt. Ratliff of District 4. “Let's look at risk management and best practices. What can I do to improve my officers? Do I have a loose cannon out here? If I did, I think I'd be able to identify it, not only through critiquing his behavior, but other policemen would tell me, "This guy is dangerous.' I don't have that.”
However, the department repeatedly has failed to conduct reviews when its early-warning system identifies people who repeatedly use force.
An officer is supposed to be reviewed if during a 12-month period he or she uses chemical irritants seven or more times, or is involved in three physical force or injury-to-prisoner incidents.
Less than a quarter of officers who exceeded those levels were reviewed, the Enquirer found.
“Can we do better? We probably could do better in terms of timeliness,” Capt. Snider said.
Looking for patterns in use of force is important, said Mr. Scott, the police consultant.
“That's the main point of having an early-warning system in the first place, is that you would be able to identify emerging patterns and trends and tendencies among officers who use force, and give you an opportunity to think about and explore why officers use more force than others.”
Beyond that, he said, the department should be looking for patterns across its entire force.
“You might spot trends and patterns across a shift, or within the officers who work for a particular supervisor, or within a particular command assignment,” he said.
In those cases where officers were reviewed, the Enquirer found occasions where tactics were criticized, but none where they were found to have violated department policy.
The department's use-of-force policy is too broad and unclear, and is not specific about what is unacceptable, according to the Justice Department.
“This ambiguity may lead officers to believe they are justified in using force in situations in which it would be unreasonable,” investigators said in their preliminary report.
Beyond policy, there appear to be several problems with the early-warning system, the police department's primary tool for tracking use of force.
The first is a lack of detail. When officers use force, the report form doesn't require them to describe what happened, which makes it difficult to determine later whether force was justified.
The second is that information is badly kept. Not only are officers' names and badge numbers often wrong, but the database is incomplete. For example, the database does not include information on five men shot and killed by police, nor two other known shootings.
The department has trouble keeping the database current and the tracking is imprecise. The Enquirer found dozens of cases of people sprayed with chemical irritant listed under the “injury-to-prisoner” category. In 2000, out of 349 injury-to-prisoner cases, 146 involved use of chemical irritants. That leads police to under-count the use of chemicals.
Police reviews
Some supervisors and officers resist the review process, thinking that each incident has already been investigated separately, Capt. Snider said. “I know a lot of people feel these have already been reviewed and scrutinized and in effect approved, and why are we doing it again?” he said.
Resistance is apparent in some current reviews. As use of force has risen, the level of candor has declined.
For instance, a July 1997 review of an officer by then-Capt. Ronald Twitty was unusually candid. It said the officer “felt he was being targeted and had a difficult time accepting constructive criticism reference his frequent usage of chemical irritant. ... As noted, most of these incidents involved very minor infractions. (The officer) should concentrate on problem resolution rather than seeking out a violation and resolving same by arrest.”
Capt. Twitty, who is today assistant chief, concluded the review by saying, “Hopefully, the officer just went through a bad spell and this session will motivate him to utilize more finesse in dealing with potential arrests.”
Capt. Twitty's level of candor is rare. Last July, for example, six officers in District 4 were reviewed by three supervisors. Each officer received the same 119-word review, different only in the names and badge numbers.
In the weeks following the November 2000 death of Mr. Owensby at the hands of Cincinnati police, the department's management rushed to catch up with reviewing officers for use of force.
To that point in 2000, the department had reviewed just 26 officers for use of force, although some 150 officers had reached the threshold for review.
In trying to catch up, the office of Internal Affairs called for a review of one officer who had had three incidents up to July 2000. Because the database was five months out of date, the department was unaware the officer had amassed another six incidents.
“The person we had doing that (maintaining the database) was behind in reviewing the forms,” said Capt. Snider, then head of Internal Affairs. “There was so much paperwork and so much volume of work, they were behind.”
Those problems in maintaining data and performing use-of-force reviews points to a lack of accountability by the police department, said Keith Borders, an attorney who recently resigned as chairman of the city's Citizens Police Review Panel.
“The bottom line is, there's an effort to explain away what is a mistreatment and inappropriate use of authority that police have, and (police will) not even face up to accountability in terms of tracking information,” he said.
More paperwork
As the use-of-force debate unfolds, the department has been improving its early-warning system.
It instituted a point system that counts an officer's force incidents, as well as car chases, crashes and citizen complaints. Accumulating points triggers a review, and more reviews are being conducted.
The Justice Department is recommending even more tracking be done, asking, for instance, that the department track all use of holds and other restraining forces, and all incidents where officers draw their guns and point them at citizens.
The tracking and reviews come at a cost, Mr. Fangman said.
“We'll fill out all the reports they want. But it's going to mean less officers on the street, more officers tied up in feel-good paperwork and less officers on patrol.”
Scotty Johnson, president of the Sentinels Police Association of black Cincinnati officers and a police specialist himself, said little will change so long as trust remains broken between Cincinnati police and residents.
“Unless and until we start to build a foundation of mutual trust and respect, unfortunately the police reaction and even overreaction in some cases is going to continue.”
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