Home > Events, News > Eugene public forum about “Police Use of Force” nets clear consensus and inspires passionate commentary

Eugene public forum about “Police Use of Force” nets clear consensus and inspires passionate commentary

by Drew Dakessian on January 21, 2010

A public forum to discuss and explore “Police Use of Force: Accountability and Alternatives” was held at W.O.W. Hall in Eugene on Tuesday.

About 60 people attended the event, which featured speakers such as: Eugene City Councilor George Brown; Lauren Reagan, director of the Civil Liberties Defense Center; Norman Riddle, White Bird Clinic case manager; Municipal Court Judge Rick Brissenden; violence prevention researcher Geoff Colvin; and Mike Quillin, co-chairman of the steering committee for Citizens for Public Accountability.

The Eugene Police Department (EPD) was not represented on the panel. According to EPD Public Information Director Melinda Kletzok, the Citizens for Public Accountability did contact the EPD to participate; however, the group made this appeal to an EPD “community service officer” who was not an appropriate point of contact because an individual in that role lacks the necessary qualifications to speak about “use of force” policy and procedure.

Even without an EPD presence, the event invitation had said that the panelists would represent a wide range of viewpoints; overall, though, they were actually in agreement. The consensus among panelists was that the duty of the police is to protect citizens, and that Eugene police have recently ignored and even flouted this duty. “We’re not here to vilify individual police officers. We’re here tonight…to discuss the apparent breakdown in the…institution of the police in Eugene…Police are given the right to use force, which would otherwise be considered unlawful, in order to do their job,” Quillin said.

On September 22 of last year, a Eugene police officer tasered a non-English speaking Chinese student for trespassing in a townhouse on West 11th Avenue, when in fact the Chinese student had lawfully moved in earlier that day. “I believe that the use of the taser in that case was totally unwarranted,” Brown said. “It’s not against the law not to speak English.” Nevertheless, Eugene Police Chief Pete Kerns cleared the officer on January 6, calling the use of a taser “reasonable.”

“Whatever happened to old-fashioned talking, crisis prevention or negotiating? That would probably be more effective and would foster mutual respect, something vastly lacking our community right now,” Reagan said. “If we the people do not hold violent police officers that seem to be out of control accountable for their actions in their community, who will?”

“There is a place for physical force, but it should be relatively rare,” Colvin said, advocating instead for “two things: pause, and slight disengagement.”

“We are offering ourselves up

as a resource to finding a new

approach.”

“We are offering ourselves up as a resource to finding a new approach,” Riddle said.

“Far too often,” Brissenden said, “We get into dangerous situations because [officers] are protecting against things that have a very small [likelihood] of happening…It’s clearly the idea in the officer’s head that the quicker we can get this done, the better.”

Agreeing with Colvin, Brissenden said, “There’s no reason not to take another minute, or five, or ten, to analyze the situation, to talk a little bit.”

Brissenden described what he calls the “Bad Seed Factor,” noting that “Some people do not belong in the professions that they’re in…they are not emotionally suited to it…They’re people who are bullies, perhaps, who just tend to get a little too physical. There are people who are just incompetent. They are a small minority, but they shouldn’t be there [in the police force] and they have got to get out now.”

The panel agreed that there could be a certain degree of conflict of interest when the police are charged with policing themselves. “If you think about it,” Wilkinson said, “You have somebody who’s going to investigate…fellow officers and then go back into the force.”

“There are good people in the leadership of the police department, but…sometimes you’re going to have to tip off the rank and file…to step up and be a good leader and say, No, this was wrong; this is bad policing,” Brissenden said.

The panel was adamant that community input is essential to a fair and just society. “Make your thoughts…known. These are institutions that we all create. We have a voice, and if we don’t like…the direction we see…some of our institutions [taking], we have a duty to speak out,” Wilkinson said.

Community members had the chance to speak out during an open-microphone question-and-answer session following the panel. People formed a queue to voice their concerns, but several of them spent upwards of ten minutes each telling the stories of their lives to the panelists and their fellow citizens, apparently driven to distraction by their passion for the issue. However, when the audience felt that these stories were only tangentially related to the issue at hand, they took it upon themselves to interrupt and keep the dialogue focused.

Those who participated in the Q and A session included the homeless, longtime residents of Eugene, and the founder of Citizens for Public Accountability. All were so passionate that the small-group sessions that had been scheduled to follow the open-microphone portion were canceled due to time constraints, but only after the majority of the audience voted against it with a show of hands. The few who did still want to have a small-group session were assured that they would be able to participate at another time.

The meeting ended without mention of the next meeting date, action items, or anticipated next steps.

Today’s follow-up call to the EPD ended with Kletzok saying that the Police Commission is currently in the process of reviewing recommendations regarding the use-of-force/taser policy.

A video recording of the event is available here.