On Nov. 6, 2008, David Kerstetter was shot and killed inside his home by D.C. police officers. Despite the decision of the U.S. attorney's office not to prosecute the officers involved, Kerstetter's family has filed a notice with the District that it plans to sue the city over their son's death. The family's attorney, Douglas Sparks, notified Mayor Adrian Fenty in a letter dated May 1 [PDF].

We have written about the Kerstetter shooting here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here---not to mention the cover story linked above. The Sparks letter is based on the lawyer's interviews with witnesses, the autopsy report, and an exhaustive scene analysis. It provides the first counter-narrative to law enforcement's public account that Kerstetter had lunged at the officers with a knife---that Officer Frederick Friday shot and killed the Logan Circle resident in self defense. The new evidence appears to point to excessive force.

On the morning of Nov. 6, Officers Friday and Christian Glynn responded to the Kerstetter home after receiving a radio report for a suspicious door. The two met with the condo complex's maintenance man and a concerned neighbor. Sparks writes:

The maintenance man nudged the door open further and yelled upstairs to David, asking if he was home and whether the maintenance man could go upstairs. David replied that he was home, but that he did not want the man to enter or come upstairs because he had seen the police officers standing behind him. David said they should just go away and just leave him alone. The police officers then stood just outside David's front door for twenty to forty minutes while they spoke further with the maintenance man and neighbor, communicated via radio with police supervisors, and discussed David's known mental illness...and his history of depression following the death of his partner one year earlier.

Sparks states that the officers were unsure about what to do next. Kerstetter had made it clear that he did not want them in his home. Soon, though, they became "impatient" and announced, "We're going in." Sparks says the officers had no "reasonable belief" that a crime was in progress. The two cops drew their guns, went inside, and walked up the stairs to the second-floor living room and kitchen area.

It is unclear what Officers Friday and Glynn found on the second floor. They must have noticed that the furnishings were immaculate, that everything was perfectly in place.

Officers Friday and Glynn eventually made their way up to the third floor.

Sparks notes in his letter:

The officers apparently knew of no standard protocol to follow when responding to calls involving persons in crisis or persons known to suffer from mental illness---whether from a lack of standards, or a lack of training to carry out existing standards. Nor did they seek assistance from specialists at the District's Department of Mental Health who were available to assist with these types of matters.

Officers Friday and Glynn found Kerstetter in his bedroom.

Even law enforcement officials are unsure as to what exactly happened inside that bedroom.

Immediately following the shooting, D.C. police issued a press release which stated: "The officers were suddenly confronted by an adult male...reportedly wielding a knife. Reportedly, a struggle ensued as the officers repeatedly ordered the man to drop the weapon. It was at that time that the police in the face of apparent imminent danger fired upon the subject."

The U.S. attorney's office tells a different account of the exchange between Kerstetter and Officers Friday and Glynn. Spokesperson Channing Phillips omits the struggle narrative in an e-mail to Washington City Paper:

Mr. Kerstetter threatened to take his own life and held a knife to his own throat. Despite reasonable efforts to avoid taking Mr. Kerstetter’s life by repeatedly telling him to drop the knife, Mr. Kerstetter instead lunged toward the officers with the knife and ultimately left the officer who had his weapon drawn with no choice but to use deadly force to protect himself and others from death or serious bodily injury.

Sparks says the shooting appears to be plain overkill. He points to the autopsy report [PDF] and his scene work. The bloody scene suggests that Kerstetter had been effectively caged in, that he had been trapped in the far left corner of the room between his bed and the bathroom door. So far there has been no evidence cited which supports a struggle between the cops and Kerstetter. The pictures on the bedroom walls remained untouched. A blood-stained vase next to the bathroom door hadn't been knocked over.

Kerstetter bled out in his bathroom.

According to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner's autopsy report, Kerstetter was shot five times. There were two gunshot wounds to the torso. The track of each bullet was front to back and downward. There were three shots to the lower extremities hitting knee, femur, bladder, and so on. The track of each bullet was back to front and upward. "It's consistent with a man in a sitting position and falling backwards," Sparks says in an interview.

Sparks writes that the cops fired at least eight rounds at Kerstetter. The three allegedly missed bullets were found in the bathroom floor, the floorboard in front of the bathroom, and in a bathroom wall.

"The trajectory of the rounds that hit David, as well as those that missed him, establishes that the officers fired downward," Sparks writes. "Blood spatter patterns along baseboards, trim work and elsewhere demonstrate that most, and perhaps all, rounds were fired while David was down and incapacitated."

In an e-mail sent this afternoon, Phillips says that the U.S. attorney's office did not conduct blood-spatter analysis in this case, "but it's my understanding that it wouldn't have been necessary in this instance given the other corroborating evidence that was available."

Phillips says the evidence included the knife, shell casings, audiotaped witness statements, and toxicology report.

"Shell casings---we all know they shot him. No surprise they found shell casings. They found a knife. What does that establish? The issue in question is where were the officers and where was [Kerstetter] when they fired off eight rounds," Sparks says. "Had they done a blood-spatter analysis, they would have discovered that it contradicts the police assertions and is far more reliable and scientific."

"We did a thorough forensic examination through a combination of highly respected experts in a variety of disciplines," Sparks adds. He says that he would want to see law enforcement's forensic examinations. "What was the available forensic evidence they relied upon? We'd sure like to see it. Not just we. When homicides are committed in our name with our money, the public has a right to know the facts on a basic moral level."

Sparks notes that police missed at least one bullet during the course of their examination of the Kerstetter home. The family found the bullet when they went through their son's bedroom. The bullet was found in a floor board:

"If there's something that's justified let's find out. If there's something that's not, let's fix it," Sparks explains.

In the aftermath of the Kerstetter shooting---and the shooting death of Osman Abdullahi---the police department has decided to completely overhaul how it deals with mentally-ill residents.

Photographs courtesy of Douglas Sparks

The U.S. Attorney's Office has declined to prosecute Officer Frederick Friday for the shooting death of David Kerstetter in early November of last year. Friday had shot and killed Kerstetter in the Logan Circle resident's bathroom entrance. Friday, and his partner Officer Christian Glynn, had responded to the home after a report of an open door. Kerstetter suffered from a mental illness and had pleaded for the police to leave him alone. The police went in anyway to investigate. Officer Friday claimed Kerstetter came at him with a knife before he opened fire. Kerstetter was shot multiple times.

"We’ve closed it out," wrote  Channing Phillips, spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office, an e-mail. "After a thorough review of the matter, we declined to bring charges after determining that it was a justifiable shooting.  We have since sent the matter back to MPD for whatever action it deems appropriate."

Phillips went on to state: "There was no evidence that the officer violated the law when he used deadly force in this case.  Beyond that, I can’t comment."

Today, Phillips wrote another e-mail explaining further the office's decision.

Phillips writes:

“Our decision not to file charges in this matter was the result of a thorough investigation, which included an examination of the autopsy report, all available forensic evidence, radio communications, and witness interviews.  In this tragic incident, the officers arrived at Mr. Kerstetter’s home and discovered that his door had been kicked in and that nobody was responding from the residence.  The officers worked with Mr. Kerstetter’s neighbors and attempted to contact several third parties in order to resolve the situation peacefully.  When these efforts failed, and the officers reluctantly entered his residence, Mr. Kerstetter threatened to take his own life and held a knife to his own throat.  Despite reasonable efforts to avoid taking Mr. Kerstetter’s life by repeatedly telling him to drop the knife, Mr. Kerstetter instead lunged toward the officers with the knife and ultimately left the officer who had his weapon drawn with no choice but to use deadly force to protect himself and others from death or serious bodily injury."

The Kerstetter shooting may have played a role in the D.C. Police Department's recent decision to change how they train officers on dealing with residents in crisis. The prosecutor's decision is not all that shocking.

In the last 10 years, according to Phillips, the U.S. Attorney's Office has not prosecuted a single cop for shooting a citizen.

Last week, the Washington Post wrote an editorial asking why it took a civil suit to reveal new facts in the Rawlings shooting. Maybe it's because prosecutors just don't go after cop shooters. The bar is significantly higher to get a conviction in a criminal court.

In a cover story, a very, very old cover story, prosecutor Deb Sines broke it down: "All the cop has to do is take the stand and cry and look at a jury with tears in his eyes, and say, 'I lost it. I'm trying to do the right thing. I'm trying to be a good cop. People spit on us. People shoot us. They have no respect. I lost it. I'm so sorry.' Not one juror will convict him."

I went on to write of one example of some seriously bad policing:

D.C. cops have offered far worse testimonials. After getting stabbed by an unknown assailant on June 20, 1998, at the intersection of 14th Street and Park Road NW, Officer Edward Miller fired his Glock, hitting unarmed suspect Jose Joya several times. When later asked why he fired his weapon, Miller told a prosecutor: "I knew I had to get a shot off because I would get teased back at the station by the guys at 4D for not getting a shot off." Joya won a $500,000 civil-suit settlement in 2000.

Kerstetter's family has hired veteran attorney Doug Sparks. "On behalf of the family, we have conducted an investigation at least and likely far more thorough than the investigation described in the U.S. Attorney's statement," Sparks says in an interview this afternoon. "The results of our investigation paint a far different picture of the events leading to David's death. In particular, I haven't heard a word from law enforcement authorities about any ballistics tests in terms of bullet trajectories or any analysis of blood spatter patterns. In my view, that's probably because they didn't conduct these forensic analyses. We did. They show at least eight rounds were fired at David and five hit him. Our expert forensic analysis shows that the officers fired downward....Most if not all of the rounds were fired while David was down and incompacitated."

Sparks goes on to say: "At the end of the day, the issue for the Kerstetters is far more about police training when responding to matters of this nature than they are about whether the police officers should face criminal charges. That's the difference between the role of the U.S. Attorney's Office and the civil justice system."

The other day Carl Kerstetter sent me the above picture of his son David with his medals from his military service which included a tour of duty during the first Gulf War. The picture shows what David was before his mental-illness reared up and took over much of his life. On November 6, he was shot and killed inside his Logan Circle home by D.C. Police Officer Frederick Friday. While the incident is still under investigation, my cover story on the subject raises many questions left unanswered.

I am using this new picture of David as an excuse to complain about the latest stonewalling on the part of the D.C. Police Department's press office.

A month after the shooting, I submitted a FOIA to the D.C. Police Department's spokesperson Traci Hughes. The FOIA was very simple. I asked for e-mails sent from a few police officials to the officials at the Department of Mental Health. My request gave a specific time frame and a specific subject matter to search. But after I sent my FOIA, I heard nothing back from police brass.

I waited. And then I waited some more.

After a month, I started regularly calling and e-mail Hughes about my FOIA. She replied that I needed my FOIA number. I told her that I never received a letter from her with a FOIA number. How should I know what my "FOIA number" is?

To refresh her memory, I sent her a copy of my original FOIA with the date attached. I then waited some more. But I kept calling her office and e-mailing her.

I finally reached Hughes on the phone. She told me that she was writing my rejection letter while we were on the phone. Awesome! She said that my FOIA was being denied because it was "overly broad."

I asked Hughes: How can I fix the FOIA since it asks for specific information from specific officials for a specific time period. I mentioned that when a similar issue came up with the Department of Mental Health, its FOIA officer worked with me on a compromise.

Hughes said she wasn't going to help.

How sweet.

Even better: I am still waiting for Hughes' rejection letter. Now, Hughes is on maternity leave.

I'm gonna say it: She shouldn't come back to her post as police spokesperson. The city and the press deserve better from its public officials.

It has been four months since I sent my original FOIA request. And two months since I sent a follow-up FOIA on a related matter. I do not think D.C. Police Department could be more indifferent to FOIA regs.

At Monday's hearing, D.C.Police Chief Cathy Lanier and her top brass assured Mendelson that he would have the Rawlings case report on his desk very soon. The expection was for a Friday deadline. In an editorial the day of the deadline, the Post urged the police department to release more information about shootings--including the details on the recent police shooting death of a bus driver. We'd like the records behind the David Kerstetter shooting on November 6. And the Osman Abdullahi shooting in late February. The Post sort of piggybacked on David Simon's own editorial in its newspaper a few weeks ago.

So is it shocking that on Friday, the D.C. Police failed to give Mendelson the DeOnte Rawlings report? Of course not. This is what the department does with such things.

"I think that's still at the factory for redactions," Mendelson joked during a phone interview. It was 5 p.m. on Friday. "This is at least the third time I've asked for the D. Rawlings report."

Mendelson believes getting these force-investigation shooting reports is important. "If the executive branch does not want accountability and transparency then they will ignore the legislature's request," Mendelson says. "I agree with what [the Post] wrote. How do we do oversight if they withhold information? Of course that raises the question: Is there something they are trying to hide? Maybe it's nothing but it certainly provokes the question. Anything controversial like that sunshine is most helpful."

From the right: David, his father Carl, and his brother Kristopher

A few days ago, I called David Kerstetter's parents in Arizona. I wanted to know what they thought about the D.C. Police Department's sudden change in policy in how it handles mentally-ill residents. Their son had been suffering from mental-illness and was shot and killed by a police officer on Nov. 6 inside his home. The department's investigation into the shooting is "still ongoing," according to its Internal Affairs bureau.

After hearing the awful news on Nov. 6, the Kerstetters immediately flew from their Phoenix-area home to D.C.

They had to identify their son's body in the morgue. They had to bury him in Rock Creek Cemetery. And they went to his apartment to try and make sense of the scene the police left behind. They saw David's blood on his bathroom floor. They saw multiple bullet holes.

The family wanted answers so they asked to meet with Chief Cathy Lanier. They had read her statements in the Washington Post that seemed to quickly exonerate her officers. They never got to talk to her. Instead they got Assistant Chief Peter Newsham, who heads up Internal Affairs.

David's parents, Carl and Susan Kerstetter, returned to D.C. a second time---from Jan, 10 through Feb. 6. They had come to close out David's townhouse, which involved arranging for biohazard people to clean the blood---splatters and congealed matter in David's upstairs bathroom. There were also bullet holes in the bathroom door frame. "Sue wouldn't go upstairs unless I was with her," Carl remembers.

They spent very little time outside of David's apartment. Carl recalls taking one five-hour break to visit a museum. They watched the Super Bowl at their lawyer, Doug Sparks' home. Sometimes they would go out for lunch or dinner around Logan Circle. There was just too much to do.

They spent a lot of time figuring out what to give away to charity and what to keep. The Kerstetters took home their son's military medals from his time fighting in the first Gulf War. Susan wanted David's bed and they arranged to bring it back.

They didn't call police brass to ask about the investigation into their son's death. "I knew that they wouldn't talk to me," Carl explains. "It was like the first time we were down there....I would like to sit down with the Assistant Chief [Peter Newsham] and the Chief of Police."

At the press conference regarding the arrest in the Chandra Levy murder, Lanier denied the Post's initial reporting on the Kerstetter case where she is quoted giving a favorable opinion on the officers' shooting. "Do you believe everything you read in the Post?" she asked. But she went on to defend her cops.

Early on, one of the most powerful things Lanier brought to the top cop job was her ability to empathize with family members who have lost loved ones to violence. It showed when she pushed to get the Chandra Levy and Shaquita Bell cold cases solved.  I've seen her comfort a family at their worst moment. Her ability to feel your pain had not gone unnoticed.

But Lanier never reached out to the Kerstetter family, never held their hands.

"I am disappointed in her," Susan says. "She never talked to us. She would never talk to us....We didn't get an apology, nothing from her. I just felt like she didn't really care, like it was another day at the office. If she has compassion for victim's families, we didn't see it."

Susan is suspicious that the police department's sudden policy shift in how they treat mentally-ill residents will actually happen. "I don't have a lot of faith in it," she says.

Carl had this to say: "I'm glad to see they've finally done something. But it's a little too late to help David."

*photo courtesy of the Kerstetter family.

D.C. police have decided to overhaul how it responds to mentally ill residents in crisis and police brass have requested training assistance from the Department of Mental Health, says DMH director Stephen T. Baron.

The decision follows two police-shooting deaths in recent months involving mentally ill victims. In November, police shot and killed David Kerstetter in his Logan Circle residence. In late January, an officer killed Osman Abdullahi inside an unlicensed group home near H Street NE.

The department plans to adopt what's called the "Crisis Intervention Team," or "CIT," model, which would train a core group of officers who would be assigned to respond to emergency situations involving the mentally ill, Baron says. Mental-health advocates and police watchdog groups have long pressed the department to adopt such a model.

The program was developed in the late '80s by the Memphis Police Department after one of their officers shot and killed a knife-wielding mentally ill man. The model has since been replicated by police departments across the country from Georgia to Houston to Seattle.

"We've begun planning training" for the officers, says Baron, who was approached by police brass three weeks ago. He says that it will take a couple years to get the program fully staffed. "We hope to start in the next few months with the first training class."

"They came to me," Baron says of the police department.

For years, the department resisted making the switch to a specialized unit. Former Chief Charles Ramsey and current Chief Cathy Lanier had rebuffed earlier lobbying efforts. When asked to explain the sudden change, Lanier said: "It's my decision. I think it was time."

Lanier says the move had nothing to do with the Kerstetter incident. The change came about, she insists, because the department has seen an increase in officers and resources. [This is news to FOP head Kristopher Baumann, who says the last time he checked, the department appeared to be behind in their staff goals. The police press office says they have approximately 4,000 officers.]

But Assistant Chief Peter Newsham, who runs the department's Internal Affairs Unit, says the shootings did prompt officials to think about the CIT model. "Obviously, it's a good idea," Newsham says. "There's been some concern recently about how we deal with people [who have] mental illness....The recent shootings have definitely drawn attention to the issue."

This "good idea" wasn't deemed so by the police department for more than a decade. Since the early '90s, the department had been lobbied by a group defense attorneys and mental-health advocates to adopt the CIT model. "There was a strong recommendation," recalls Dr. Robert Keisling of Pathways to Housing. "I remember going to the meetings in the early 1990s. It's been over 15 years of efforts."

Mary Ann Luby, a longtime outreach worker with the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, also urged the police to change. "We have an ongoing struggle with the police and the way that they sometimes approach people that are mentally ill," Luby says. "We've talked about it for a very long time.... When Ramsey was here, we tried to introduce it to him. This is going back six or seven years ago."

The Office of Police Complaints had been lobbying for the CIT model since issuing a report in 2006. The agency's efforts had been ignored despite the mounting anecdotal evidence that the department had a problem.

"I am pleased that the MPD for whatever reason is moving forward with the Crisis Intervention Team," says Philip Eure, OPC's executive direstor. "The CIT concept has been tried and tested around the country. There is every reason to believe that D.C. will benefit from it just like Memphis and other cities around the country."

The CIT model may have come in handy on the morning of Nov. 6. Two officers responded to a call for an open door at Kerstetter's Logan Circle apartment. Once they arrived, they were briefed on Kerstetter's deteriorating mental-health condition by a neighbor. One of the officers, Frederick Friday, told Washington City Paper that he made several calls seeking assistance. He says that he tried calling Kerstetter's therapist.

Kerstetter told the officers to not enter his home. After waiting around outside, Friday and his partner Christian Glynn, decided to enter Kerstetter's condo. They found Kerstetter holding a knife and a struggle ensued, according to a police press release.

Friday shot Kerstetter multiple times. Kerstetter ended up in his bathroom. [A review of the pictures from the scene show nothing out of place, nothing that would indicate a struggle.]

Kerstetter died from his wounds. Friday says he acted in self-defense. The shooting is still under investigation.

When questioned about the case yesterday, Lanier defended the officers' actions. "They followed policy," she said.

Lanier added that they had to make a "split-second decision." But when asked about the 30 minutes the officers waited outside Kerstetter's apartment, she had added a new wrinkle to the boilerplate: "So sometimes they have to make a 30-minute decision."

Simon writes:

"In January, a new Baltimore police spokesman -- a refugee from the Bush administration -- came to the incredible conclusion that the city department could decide not to identify those police officers who shot or even killed someone. (Similar policies have been established by several other police departments in the United States as well as by the FBI.)

Anthony Guglielmi, the department's director of public affairs, informed Baltimoreans that, henceforth, Police Commissioner Frederick Bealefeld would decide unilaterally whether citizens would know the names of those who had used their weapons on civilians. If they did something illegal or unwarranted -- in the commissioner's judgment -- they would be named. Otherwise, the Baltimore department would no longer regard the decision to shoot someone as the sort of responsibility for which officers might be required to stand before the public./blockquote>

I sympathize with Simon on this one. The D.C. police department not only refuses to release the names of officers involved in shootings, its spokesperson doesn't quite understand the need for such openness.

I was able to get the names of the cops in the David Kerstetter shooting only by talking to friendly officers and digging up the officers' phone numbers. [The Post never bothered to even name Kerstetter in its short account of the shooting]. The department still wouldn't confirm the names even after I interviewed the cops. A few months later, an officer shot and killed Osman Abdullahi, and an off-duty cop shot another mentally ill man the next day.

The D.C. police investigation into the DeOnte Rawlings shooting has yet to be made public. The head of the police union, Kristopher Baumann says the Rawlings case should be made public. He blames Mayor Adrian M. Fenty for keeping the investigation under wraps.

"This is a decision the mayor is making," Baumann says. "If they did start making those investigations public, I would be fascinated to see how that would go." He's open to the idea but with one important caveat: make all cases public.

"You can't have one standard for police officers and one for high-ranking officials," he says. "That would be one of the issues....If you do it for the Rawlings case, it has to be done for all cases and all situations. It has to be one standard. That standard has to be across the board.”

But Baumann is against naming names. I will have more posts on this issue later today.

Photo of David Kerstetter provided by the Kerstetter family

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/03/02/simon-says-name-the-cops-involved-in-shootings-we-agree/feed/ 4 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/02/25/remembering-david-kerstetter/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/02/25/remembering-david-kerstetter/#comments Wed, 25 Feb 2009 18:02:24 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=17312

During last week's oversight hearing on the Department of Mental Health, there was an opportunity for Councilmember David Catania to fire up his inner prosecutor and start asking some tough questions about what happened on the morning of Nov. 6.

On that morning, two police officers responded to David Kerstetter's Logan Circle home. The two cops knew that Kerstetter was mentally-ill and that he was in crisis. The officers did not quite know what to do. They waited outside his home for roughly a half hour. They called their supervisor. They tried calling Kerstetter's therapist.

The officers should have called DMH's mobile crisis response team. Instead, they went inside Kerstetter's home. Kerstetter ended up being shot multiple times and died. He allegedly came at the officers with a knife and a struggle ensued. [The evidence casts serious doubt on that narrative]. While a standard MOU had yet to be signed between DMH and D.C. Police, the existence of the mobile crisis team was known all the way up to the highest levels of the police department.

So I waited for Kerstetter's name to be invoked. And I waited for Catania to ask some tough questions. Instead, Catania played it safe and gentle.

When the subject of mobile crisis and police-DMH cooperation came up, Catania offered this limp assessment:

“You don’t always get it right," he said.  "You got to have to have those systems willing to back each other up…That’s part of the beauty here. I’m very pleased with the collaboration going on there.”

“Everything isn’t neat in a crisis,” Catania went on to say. So much for deep insight.

David Kerstetter was never mentioned. Maybe he came up later in the hearing. I'm still watching the hours of testimony. But that moment would have been the moment to start asking some tough questions about the morning of November 6.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/02/25/remembering-david-kerstetter/feed/ 0 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/02/05/two-shootings-two-deaths-two-cops-two-mentally-ill-residents/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/02/05/two-shootings-two-deaths-two-cops-two-mentally-ill-residents/#comments Thu, 05 Feb 2009 17:15:13 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=15438

In early November, D.C. police entered David Kerstetter's Logan Circle home and shot and killed him. Police say Mr. Kerstetter had a knife, that there was a struggle. The crime scene shows no evidence of a struggle. On January 26, Osman Abdullahi was shot and killed by D.C. police after they entered his unlicensed group home at 830 7th Street NE. He had a knife. He used a metal pole as a weapon. He allegedly tried to attack the police. Witnesses say he urged the police to kill him. Abdullahi is the subject of this week's cover story.

What did Kerstetter and Abdullahi have in common? They were both residents in crisis. Both suffered from mental illness. Both had stopped taking their meds.

The police knew Kerstetter. The police did not know Abdullahi.

The New York Police Department recently adopted a new policy. Any time a known mentally-ill person is the subject of a 911 dispatch, the officers rushing to the scene are notified. In a limited way, DMH did know about Abdullahi. In early December, he had called its helpline and requested services. The other men he was living with in that group house--most of them had been in the system at some point in their lives. Not to mention that the house was operated by Mark Spence; DMH knew him very, very well.

How to respond to the mentally ill has been an issue that the D.C. Police Department has refused to address. For years, they have fielded complaints from residents, from the Office of Police Compliants, and done very close to nothing. I wonder how many more times is the department going to put the lives of its officers at risk? How many more residents in crisis are going to have to die before the department starts to seriously look at its policies? And when is the D.C. Council going to hold hearings on the issue?

I had called Chief Lanier about these issues repeatedly in the wake of Kerstetter's death. I e-mailed her directly twice. I called her office. I called her people. She never called me back. Not once. She never felt it necessary to address the circumstances of Kerstetter's death--she had immediately declared the cops involved as probably justified--nor how her department handles residents in crisis. I have seen Lanier tend to grieving families with a grace and skill few officials can match. I find it difficult to imagine that Lanier hasn't thought about this issue in a serious way.

I did call Assistant Chief Peter Newsham, who runs the Internal Affairs Bureau. I asked him about policy changes and the NYPD's new warning system.

"It would be very helpful to know what the officers are walking into," Newsham said. "We are definitely going to take a look at that...That's something we'll definitely look at."

But what will the D.C. Police do about it?

*Undated photo of Abdullahi was provided by his family.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/02/05/two-shootings-two-deaths-two-cops-two-mentally-ill-residents/feed/ 1 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/27/another-police-shooting-of-a-mentally-ill-man/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/27/another-police-shooting-of-a-mentally-ill-man/#comments Tue, 27 Jan 2009 23:47:38 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=14984 This time at 16th and Kalorama. Here's the D.C. Police Department press release:

"At approximately 11:50 a.m., on Tuesday, January 27, 2009, an off-duty Metropolitan Police Department detective reportedly exited his vehicle in the area of the 1600 block of Kalorama Road, NW and was attacked by an apparently deranged man unknown to him. The detective apparently was almost beaten to the point of unconsciousness. At that point, in fear of his life, the detective was forced to draw and discharge his service handgun, striking the suspect once in the abdomen.

The detective has been with the Metropolitan Police Department for 20 years and is currently assigned to the Narcotics and Special Investigations Division. He was treated for non-life-threatening injuries at a local hospital and released. The detective, whose name is being withheld at this time, has been placed on administrative leave with pay pending the outcome of the investigation.

The identity of the suspect, who appears to be emotionally disturbed, has not yet been determined. He was transported to an area hospital in police custody on a charge of Aggravated Assault and admitted in stable condition."

This follows the shooting death of David Kerstetter in early November and yesterday morning's shooting death of Osman Abdullahi.

Update 1:36 p.m. I just talked to a police official who knows the detective involved in yesterday's shooting.

"Nothing bad to say about the guy," the official says. "Never in any trouble and does his work and does good work. All he felt was a knock in the head. He had to defend himself. He was very upset about it. He felt very concerned about the person he shot and concerned about his own safety. He had a hell of knot on his head."

“Luckily it worked out where nobody died. He could have been seriously hurt with that blow to the head," the official says.

For another version from an anonymous partial witness, read below in the comments section.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/27/another-police-shooting-of-a-mentally-ill-man/feed/ 16 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/26/more-details-on-the-police-shooting-7th-street-ne/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/26/more-details-on-the-police-shooting-7th-street-ne/#comments Tue, 27 Jan 2009 01:35:54 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=14916 Earlier today, we wrote about the police shooting that took place this morning at 830 7th Street NE. According to news accounts and police statements, D.C. cops were called to the address for a domestic dispute or assault. When they arrived they found a stabbing victim and the alleged perp. The suspect allegedly charged at the police with a pole. The police opened fire on the man and killed him. “He was dead on arrival. It was a fatal shooting," says Traci Hughes, the D.C. police spokesperson.

The incident happened shortly before 11 a.m. While there was some back and forth over whether the home was a group home, it is a rooming house that does include people who are mentally ill. One former resident I interviewed said that he had been referred to the house by a psych facility. "This is supposed to be a community residential facility," said the former resident of his one-time 7th Street home.

Tonight, the home was empty except for two residents. The former resident was on the scene as well. He talked about the man who had been shot and killed by police. He knew him as "Osmond." Police released his name a few hours ago. His name is Osman A. Abdullahi. He was 36. The former resident said that Osman could be delusional, that he talked often about people out to get him. Some of Osman's enemies were from Alaska. "I would say he was schizophrenic," said the resident. "He talked about people coming to get him."

A month ago, he says, he saw Osman laying on his bed. "He had a butcher knife under [the] covers," he recalled. "He was worried about his roommates. He said the roommates were talking in their sleep about him."

This morning, Osman, attacked one of his roommates, a senior citizen, someone the two current residents referred to only as "Lewis." Grant Osborne, 57, a resident at the 7th Street home, says he woke up this morning to Osman standing in the doorway with a knife. He was fuming about his same old problem: People were out to get him. They were coming for him. Osborne didn't understand. The shades were drawn.

Osborne remembers the police breaking down the door. He heard the police ask Osman multiple times to drop his weapon. He says he heard one shot.

Osborne is speaking from his stoop. He is dressed in sweat pants, a sweat shirt and jacket. He is wearing a knitcap. It is 6:15 p.m. Soon two members of the Department of Mental Health's mobile crisis unit show up at the stoop. They offer to talk to Osborne and another resident. They want to talk inside where it is supposedly warm.

When they open the door to 730 8th Street, it is immediately apparent that inside will not work. There is blood in the foyer. It has pooled and congealed in spots. In one area, there is a small squiggle of bloody flesh.

Blood splatter or blood smears are on the lower right corner of the wall. Mobile Crisis calls it in. They want to see about getting this cleaned up. "There's still blood on the floor," one tells the authorities. "Nobody's here except for the people that live here."

"There is blood in the hallway," she tells the police during a second call. "This is a biohazard." It is 6:45 p.m. Police say they are done with the crime scene. It isn't their job to clean up the blood. A police cruiser soon passes by. And then another.

The carpet is drenched with blood and fluids. It's not quite a carpet. It looks like the foam layer that comes with the carpet. The foam is duct taped to the floor and stairs. In the kitchen, the sink is stopped up. The garbage disposal switch does nothing. Also, Osborne says one of the bathrooms is "messed up."

The former resident says he had to move because his bedroom had a mold problem. The former resident eventually leaves. He says he is headed for a niece's house in Maryland. He carries with him a loaded down garbage bag. If anyone needs him, he says, he will be at a local psych facility in the morning.

It is freezing inside 830 7th Street. Osborne says sometimes the heat comes on. Sometimes it's just cold. Upstairs there is a blood stain in the hall.

There is no one there to supervise the men. There is no one there to make sure the heat works, to clean up all the blood on the floor. Mobile Crisis makes a call to the proprietor--Mark Spence of an organization called "Hope Finders." Mobile Crisis has to leave a message.The men say they haven't seen him in a while.

I later reach Spence. He says that he has yet to visit his property since the shooting death of Osmond. "I wasn't down there," he says. "I know all about it. I really don't have any comment."

Osborne says he has been living at 830 7th Street for no more than a year. When he first arrived, he says, "everything was brand new." He doesn't know how many group homes or rooming houses he's lived in. There was one in Baltimore. There was a stay at the Psychiatric Institute of Washington. Now, there is uncertainty.

The two employees from Mobile Crisis do not think it is a good idea for Osborne to stay at 830 7th Street. They bring up the blood.

Osborne is prepared to leave, he says. He agrees to get in their van and find other shelter options. He tells one of the employees that he left all of his clothes and belongings in his first-floor room. But that he doesn't care. The employee assures him that he can get more clothes. All he carries with him to the van is a small, half-filled plastic bag. His nose is running. His sweat pants have seen better days. But his tan work boots look new. Osborne takes a seat in the far back corner of the van.

Osborne just stares out the window and takes in the car's heat.

There is one resident left at 830 7th Street NE. He tells mobile crisis that he doesn't want to go with them in their van. There is not much else mobile crisis can do. The resident quietly closes the door, walks back across the blood, and on inside.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/26/more-details-on-the-police-shooting-7th-street-ne/feed/ 7 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/26/police-involved-shooting-7th-street-ne/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/26/police-involved-shooting-7th-street-ne/#comments Mon, 26 Jan 2009 19:16:35 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=14874 This morning D.C. Police were involved in a shooting at a group home on 7th Street NE (Post has it at 7th Street NW and they are wrong). According to WJLA, police say they responded to a call for a domestic incident at the group home. When they arrived, police were allegedly attacked by a man with both a knife and a pole. Officers responded by firing on the man. The man is in critical condition at this time. Police found a stabbing victim inside the group home. There is no word on the condition of either the alleged attacker or the stabbing victim.

Department of Mental Health spokesperson Phyllis Jones says that the address is not a group home operated by DMH or is a facility that has a contract with DMH.

There was a violent incident at a group home roughly a month ago.  On December 14, Donna Gardner robbed and killed Helen May at a Community Connections group home at 5422 Blair Road NE. Gardner, according to court documents, suffocated May with a blanket.

This also may be the second incident involving the police shooting a citizen in crisis. In early November, David Kerstetter was shot and killed by a D.C. police officer.

Just as the Kerstetter incident raised questions about the city's inability to deal with residents in crisis, the May murder brought up issues about how a group home monitors its own.

Update 3:28 p.m. I just got off the phone with Traci Hughes, the D.C. Police Department spokesperson. She says the man who was shot by police has died from his injuries.

"He was dead on arrival. It was a fatal shooting." She goes on to give a better account of what happened. When the police arrived at the 7th Street NE address (it was NE), they immediately came upon a victim with a stab wound to the neck. They then found the person's alleged attacker. He chased police with a pole, Hughes says. A scuffle ensued. "It all happened really quick," Hughes says. Hughes did not yet have the name of the dead man.

Update 4:42 p.m.: Department of Mental Health spokesperson Phyllis Jones: "We are investigating now whether or not people in the house were receiving mental health services." She does not yet know if DMH's mobile crisis response team was called this morning to respond to the incident. Calls to the mobile crisis response team have not be returned. Hughes says she is not sure if DMH responded to the incident or were called.

Here are the details from that group home murder.

On December 14, Gardner, according to court records, had told police that she had been smoking crack with a male friend. She then returned to the group home and went into May's bathroom in an attempt to steal money from May's purse. May caught her in the act. Court records go on to state that when May opened her purse, Gardner grabbed $100 from the purse and bolted. At 4:30 a.m., Gardner returned to May's room in an attempt to steal more money. Gardner and May then got into a fight. May began to scream and "make noises."

"The defendant said she then grabbed the decedent's nose with her right hand and put her other hand over the decedent's mouth. The defendant said the decedent slid off the bed onto the floor and that she got on top of the decedent. The defendant said while on the floor, she punched the decedent several times in the face with a closed fist and continued to grab the decedent's nose and stuff covers into the decedent's mouth until the decedent stopped moving. After the decedent stopped moving, the defendant opened the purse and took $88 in coins from the purse.

The defendant then took the coins to a nearby Giant Foodstore and utilized the Coinstar machine to convert the coins into paper money. Upon leaving the Giant, the defendant then used the money to buy more cocaine"

Questions still outstanding: What was the group home's staff doing at the time of the May murder? Did anyone respond to May's screams? How is a resident allowed to enter another resident's room multiple times? Did the staff greet Gardner at the entrance? Did they know she was high? (Community Connections refused to comment to City Desk). With the 7th Street incident today, was DMH's mobile crisis response unit called?

Hat tip to DCist.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/26/police-involved-shooting-7th-street-ne/feed/ 0 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/05/nyc-police-change-how-they-confront-mentally-ill-residents/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/05/nyc-police-change-how-they-confront-mentally-ill-residents/#comments Mon, 05 Jan 2009 20:48:16 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=12978 The New York Police Department recently announced a significant change in how its rank and file deal with mentally-ill citizens. The NYPD has started an alert system focused on people who are mentally ill. According to a Newsday story:

"The New York Police Department has a new alert system that lets officers know if they are responding to locations where police have previously been sent to deal with the mentally ill, an initiative sparked by the fatal 2007 shooting of a man who confronted officers with a broken wine bottle."

The 2007 incident should appear familiar to District residents. The police recently shot and killed a resident in crisis who allegedly was holding a knife. David Kerstetter was shot and killed on Nov. 6. The events that led up to his death remain under investigation. The D.C. Police Department has steadfastly insisted that it doesn't need to change how it deals with mentally-ill residents.

The NYPD thought differently.

Newsday goes on to report:

"Two deadly confrontations in November 2007, including one involving the man with the bottle, plus a recent case in which a naked man fell to his death after he was jolted with a Taser, illustrate the challenges police face in such circumstances.

The NYPD is also working with mental health officials to identify locations, such as group homes, that house the mentally ill, according to Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne, the NYPD's top spokesman.

'You don't want to leave it to an officer -- hopefully the police officer on duty is one who happens to remember who lives there,' Browne says. 'It's better if we know in advance about these locations.'"

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/01/05/nyc-police-change-how-they-confront-mentally-ill-residents/feed/ 1 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2008/12/09/debate-should-the-police-have-entered-david-kerstetters-home/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2008/12/09/debate-should-the-police-have-entered-david-kerstetters-home/#comments Tue, 09 Dec 2008 19:56:48 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=11846

If you examine the police-involved shooting death of David Kerstetter, you have to look closely at one key question: Were the two cops justified in entering Kerstetter's Logan Circle condo.

With that in mind, I asked a number of experts for their opinions. Before I get to their answers, first some background.

On the morning of November 6, the police got a call for an open door at Kerstetter's address. Kerstetter's door appeared to be bashed in. It had also been left ajar.

One of the cops--Master Patrol Officer Frederick Friday--knew some of Kerstetter's mental-health history. He and his partner had also been filled in by an employee of the condo complex and a concerned neighbor. But when the employee called up to Kerstetter that morning to see if he could come inside, Kerstetter refused.

After more back and forth, Kerstetter again rejected the employee's plea. He argued that he was the police. Maybe Kerstetter knew the police were standing outside his home. We will never know.

I still wonder if the police had a right to even enter his home.

With that question in mind, I sent the story around to various legal experts and went through it with a police veteran.

Jensen E. Barber II, a noted and experienced defense attorney, responded via e-mail:

"I think the police did have a right to enter. But they should have called hostage/negotiation or rescue or some other entity before the use of deadly force. The police had prior experience w this fellow, however, there was no way they could tell if he was being held hostage, or that he was considering taking his life or if someone was there w him etc. I am sorry this unfolded this way, a seasoned hostage or psych nurse could have made all the difference."

Doug Wood, an experienced defense attorney, replied via e-mail:

"I cannot think of a good reason why the police had to enter the home. The maintenance man calls them for an open door but when the police and the maintenace man are at the door David Kerstetter simply says he is not coming out. Since there was no report of a serious crime prior to the arrival and upon arrival the police had no information that anyone other than the resident is inside what is the urgency requiring entry?

I can understand that with Kerstetter's history the police could be concerned for him but there was no exigency that required an immediate entry. Maybe the police were in a rush to conclude the call and quickly say they checked everything out.

I also don't understand that if the police make entry into the apartment and he has a knife in his hand, why they cannot simply back off and leave and call for some type of mental health person to negotiate with him. If the police precipitously put themselves in a dangerous situation and their presence aggravates the situation, then it is a stretch to say it is self-defense. But I understand that the claim of self-defense is the typical party line."

Sgt. John Brennan, is a veteran narcotics cop. Washington City Paper has quoted him often in the past on everything from Khat to Rayful Edmond III to catching coke smugglers at Union Station. I went over the Kerstetter case with him on the phone. Here is what he had to say:

“He has a history of mental illness. If they would have left the scene and this guy was hanging himself….they would have been at fault. If I was the official on the scene, I would have gone in. Especially if you know there’s a background of mental illness and suicide….You may need to commit him. When they went in, what was he doing?...

By an officer going in, he did it in good faith. All he’s doing is doing his job. The officers did the right thing, they went in and checked on him....

He could have been held hostage. There could have been several reasons. Of all the reasons, they’re checking on his safety. That would have been my concern above anything. You have to check on that man’s safety.”

Fritz Mulhauser, Staff Attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union of the National Capital Area, replied via e-mail:

"The appropriateness of a warrantless entry will be highly fact-specific. When MPD explains the detailed facts officers knew, the family and the community will be better able to evaluate the lawfulness of the officers' actions. Until then, one can only speculate."

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2008/12/09/debate-should-the-police-have-entered-david-kerstetters-home/feed/ 2 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2008/12/04/dc-police-sign-mou-with-department-of-mental-health/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2008/12/04/dc-police-sign-mou-with-department-of-mental-health/#comments Thu, 04 Dec 2008 17:58:08 +0000 Jason Cherkis http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=11566

On November 6, two D.C. Police Department officers shot and killed David Kerstetter. The two cops knew that he was mentally-ill, that he was probably in crisis. The police department says that Kerstetter had a knife, that there was a struggle, that the officers had to shoot. We recently published a full story on the incident.

In October, the Department of Mental Health started up its Mobile Crisis Services. This office's main function is to take calls from police, concerned families, and mental-health providers and attend to residents in crisis---to attend to people very much like David Kerstetter.

On Nov. 1, the mobile crisis response teams were fully staffed and operational. Five days later, Kerstetter was shot and killed by police.

Officer Frederick Friday, who shot Kerstetter, told Washington City Paper he tried to call the 38-year-old's psychiatrist and others before entering Kerstetter's apartment. He failed to reach anyone. According to DMH officials, Friday did not call Mobile Crisis.

Police brass were well aware of this new mobile-crisis unit. It had been planned for more than a year; one official even takes credit for its creation. But at the time of Kerstetter's death, a Memorandum of Understanding had yet to be signed between DMH and the D.C. Police Department.

DMH sent the memorandum to police the day after Kerstetter's death. Two weeks later, on November 21, it was signed by all parties. The memo outlines clear protocols on what the police should do when facing a resident in crisis:

"The purpose of this Memorandum of Understanding shall be to ensure the coordination between DMH and MPD in responding to individuals in need of mobile crisis services. The overall objective of the mobile crisis service is to ensure quick access to services and prevent serious injuries that can occur during a mental health emergency..."

The memo goes on to state: "When an MPD officer determines that upon encountering an individual with an apparent mental health crisis and a mental health intervention is the most appropriate response, MPD shall contact MCS or chAMPS for assistance. If available, MCS or ChAMPS (depending on the age of the individual) should respond and assist the on-scene MPD unit to determine the best mental health option for the individual."

You can read the memo below or download it.

*passport photo of David Kerstetter provided by the Kerstetter family.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2008/12/04/dc-police-sign-mou-with-department-of-mental-health/feed/ 0