Over the weekend, Tyrone Smith, 32 was arrested after being suspected of shooting a Twin Rivers Unified School District Officer multiple times during an attempted traffic stop.
The officer was reportedly hit by several bullets after he attempted to pull over a white sport-utility vehicle on Saturday afternoon. The police did not offer a reason for the traffic stop, nor did they release the name of the officer.
Conflicting information is coming out on the death of Tyrone Smith.
According to reports in the Sacramento Bee on Sunday, citing Sgt. Andrew Petit of the Sacramento Police Department, “The suspect was apprehended about 11:10 p.m. without incident on Branch Street, a few blocks from the shooting site.”
“We got him in custody,” said Sgt. Andrew Pettit, Sacramento Police Department spokesman
Except we now know that is probably not true that they had him in custody.
According to the Bee, “Acting Sacramento Deputy Police Chief Dana Matthes said the suspect in the shooting had struggled with officers before being placed into custody at 11:10 p.m. in the 3500 block of Branch Street.”
Chief Matthes added that officers “acted appropriately and used minimal force” in the arrest.
However, the authorities waited more than 18 hours before confirming Mr. Smith’s death.
The chief told the Bee, “Officers noticed the suspect was unresponsive while taking him to police headquarters in south Sacramento,” they then pulled off Highway 99, and “after finding no pulse, officers administered CPR and requested medical aid from the Sacramento Fire Department.”
They transported him to UC Davis Medical Center, where Mr. Smith was pronounced dead.
The matter will be investigated by the police department and the Sacramento County District Attorney’s office.
Fox 40 quoted the Acting Chief Matthes: “As you know, we do have in-car camera videos. And the video does show the officer checking the suspect periodically, as he’s transporting him. And at one point he becomes concerned.”
Fox reports, however, “Police say Smith was never beaten that his arrest was without force and without incident, until just before Smith was put into the police cruiser. He is seen on camera stumbling and pitching forward to the ground. Officers then carried him the rest of the way to cruiser.”
According to their report, Mr. Smith was asthmatic.
“My cousin is short-breathed. He will talk to you and he will weeze, just in normal conversation,” a cousin said.
“We understand that the perception is that when you arrest somebody for shooting a police officer, and then that person dies in custody, it raises concerns. It raises concerns on our part too. We’ve launched an investigation,” Chief Matthes said.
There will undoubtedly be a lot of questions asked about this incident. One will be the initial stumble and pitching forward to the ground – should the police have better attempted to assess his medical history at that point?
Others have expressed concern that the police stopped and attempted to administer CPR before calling for emergency medical equipment.
Still others will look at the initial reports when the police claimed to have him in custody, when we now know they may not have gotten him into custody and by the time they issued that statement, the suspect was likely deceased.
None of this means any malfeasance occurred, but as the police chief said herself, there is a perception that when someone is arrested for shooting a police officer and that individual dies in custody, that it “raises concerns.”
Unfortunately, like many other incidents, there is no external investigation, as it is a matter that the DA and the police handle, and that always raises the issue of a conflict of interests.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Thats called KARMA !
All around, this thing is a tragedy. Hopefully the young cop makes a full recovery and can return to his job.
A question … Am I alone in not having ever before heard of the Twin Rivers District Police Department? I gather from watching the TV news that this is a special multi-county force designed to keep the peace at a number of violent, gang-infested schools. But I also understand that when the cops are driving from high school to high school they have the full authority of any police officer who is assigned to a city or a deputy sheriff assigned to an unincorporated area.
In a way, this kind of special force reminds me of BART cops. And, given the recent history of bad judgment or just bad actions on the part of BART cops, I wonder if the cops who work for the Twin Rivers PD are not of the highest caliber? That is the accusation which was made against BART in the wake of the accidental shooting of Oscar Grant–that cops who work for the BART PD are just not as good or as well trained as say the SFPD or the Berkeley PD.
Anyone know much more about the TRDPD?
I was kind of perplexed myself. Something I will look more into.
Tyrone’s picture in the Sacramento Bee today makes him look like a pretty big guy. I wonder if this is another case of sudden death from positional asphyxia. Obesity alone is a risk factor for positional asphyxia, and a struggle makes it more likely, too.
I was watching this play out on KCRA and their camera recorded the take down. No less than 6 officers tackled him onto the pavement and then laid on him until he was restrained. It would not surprise me that this suffocated him right there.
The above discussion makes me wonder if there needs to be a change in police procedure in regard to “piling on”, much as the “chokehold technique” was banned by the LAPD after too many deaths as a result of its use…