Police shoot elderly man with dementia after report he was armed with a revolver

[AlwaysShocked]

As mentioned in the article, this was the second incident that day for this same man. Eight hours earlier he had been banging at the doors and windows of another neighbor's house. And he had his hand in his pockets that time too. And that neighbor thought he might have had a gun.

It is a shame the man was shot but I would think there is always going to be a risk of this type of a police response when a dementia patient is wandering a neighborhood at will. Family members may try to keep an eye on them but there is a reason that dementia units are locked units! Another thing - dementia patients are not always benign.

I think we don't know enough of the full story of what was going on with this man/in this neighborhood.

 

[DexterMorgan]

As mentioned in the article, this was the second incident that day for this same man. Eight hours earlier he had been banging at the doors and windows of another neighbor's house. And he had his hand in his pockets that time too. And that neighbor thought he might have had a gun.

It is a shame the man was shot but I would think there is always going to be a risk of this type of a police response when a dementia patient is wandering a neighborhood at will. Family members may try to keep an eye on them but there is a reason that dementia units are locked units! Another thing - dementia patients are not always benign.

I think we don't know enough of the full story of what was going on with this man/in this neighborhood.

The question is.

What did this 74 year old do to LE before being killed. Jmo

Because hands in pocket at 70 years old on a cold season is not okay to be killed. Jmo

 

[HoneyWest]

I am so tired of hearing explanations of why it is OK for cops to kill unarmed people.

Police officers are trained to handle these types of situations without killing someone. Yes, sometimes they fear for their own lives and that is part of their job, they have been trained to ascertain when deadly force is warranted. Think about the average person who thinks they are doing nothing wrong and suddenly has a gun in their face and several cops screaming at them. Are you going to remain calm and have no reaction except to do exactly what is being screamed at you? I wouldn't, I would probably scream WHAT?! OMG DON"T KILL ME!

We are not trained to deal with a cop using deadly force on us. On the other hand, the police are trained to know when and how to use it. The onus is on them when they kill an innocent or unarmed person.

(In this case in particular, I don't blame the woman. I want to know exactly what this elderly man did to make the officer think the right thing to do was blow him away.)

 

[AlwaysShocked]

This is what happened according to the article in the OP:

"About 12:30 a.m., a woman arrived at her home in the 7900 block of Silver Birch Avenue, the same block as Serna’s home, and began removing items from a vehicle, Martin said. When Serna approached her, he was acting bizarrely and had one hand in his pocket, according to Martin. Police said she saw a black- or brown-handled object that she believed was a firearm.
The woman ran inside her home and told her husband to call police. The husband told a 911 dispatcher that a man outside had a revolver and had brandished the weapon.
Two police officers responded just after 12:40 a.m. As officers and the couple stood outside, the woman spotted Serna exiting his home across the street.
Martin said she pointed toward Serna, saying, “That’s him.”
The couple rushed inside their home and closed their doors.*The officers took cover.
Serna kept both hands in his jacket and continued walking toward police, who ordered him to stop and show his hands. Serna ignored the officers’ commands, police said.
When Serna was about 20 feet away, after ignoring commands to stop, Officer Reagan Selman fired seven rounds at Serna, Martin said.
Serna was struck and fell in the driveway. He was pronounced dead, just across the street from his home."


The police who responded had been told the man was brandishing a gun. Whether someone deliberately or not deliberately reported that the man brandished a gun, that is what police were told. So of course they responded in kind. It was an unfortunate event. But it is easy to see how it happened.

There are some dementia patients who develop "Sundowner's Syndrome". They become agitated and will wander at night. It can be dangerous for the dementia patient. As we have seen here. Again, there is a reason dementia patients are housed in locked facilities.

 

[Tawny]

Disobeying commands is not a capital punishment and again there were six officers on scene. Was he walking toward them or being aggressive toward them? There is quite a difference between the two. Stop justifying public executions, especially of people in mental distress. This isn't the wild west.

 

[yllek]

Disobeying commands is not a capital punishment and again there were six officers on scene. Was he walking toward them or being aggressive toward them? There is quite a difference between the two. Stop justifying public executions, especially of people in mental distress. This isn't the wild west.

I agree.

-- Serna was walking towards police who thought he probably had a firearm and he refused commands to show his hands.
--The woman who called 911 (and her partner) were safely indoors.
--There were six officers on the scene and none of them had seen a gun or been threatened in any way. There is nothing to indicate that there were bystanders in potential danger.
--There is nothing to indicate that Mr. Serna was running towards the officers, threatening anyone, or brandished a weapon.

^ That's my understanding. If that's correct, the shooting officer absolutely should not have fired on the spot, in my opinion. And, fired 7 times? -- no effin' way.

There were other tactics that should have been employed. For example, the officers could have dispersed and let him walk while keeping curious residents from coming near to check it out, issued commands over the vehicle speaker, etc... If Serna became aggressive or a threat to someone after that point and he had to be shot, I doubt it would have taken 7 bullets to neutralize the perceived threat.

Officers should be trained to stop shooting when the subject is hit unless the subject continues to move or pose a threat. IMO.


RIP Francisco Serna (pic source: http://heavy.com/news/2016/12/franc...t-police-bakersfield-california-photos-video/)

It makes me mad and sad. Just like when unarmed Alheimer's-afflicted Ronald Westbrook was shot dead by a home renter in Georgia who couldn't wait for LE to respond to his fiancee's 911 call a couple of years back. So.......the home renter went outside, confronted the silhouette in the dark, and fired. The shooter wasn't charged; "fear for his life" and all. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/no-charges-in-fatal-shooting-of-georgia-alzheimers-patient/

 

[yllek]

Did this guy look 74 years old?

Did the police see a gun while trying to talk to him?

Iam confused.

Was this 74 year old guy looking confused to the officers since he had dementia?

So my main question is. What made them shoot first.

I just read some of the early articles and watched some videos of the news coverage.

The couple who called 911 didn't know Serna as they were just visiting the neighborhood. They described him as in his late 60s.

The female 911 caller's mother lives across the street from the Sernas. She told ABC that Serna was the nicest man in the world and always came outside when people were around (though not usually so late at night).

I hadn't realized until today that the 911 dispatcher actually told the responding officers the identity of Serna AND that he had dementia. Those officers (at least, the first responders) knew he was elderly and suffered from the disease before he was shot seven times walking out of his own house. Source (text and video): http://abcnews.go.com/US/authorities-probe-fatal-police-shooting-unarmed-73-year/story?id=44163795

No body cams or dash cams of the shooting, of course. I really hope body cams become mandatory across the country very soon, for many reasons, including that they motivate officers and the people with whom officers are engaging to better assess before they act (in my opinion). But, I've been hoping that for more than 3 years, so..........

 

[KaaBoom]

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/...a-bakersfield-killed-nine-20161213-story.html

About 12:30 a.m., a woman arrived at her home in the 7900 block of Silver Birch Avenue, the same block as Serna’s home, and began removing items from a vehicle, Martin said. When Serna approached her, he was acting bizarrely and had one hand in his pocket, according to Martin. Police said she saw a black- or brown-handled object that she believed was a firearm.
The woman ran inside her home and told her husband to call police. The husband told a 911 dispatcher that a man outside had a revolver and had brandished the weapon.

Fast forward to one year from now. The district attorney after a lengthy and pointless investigation will determine that the cops did absolutely nothing wrong, and no charges will be brought. A civil court jury will determine that the cops were guilty of wrongful death and award the man's family about a million dollars. Nothing ever changes. The cops will continue to get away with thousands of murders a year, taxpayers will continue to pay for it, and most Americans could care less.

 

[Tawny]

I just read some of the early articles and watched some videos of the news coverage.

The couple who called 911 didn't know Serna as they were just visiting the neighborhood. They described him as in his late 60s.

The female 911 caller's mother lives across the street from the Sernas. She told ABC that Serna was the nicest man in the world and always came outside when people were around (though not usually so late at night).

I hadn't realized until today that the 911 dispatcher actually told the responding officers the identity of Serna AND that he had dementia. Those officers (at least, the first responders) knew he was elderly and suffered from the disease before he was shot seven times walking out of his own house. Source (text and video): http://abcnews.go.com/US/authorities-probe-fatal-police-shooting-unarmed-73-year/story?id=44163795

No body cams or dash cams of the shooting, of course. I really hope body cams become mandatory across the country very soon, for many reasons, including that they motivate officers and the people with whom officers are engaging to better assess before they act (in my opinion). But, I've been hoping that for more than 3 years, so..........

Jesus

 

[yllek]

The 911 call.
[video=youtube;Ga7ZqaljX1c]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga7ZqaljX1c[/video]

 

[yllek]

The dispatcher identifies Mr. Serna and reports that he has Dementia.
[video=youtube;Pqm4jfU0STA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pqm4jfU0STA[/video]

 

[Tawny]

What a strange call.

He's "brandishing" the weapon and they claim to have actually SEEN it. Not okay

 

[yllek]

This is good news for the Serna family and the community, IMO.

Snip:
The new chief of the Bakersfield Police Department has asked the FBI to review the case of a 73-year-old man with early dementia who was shot and killed by an officer just steps from his home last week.

Chief Lyle Martin has requested an examination of “the facts and evidence” surrounding the death of Francisco Serna “to increase transparency and trust within our community.” The FBI investigation will be independent of probes now underway by the department and the Kern County district attorney’s office.

“Public confidence in the criminal justice system is critical,” the police department said in a statement issued Friday. “The Bakersfield Department is committed to seeking justice in all cases and this is accomplished by ensuring investigations are completed thoroughly and without bias.”

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/...-police-fbi-investigation-20161219-story.html

 

[bluesneakers]

Bakersfield officer cleared in shooting of unarmed man

Thursday, police said the board determined all shots fired by Officer Reagan Selman were within department policy and government guidelines.

This ruling still needs to be reviewed by the District Attorney's Office. Chief Martin also said the FBI is investigating and reviewing this case.

 

[everybodhi]

Kern county is known for the deadliest police force in America.
The Guardian did a five part series about them in December 2015.
They have a long history and it just keeps repeating.

"Seventy-five years after Kern County’s leaders banned The Grapes of Wrath from their schools and libraries, complaining that John Steinbeck’s new book portrayed their policemen as “divested of sympathy or human decency or understanding”, officer Aaron Stringer placed his hands on the body of James De La Rosa without permission.

De La Rosa had just been shot dead by police officers in Bakersfield, the biggest city in this central California county, after crashing his car when they tried to pull him over. He was unarmed. Now the 22-year-old oilfield worker lay on a gurney in the successor to the coroner’s office where Tom Joad’s granma awaited a pauper’s funeral in the 1939 novel.

Stringer, a senior Bakersfield officer whose plaudits for once saving a colleague in peril had been overshadowed by his arrest for a hit-and-run while driving under the influence of prescription drugs, reached under the bloodied white sheet and tickled De La Rosa’s toes. Then, a junior officer reported to commanders, he jerked the head to one side and joked about rigor mortis.

“I love playing with dead bodies,” said Stringer.

It was only the most remarkable act in recent times by a police officer in this rugged territory, where law enforcement officers have this year killed more people relative to the population than in any other American county recorded by The Counted, a Guardian investigation into the use of deadly force by police across the US in 2015."
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/dec/01/the-county-kern-county-deadliest-police-killings

 

[everybodhi]

In fairness, it's not just the police shooting people in Bakersfield, in two weeks in May 2016, there were 29 shootings with 14 fatalities.
There's a lot of shooting goes on out there.
https://www.google.com/amp/www.bake...23fc5db9-b7a9-55c0-b1f2-1145a4bf92b9.amp.html

 

[HoneyWest]

In fairness, it's not just the police shooting people in Bakersfield, in two weeks in May 2016, there were 29 shootings with 14 fatalities.
There's a lot of shooting goes on out there.
https://www.google.com/amp/www.bake...23fc5db9-b7a9-55c0-b1f2-1145a4bf92b9.amp.html

Sounds like Bakersfield is out of control, both the criminals and the police department. Their use of force review board, by clearing this officer of any wrongdoing is just another factor in the police being out of control.

 

[Jennifer17]

In fairness, it's not just the police shooting people in Bakersfield, in two weeks in May 2016, there were 29 shootings with 14 fatalities.
There's a lot of shooting goes on out there.
https://www.google.com/amp/www.bake...23fc5db9-b7a9-55c0-b1f2-1145a4bf92b9.amp.html

The police should be trying to control this, not adding to it. This could have been my grandfather who had dementia and would not even hear people talking to him. He was having a conversation with himself in his poor mixed up mind.