Jurors Award $4.65 Million in Taser-Torture Death of Marvin Booker

A federal jury found five Denver sheriff's deputies used excessive force against a homeless street preacher who died in the city's downtown jail and awarded his family a record $4.65 million in damages, a verdict an attorney said should send a message to law enforcement everywhere. [SOURCE]



Marvin Booker died in 2010 after deputies shocked him with a Taser while he was handcuffed, put him in a sleeper hold and lay on top of him, apparently in an effort to control him. The raw video of his killing is available online.

Inmates told investigators that the struggle began when he was ordered to sit down in the jail's booking area but instead moved to collect his shoes, which he had taken off for comfort. His family's attorneys said that was a zealous overreaction to the 56-year-old, who was frail and suffered a heart condition. The city had argued the deputies' actions were in line with the department's policies for subduing a combative inmate.

"He didn't deserve what these five sheriffs did to him that night," his brother, Spencer Booker, said, fighting tears after the verdict. "The jury spoke very, very, very clearly that they used excessive force against my brother. Your actions call for consequences."

Booker's family filed the federal lawsuit against the city and county of Denver as well as deputies Faun Gomez, James Grimes, Kyle Sharp and Kenneth Robinette and Sgt. Carrie Rodriguez. In a rare move on the eve of the trial, the city accepted liability for the actions of the deputies, meaning it is responsible for damages.

City Attorney Scott Martinez said the city was disappointed, but thanked the jurors for their work.

"The city remains committed to its ongoing efforts to improve the Denver Sheriff's Department," Martinez said in a statement.

I suspect that it will take more of these civil lawsuits before police departments around the nation change their taser-happy behavior. At least, we can be sure that police officers in the city of Denver will think twice before they engage in these taser-torture actions again! In fact, it seems that the police officers involved in the death of Mr. Booker should be prosecuted and fired from their jobs. They are definitely *not* public servants!

Coroner Rules 'Homicide' in the Taser-Killing of Alonzo Ashley

This blog told you about the taser killing of 29-year old Alonzo Ashley that took place at the Denver Zoo earlier this year. Denver's coroner recently ruled that the death at the hands of the police was a homicide. [SOURCE]

Officers said Ashley bit them before they electrocuted him with 50,000 volts of electricity from a taser gun. Police shot the taser gun FIVE times even though they had Ashley face-down on the ground, with shoulders pressed down, hands cuffed behind his back and legs crossed, flexed and pressed toward his buttocks, the autopsy by Dr. John Carver says.


Ashley began convulsing and he was dead before paramedics arrived.

Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey, however, said Ashley's death met no legal criteria for prosecution under Colorado homicide statutes.

"This clearly is not a homicide under Colorado law," Morrissey said. "I have some real questions about using the term homicide."

Police Chief Gerry Whitman said all the officers who responded to the incident will remain on duty. Additional investigations by police and Manager of Safety's Office to determine whether policies were violated are pending.

Ashley's death sparked protests by the Greater Metro Denver Ministerial Alliance. Dr. Timothy Tyler, pastor of Denver's Shorter Community AME Church, said that the city promised changes after Marvin Booker's death at the city jail in July 2010 but that apparently nothing has changed.

He predicted the Police Department will investigate its own and determine that the officers followed the restraint policy.

"Perhaps the restraint policy needs to be changed," Tyler said.

I suspect that the next thing we hear from this case will be a lawsuit filed by Mr. Ashley's family.

Taser Death: Alonzo Ashley (Denver, CO)

It happened again. We learned that another person's death has been hastened along by the use of 50,000 volts of electricity from a police officer's taser gun. This time the victim was 29-year old Alonzo Ashley.

Denver police said that officers used a Taser on Ashley but that the device was ineffective and he continued to struggle with officers until he was finally held down.

Police were called to the zoo at 5:02 p.m. Monday after the man threatened his girlfriend and attacked a zoo security guard. After arriving, officers contacted Ashley, who was acting irrationally, and he repeatedly refused to comply with officers' commands, police said.

Ashley's girlfriend, who asked not to be named, denied that Ashley threatened her. The girlfriend says that he was getting delirious because of the extreme heat. She told TV reporters that Ashley had been putting his head in a fountain, and zoo security told him to stop.

When police attempted to restrain Ashley, he attacked the officers and zoo security guards — hitting one officer and biting another officer and a security guard, police said. At this point officers used a taser gun on the young man.

Family members say that Ashley was "a positive kid."

Officers later called paramedics to examine the man, citing his "unusual behavior and extraordinary strength." While waiting for the paramedics, he started to convulse and stopped breathing, police said. He was taken to Presbyterian/St. Luke's Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Police say that drugs and drug paraphernalia were found on the suspect. Ashley's girlfriend said he had no drugs on him.

Some community members, including civil rights activist Alvertis Simmons, the Rev. Patrick Demmer and Pastor Reginald Holmes, announced tonight they plan to hold a rally outside the Denver Zoo entrance beginning at 2 p.m. Friday.

Simmons said in an e-mail, "The killing of this Black man is questionable at least and suspicious at best."

Taser Autopsy: Denver Coroner Rules 'Homicide' in Taser-Related Killing of Marvin Booker

The Denver Coroner has ruled that the July 9 death of an inmate at the new jail was the result of HOMICIDE.

Marvin Booker was being processed on a charge of possession of drug paraphernalia when he got into a scuffle with jail deputies. He was killed with a Taser gun shot at him by unidentified prison guards while being held to the floor.

Other inmates said Booker, 56, was then carried to the holding cell and dropped face first. He never recovered.

The coroner's finding means simply that another human being caused Booker's death instead of natural causes, suicide or an accident. It is not the coroner's role to determine who might have caused the death, or whether the homicide was justifiable.

The coroner ruled Booker's death was caused by "cardiorespiratory arrest during physical restraint." The coroner said deputies had their body weight on Booker's back continuously for four minutes while he was face down and put him in a "sleeper hold" for more than two minutes while shocking him with a Taser for 8 seconds.

An investigation is ongoing into the actions of the jail deputies who scuffled with Booker. Five deputies were placed on paid administrative leave.

Inmates who witnessed the event said Booker was trying to retrieve his shoes a short distance away when a jail deputy ordered him to immediately go to the holding cell. When he refused and tried to explain, he pushed the deputy and then was held down as several others dove on top of him, according to the witnesses.

A video captured the struggle, but has not been released while the investigation is underway. The coroner's report describes what is on the video, which confirms the inmates' accounts of the homicide.

"When he turned to return to the holding area for his shoes, the booking officer called him towards and isolation cell, and when he failed to come to her, she went to the holding area and placed her arms on his. He swung his arms to shake her off," the coroner's report says.

"The booking deputy was joined by three other officers who forced the decedent first to a chair, and then face down on the floor. Two officers struggled to cuff his hands behind his back; another tried to control his legs; a fourth lay across his upper back and applied a carotid "sleeper" hold around his neck.

"The decedent continued to resist, and the officer applying the neck hold requested a Taser. A fifth officer applied the Taser to his leg and discharged it for 8 seconds. The decedent ceased resisting shortly after the use of the Taser."

The sleeper hold was applied to him for two minutes and 30 seconds, but deputies said it was released intermittently to check whether Booker was still resisting.

After Booker was placed face down in the holding cell, a deputy remained on his back for another 90 seconds to two minutes.

A short time later, another deputy saw he was not breathing and began CPR.

Folks in Denver know that this man was done wrong. The powers-that-be know it as well. They are holding onto their videotape evidence of the electrocution in much the same way that Los Angeles Police Department never wanted the public to see the Rodney King video.

I sense that one or more of the five jailhouse deputies who killed Marvin Booker will be charged with a crime. What say u?

Denver Citizens Demand Justice for Taser-Killing of Marvin Booker

I encourage Denver-based villagers to head over to the New Denver Jail to join the West Denver Copwatch, Aurora Copwatch and other concerned community member on Thursday July, 22nd at 6:00pm, for a rally and vigil to demand justice for the brutal pre-judicial electrocution of Marvin Booker.

The rally organizers are demanding:

1. Justice for the brutal murder of Marvin Booker
2. Transparency regarding the brutal murder of Marvin Booker
3. Release of any and all relevant information regarding the brutal murder of Marvin Booker
4. Release of any video surveillance regarding the brutal murder of Marvin Booker
5. Punishment for the brutal murderers of Marvin Booker to the fullest extent of the law

If you have questions or wish to discuss further you should contact the West Denver Copwatch folks by email (westdenvercopwatch@riseup.net) or phone (720.878-3658).

Witnesses Describe Brutal Taser-Murder by Denver Police of Marvin Booker

This blog has been tracking taser-related deaths for quite awhile. In most cases we only hear one side of the story because the other side of the story has been electrocuted to death.

I bet that the Denver police officers who pumped multiple taser jolts into the helpless body of Marvin Booker wish that they could tell the only side of the story.

Thanks to the Kirk Mitchell and the Denver Post we get to hear the other side of the story.

Witnesses at the Denver jail tell the story of how deputies were processing Booker on a charge of possession of drug paraphernalia. At some point during the processing the deputies felt that Booker was disobedient, he was held down, hit with electric taser gun shocks and then placed facedown in a holding cell, according to two inmates who watched it unfold.

Booker never got up. He was pronounced dead later that morning.

"I've never seen anything happen like that before in my life," said John Yedo, 54, who was being processed on a charge of destruction of property and said he witnessed the scene. "What I saw is not what you'd expect to see in America."

The two jail witnesses, who were both arrested in the early-morning hours of July 9 around the time Booker was being processed, were contacted and interviewed by The Denver Post separately. Both of them said they had not been questioned by police investigating the death of Booker, a homeless ordained minister who served the poor, but also a habitual criminal with a long string of arrests.

Yedo has had one prior arrest, in 1974 on a drug charge. Christopher Maten, 25, the other witness, was arrested in 2005 for public consumption of alcohol. Neither is a career criminal. The versions the two suspects tell are nearly identical.

"I can't breathe..."

Both say that Booker, 56, was asleep in a chair in a holding area of the jail when his name was called and he was ordered to a processing desk.

Half-asleep about 3 a.m., Booker walked to the desk in his socks, forgetting to put on his shoes. The female deputy ordered Booker to sit in a chair in front of the desk.

Booker responded that he wished to stand. When the deputy threatened to have him placed in a holding cell if he didn't sit, Booker told her he would go to the holding cell, said Maten, who had been arrested that morning for resisting arrest in a confrontation with a parking-meter attendant.

" 'Let me get my shoes,' " Maten quoted Booker as saying as he walked toward the chairs to get his shoes.

The deputy yelled at him repeatedly to stop, got up and followed Booker. Booker turned and repeated that he was getting his shoes, Maten said.

The deputy grabbed Booker by the arm and put a lock on him, Yedo said. Booker, who was 5 feet 5 and weighed 175 pounds, pushed her away. At that point, four other deputies wrestled Booker to the concrete floor. They slid down two steps to the floor in the sitting area. Yedo said the deputies each grabbed a limb while he struggled.

" 'Get the Taser. Get the Taser,' " Yedo quoted one of the deputies as saying.

Yedo said he was only about 3 feet away, and Maten said he was close enough that if he stood and took one step, he could reach out and touch one of the deputies.

None of the deputies involved in the restraint has been identified. One female deputy was treated at a hospital for an injury she suffered in the confrontation, Gale said.

A fifth deputy put Booker in a headlock just as the female deputy began shocking him with a Taser with encouragement from one of the deputies, who kept repeating, "Probe his ---," Maten said. He could hear the Taser crackle repeatedly.

Booker said, "'I can't breath... ," Yedo heard. Then, Booker went limp.

Booker's wrists were handcuffed behind his back in an awkward position when the deputies picked him up, each holding an arm or a leg, and carried him stomach-down to a holding cell with an unbreakable glass door.

They set him down on his stomach, with much of his weight on one shoulder and his legs bent, Yedo said. They took the handcuffs off and without checking his pulse, the officers left him on the floor of the holding cell.

The deputies walked away high-fiving and laughing, Maten said. Several inmates were saying, " 'I can't believe they're doing this,' " Maten said.

Yedo said he stared at Booker, watching his chest, which wasn't moving. One deputy had stayed next to the cell and was also staring at Booker.

"I told the guy, 'Hey, that guy is not breathing,' " Yedo said.

The deputy turned and yelled at the sergeant.

" 'Sergeant, come here. Sergeant, hurry,' " Yedo said he yelled.

It should be interesting to see how this case turns out. Don't ya think?!