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Girls
Odessa Brown
escorts who appear in its prostitution ads,
even though it knows that pimps are usual-
ly the ones who create the ads, or force their
minor sex slaves to do so,’’ the complaint
said.
The lawsuit alleges
that photos of the
underage girls in
skimpy garb
appeared in
numerous ads on the
site, paid for by their
pimps
McDougall, the company’s attorney,
offered sympathy for the young women.
``The stories of the girls identified in the
complaint are tragedies. However, the com-
mercial sex exploitation of children is an
extremely complex problem on the streets
and online, and it must be fought intelli-
gently,’’ McDougall wrote in an email to the
newspaper.
``Backpage.com is at the forefront of
fighting it intelligently online with a triple-
tier prevention system and an unparalleled
law enforcement support system.’’
Also on Friday, Backpage attorneys won a
procedural victory in federal court. U.S.
District Court Judge Ricardo Martinez
granted an injunction that halts a new state
law that would require classified advertis-
ing companies to verify the ages of people
in sex-related advertisements.
Gov. Chris Gregoire signed the law this
year to cut down on child sex trafficking. It
had been scheduled to take effect in June.
The decision issued by U.S. District Court
Judge Ricardo S. Martinez on Friday is tem-
porary, until the full case can be heard in
court.
Force
continued from page 1
ness during a Feb. 25 struggle outside a res-
idence on Madrona Place.
The defendant, Jason Mann, was charged
with two counts of assault of a police offi-
cer for allegedly resisting the officers dur-
ing the struggle. His attorney, Deborah
Murphy, argued at trial that Mann acted in
self-defense in resisting the officers’ exces-
sive force.
The jury could not decide whether Mann
assaulted the officers. The jury hung, with
10 jurors voting to convict Mann of assault-
ing the officers and two voting to acquit
him.
Jurors were not asked to consider whether
the officers overstepped the ``reasonable
force’’ standard in their interactions with
Mann, but the case put the officers’ progres-
sive application of force during the struggle
with Mann under a microscope.
The Olympia Police Department has said
its officers followed the department’s poli-
cies and procedures. Those policies follow
the same ``reasonableness’’ standard used
by the courts, Police Chief Ronnie Roberts
told The Olympian.
Spurling, 46, who has a fourth-degree
black belt in karate, sat down with The
Olympian in a recent interview to explain
the process by which officers decide how to
legally use force, and how he teaches cadets
to make the right decisions.
Officers deciding to use force must weigh
what’s reasonable while making ``split-sec-
ond decisions in fast, tense, rapidly evolv-
ing situations,’’ Spurling said, quoting a
1989 U.S. Supreme Court opinion, Graham
v. Connor.
When an officer pulls a car over for
speeding, for instance, he or she doesn’t
know whether the driver is an armed, flee-
ing felon or a scared, otherwise law-abiding
citizen who simply has a lead foot or is late
for work, Spurling said.
An error in judgment can be fatal. The
number of law enforcement officers dying
in the line of duty in the United States
increased by 14 percent between 2011 and
2012, according to the National Law
Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund.
Recent instances of officers killed in the
line of duty, including four Lakewood offi-
cers shot to death in 2009, should be at the
forefront of any officer’s mind, said Spurl-
ing, who can reel off a list of officers killed
by suspects who took the officer’s firearm -
King County sheriff’s deputy Richard Her-
zog, killed in 2002; Chelan County sheriff’s
deputy Saul Gallegos, killed in 2003; and
Federal Way police officer Patrick Maher,
also killed in 2003.
An officer’s use of force should always be
proportionate to the threat facing the public
safety or the officer, and law enforcement
agencies need clear policies on when and
how force is to be used, said Doug Honig,
director of the American Civil Liberties
Union of Washington.
``They need to train officers well in those
policies, with leadership making crystal
clear that excessive use of force will not be
tolerated,’’ he said. ``And officers need
training on how to de-escalate confronta-
tions, so that force isn’t used in situations
where it can reasonably be avoided.
``If a police department does not respond
effectively to an incident of excessive use of
force, this undermines community trust and
PHOTO BY SUSAN FRIED
continued from page 1
Safeway grocery stores in Washington raised over $42,000 for the Odessa
Brown Children’s Clinic, which houses a comprehensive Sickle Cell Program
that provides care for children and families affected by the disease
with high quality, accessible, and culturally appropriate care. Families
obtain services in a trusted environment with a full scope of services
including medical care, social services, mental health care, nutrition, WIC,
neuropsychology, and genetic counseling. The Safeway check will benefit
families throughout the Central District.
life-threatening.
Remaining standing or sitting in a loca-
tion when an officer asks a person to leave
is an example of noncompliance, Spurling
said.
Arguing a traffic ticket is an example of
verbal resistance, he added.
Active resistance is any use of strength to
resist an officer’s commands. That includes
walking away when an officer is lawfully
commanding the person to stay where he or
she is, Spurling said.
Assaultive resistance can be verbal or
physical.
Under the right circumstances, a verbal
assault can be of greater concern to an offi-
cer than a physical assault, Spurling said.
For example, a muscular, angry person with
felony warrants who tells an officer he is
going to kill him might be more of a threat
than a drunken 17-year-old who takes a
Last month, a jury heard a case in which two
Olympia police officers punched, tased and
used a technique similar to a chokehold on a
27-year-old man who lost consciousness during
a Feb. 25 struggle outside a residence on
Madrona Place
makes it harder for the department to do its
essential job of protecting public safety.’’
Ultimately, an officer must interpret situa-
tions and decide how much force to use on
a case-by-case basis. And, Spurling notes,
those circumstances are like snowflakes:
No two are alike.
Technically, Spurling said, ``use of force’’
starts with the simplest of actions - an offi-
cer turning on a patrol car’s lights and siren
to pull over a vehicle. ``Use of force is
woven into everything that we do,’’ he said.
During 110 hours of classroom and
hands-on training, cadets are shown the dif-
ference between lawful and excessive force,
including during life-threatening situations.
They’re also taught to meet resistance with
a higher level of force in order to gain con-
trol and prevent injury to the officer or the
other person, Spurling said.
Officers are told to look first at the level
of resistance the person is offering: none,
noncompliance, verbal, active, assaultive or
swing at an officer, he said.
Officers are trained to read a person’s
body language to determine whether a phys-
ical assault might be imminent, he said. If
they believe that’s the case, they are
allowed to meet it, Spurling said.
``The courts say I don’t have to wait to be
assaulted before I respond,’’ he said.
The bottom line for an officer using force
is that the other person is brought under
control, Spurling said.
``Officers cannot make the perfect deci-
sion under stress every time,’’ he said. ``An
officer doesn’t have to pick the least intru-
sive or the least injury-producing use of
force. It just has to be a reasonable
response.’’
Many factors play into an officer’s deci-
sion on how much force to use. One is
whether the person is under the influence of
narcotics.
The phenomenon of ``excited delirium’’ -
when an intoxicated person shows strength
and endurance far beyond what might be
expected based on the person’s size and
weight - can be fatal to an officer, Spurling
said. During such a state, the person might
show little or no effect after being punched,
pepper-sprayed or shot with a Taser, he said.
If the person shows such signs of ``inhu-
man strength,’’ he said, the officer should
immediately call for help from backup offi-
cers and try to overpower the person.
``A Taser has its limitations,’’ Spurling
said. ``There’s nothing we have that’s guar-
anteed.’’
Cadets also learn the importance of main-
taining control of their gun belts, Spurling
said. In a struggle in close quarters, the
other person might try to wrestle away an
officer’s pepper spray, baton or firearm.
``Anytime there’s a fight and you’re with-
in arm’s reach of me, every one of my
weapons is available to you,’’ Spurling said.
In addition, the length of the struggle
increases the chance of making a mental
mistake, Spurling said.
Research shows 80 percent of people lose
the ability to process complex thoughts in
any life-threatening situation, he said.
That’s why schools and businesses conduct
fire drills, so people have practice and a
plan for how to act rationally during an
emergency, he added.
To teach cadets how to make decisions
when exhausted, ``we make them fight,’’
Spurling said, sometimes after completing
an obstacle course or as many pushups as
they can stand.
When an officer resorts to force, he or she
must be able to articulate why, Spurling
said. The Olympia Police Department’s use-
of-force policy states: ``When force is
applied, officers must be able to articulate
how that force was reasonable and how it
conformed to the law.’’
For many officers, Spurling said, articu-
lating why force was used is one of the most
difficult parts of the job.
During just one minute of a close-quarters
struggle, an officer might instinctively
respond to any number of punches, kicks,
lunges and grabs, he said. Afterward, it can
be difficult to write a report giving a coher-
ent narrative of what happened during the
heat of the moment, he said.
``Rebuilding five seconds of physical
activity is really hard to do,’’ Spurling said.
August 1, 2012 The Seattle Skanner Page 3