A police officer decided to stop two bicyclists who were leaving the city’s commercial district at 1:45 a.m. one night. One cyclist stopped as instructed, but the other continued. The officer followed and shouted commands from the patrol car for the cyclist to stop. The officer claimed he sped up to pass the cyclist, pulled to the curb, opened the patrol car door, and the then- riderless bicycle collided with the officer and into the opened patrol car door. The officer told the cyclist to sit on the curb, and once the cyclist complied, the officer turned on his body worn camera (BWC) and called for backup.
The cyclist was arrested for assaulting and resisting a police officer and possession of drug paraphernalia. The officer told his sergeant that the cyclist had assaulted him with his bicycle and that the officer had to use force to handcuff the cyclist. After the DA declined the case, the city’s police department initiated an IA into the officer’s actions.
The first seconds of the BWC footage showed the cyclist sitting on the curb saying: “Now you turn your camera on when you just got done beating me up.” The officer responds: “ I didn’t beat you up.” The cyclist profanely refutes the officer’s statement. The officer tells the cyclist to stop. The cyclist asks “Stop what?” The officer repeats “Stop.”
During his interviews, the cyclist consistently claimed that the officer had turned the patrol car into his bicycle, and then pummeled him with fists. During his IA interview, the officer denied both claims. The officer admitted only that he failed to immediately turn on his BWC or call dispatch.
After completing the IA and pre-disciplinary due process, the city issued the officer a notice of termination for: 1) use of unreasonable force and failure to de-escalate; and 2) giving false or misleading statements: a) to a supervisor, b) in a police report, and c) during an IA investigation. The officer appealed to arbitration.
Attorney Carvalho convinced the arbitrator to uphold the termination for two main reasons. First, the physical evidence showed a dent on the outside of the patrol car driver’s door at the same height as the bicycle handlebar. The BWC also showed the cyclist telling the officers at the scene that his handlebar hit the patrol car door. Second, the cyclist’s account was consistent during several interviews, while the officer’s account had unexplained discrepancies and was highly implausible.
The arbitrator agreed with Attorney Carvalho. The arbitrator found that officer’s expression of fear of the cyclist was especially implausible. The officer weighed 260 pounds, and was highly-trained in martial arts. The cyclist weighed 140 pounds. The arbitrator found that the officer falsely magnified his fear in order to justify the use of force that is shown on the BWC. The arbitrator also found that the officer told the cyclist to “stop” while his BWC was running and immediately went “hands on” with the cyclist so that the cyclist would not make any more statements that would incriminate the officer. The arbitrator found the officer’s version of events was a “total fabrication.” Therefore, the arbitrator sustained the charges concerning the officer’s unlawful use of force and dishonesty, and affirmed the termination.