Court orders Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office to release autopsy video in death of Branch Wroth

A federal judge in San Francisco has ordered the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office to turn over video taken during the autopsy of a 41-year-old Forestville man who died in May after a Rohnert Park police officer shocked him with a stun gun in a struggle outside his motel room.

The federal subpoena issued Nov. 7 requires the county coroner to release video and audio of Branch Wroth’s autopsy to the man’s family, which has sought the recording as part of their civil rights lawsuit against the city of Rohnert Park and the two officers involved in the fatal incident.

Christopher and Marni Wroth, Branch Wroth’s parents, are seeking unspecified financial damages claiming the officers showed a reckless disregard for their son’s rights during a welfare check. The wrongful death lawsuit claims he was in handcuffs and on the ground when he was shocked with a stun gun in the back four times. Wroth fell unconscious and died at the scene.

The federal court order comes after the Wroths pressed, unsuccessfully in Sonoma County Superior Court, to have their own independent pathologist observe their son’s autopsy, a move the county opposed. Sonoma County Judge Elliott Daum struck a compromise and ordered the county to record the autopsy and provide a copy to the family, a ruling the county appealed, unsuccessfully.

The video, once it is released, can be reviewed by an independent pathologist and could provide key evidence in the Wroth family’s civil rights case, said Izaak Schwaiger, an attorney for the family.

No preliminary finding has been disclosed on cause of death by the county coroner.

“Shouldn’t we be striving to greater transparency in officer-involved shootings and deaths?” Schwaiger said.

The court-ordered release of autopsy footage in a criminal case appeared to be unprecedented in Sonoma County and possibly the state, authorities said.

Sgt. Spencer Crum, a Sheriff’s Office spokesman, the requirement was “unheard of” and “opens doors that haven’t been opened before.”

Crum said the Sheriff’s Office would turn over the video after its investigation into Wroth’s death is complete. The court-ordered deadline is 10 a.m. Nov. 29.

“The Sheriff’s Office is planning on complying with the subpoena but we won’t rush our independent investigation (for) a civil litigant,” Crum said by email. “If it’s not complete by that time we will deal with it then.”

The Sheriff’s Office is investigating under the local law enforcement protocol for fatal, officer-involved incidents that originate in another department.

On May 12, Rohnert Park Public Safety Officers David Sittig-Wattson and Sean Huot responded to a call of a man “acting strangely” at the Budget Inn about 3:15 p.m.

The two found Wroth, who worked in construction, incoherent and in an altered state, police said at the time. Wroth told the police officers he thought he had been poisoned with chemicals.

Wroth had a $10,000 misdemeanor arrest warrant for possession of concentrated cannabis, a DUI and a violation of a court order, according to Crum. After initially cooperating with police and agreeing to be handcuffed, Wroth became combative and attempted to jump out of a window, Crum said after the incident.

One of the officers - investigators have not said who - shocked Wroth with a Taser an undisclosed number of times. Wroth was then taken to the ground and restrained before he lost consciousness, according to Crum. Officers Sittig-Wattson and Huot then administered CPR until paramedics arrived, police said in May.

There is also body-camera video of the incident that the family is seeking through discovery in federal court, Schwaiger said.

Schwaiger represented Branch Wroth’s younger brother, Esa Wroth, in an excessive force lawsuit that the county settled for $1.25 million in 2015. The suit came after Esa Wroth was shocked with a Taser 23 times in the Sonoma County Jail while being booked on suspicion of drunken driving.

You can reach Staff Writer Nick Rahaim at 707-521-5203 or nick.rahaim@pressdemocrat.com.