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“Nothing presented at trial showed that the officers’ extraordinary use of force was reasonably necessary to safely arrest (the plaintiff),” said the opinion Black wrote this month.

He speculated that jurors may have been confused by a disorganized presentation of the plaintiff’s case and a weak expert, but concluded no reasonable jury could have found in favor of APD.

“Instead, the only reasonable conclusion that can be drawn from evidence shown is that the force was clearly excessive. Allowing this verdict to stand would be a miscarriage of justice, and (the plaintiff’s) motion for judgment as a matter of law will be granted.”

The decision to overturn the verdict and issue his own findings in the civil case is so novel that experienced trial lawyers can’t remember a similar occurrence during their careers.

Assistant City Attorney Stephanie Griffin said Wednesday her comments would be limited because the case is still pending. But she said the city is exploring filing a motion asking Black to reconsider, and “pointing out testimony in the record.”

The civil rights lawsuit stemmed from police response to a March 3, 2009, argument between two drunken friends that escalated. Hours of beer-drinking turned into an argument, and Jeffrey Patterson called 911 asking to have his buddy Tony Nelson removed from Patterson’s house. When no one responded, Patterson called back and said Nelson had threatened him with a knife and pellet gun.

This time, the response was immediate — and full bore.

Forty-seven members of APD showed up at Patterson’s house: 17 SWAT officers, eight K-9 units and three snipers among them. Some of them arrived in an armored van known as the BearCat with a range of lethal and nonlethal weapons.

Civilian neighbors were evacuated, while snipers were poised on the roofs of nearby buildings.

Officers supported their tactics by testifying that it is safer to arrest a suspect while exercising complete control over him, then failing that, they use physical force. But Black noted that nothing at trial showed that such tactics “were even remotely objectively necessary” for Nelson’s arrest.

According to the lawsuit:

Patterson was sitting outside when the officers arrived and placed him under arrest. He explained that he had called 911, and Nelson was still in the house.

Officers used loudspeakers to order Nelson out, to walk toward them and to drop his knife, which he did after some delay. Nelson, told to raise his hands while he walked, appeared intoxicated, disoriented and unable to maintain a straight line, and did not raise his hands. Snipers, however, could see through their long-range scopes that he did not have a weapon.

Nelson was ordered to stop and turn around. Eventually, he did, but police interpreted the move as an attempt to return to the house, and an officer ordered, “Bag him.”

Nelson was shot with successive bean bag rounds, then with a flash-bang explosive that landed between him and the house.

Another officer next shot Nelson with a canister of four wooden batons, two of which pierced his skin.

A K-9 officer dispatched his police service dog, trained to “bite and hold” suspects indefinitely — and whose meaty, flesh-tearing bite prompted Nelson to cling to a nearby fence with his hand. The dog remained “on the bite” while the officer commanded the dog to pull Nelson toward him, further ripping his arm.

At this point, Nelson wasn’t trying to go back to the house, according to officers’ testimony cited by Black, but since he was still “standing upright,” an officer Tasered his chest.

But Nelson kept clinging to the fence, and police worried that the Taser wasn’t working through Nelson’s thick jacket, and Tasered his neck. Officer Daniel Hughes cycled the Taser for the maximum time — 5 seconds — then did it five more times.

At that point, the nonlethal weapons had all been deployed.

APD called off the dog, “Doc,” pried Nelson’s hand from the fence and he collapsed and quit moving. “They carried his unconscious body to the BearCat, leaving a trail of blood and urine,” Black’s summary of the police testimony said.

Nelson was arrested for aggravated assault. But there was an hour between his dangerous conduct and his APD encounter, the court noted, during which the assault had ended.

Citing factors highlighted in the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals about what constitutes an imminent safety threat, Black said it is clear Nelson was not a safety threat “when he staggered out onto the driveway unarmed.”

Black said testimony showed Nelson was slow to react, incoherent, clearly not holding a weapon after he dropped the knife, was a significant distance from officers who were armored, in tactically shielded positions and who possessed “a plethora of both projectile and lethal weapons, and protected by numerous attack dogs.”

— This article appeared on page A1 of the Albuquerque Journal