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The Milwaukee police officer who fatally shot Dontre Hamilton at Red Arrow Park has been fired because he did not follow department procedures for dealing with emotionally disturbed people, Chief Edward Flynn announced Wednesday.

The officer, Christopher Manney, did not use excessive force when he shot Hamilton 14 times, Flynn said; rather, the officer did not follow department rules in the moments leading up to the shooting.

Manney decided Hamilton was dangerous "based solely on observations of apparent mental illness, absent any overt actions on the part of Mr. Hamilton," Flynn said.

Hamilton, an unarmed man with a history of paranoid schizophrenia, was killed April 30.

Workers at the nearby Starbucks called police to complain about Hamilton, 31, sleeping in the park. A pair of officers checked on him and found he was doing nothing wrong.

Manney, the beat officer in the area, was not aware the other officers already had been to the park when he retrieved a voice mail regarding Hamilton's presence there. Instead of following his training about how to deal with emotionally disturbed people, Manney came up behind Hamilton, placing his hands under Hamilton's arms and on his chest in what Flynn described as an "out of policy pat-down." Manney had no reason to believe Hamilton was dangerous. Rather, the officer made assumptions based on his perceptions that Hamilton was mentally ill and homeless, the chief said.

"This intentional action, in violation of training and policy, instigated a physical confrontation that resulted in a deadly use of force," Flynn said.

Hamilton's family, who with the grass-roots Coalition for Justice has organized numerous protest marches since his death, said they were happy Manney would no longer serve as a police officer. But they will not stop demonstrating until Manney is criminally charged, according to Hamilton's brother.

"(Flynn) just acknowledged that Dontre's rights were broken illegally," Nathaniel Hamilton said after Flynn's Wednesday news conference. "If I go and break someone's rights and then it ends up killing them, I'm going to jail, and the Police Department should have the same accountability."

Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm has given no time frame regarding when he plans to make a decision about criminal charges against Manney.

Mike Crivello, president of the Milwaukee Police Association, which represents rank-and-file officers, said Manney and the rest of the union wished for peace for Hamilton's family, but disagreed with assertions that the officer acted inappropriately.

"There is no doubt that the officer involved in this situation wishes he wasn't," Crivello said in a statement. "Officers come to work each and every day hoping to affect life to the positive, not to be forced into a deadly force scenario."

Manney's decision to shoot, Crivello said, was a difficult decision made in an instant.

"As to the MPD leadership and city leadership, today is an unfortunate day — the decision to terminate this officer is cowardice and certainly unfounded and unsupported by fact," Crivello said.

'My decision alone'

When it comes to deaths involving police officers, two separate investigations occur: one to determine whether the officer broke the law; another to figure out whether any department rules were violated.

In the past, the Police Department has almost always waited for Chisholm to decide on criminal charges before completing its disciplinary review. Internal investigators have often cited the district attorney's decision against charges when they later cleared officers of rule violations.

Hamilton's case was the first affected by a new law, passed earlier this year, that requires an outside agency to lead the criminal review of any officer-involved death. Individual police departments maintain the authority to conduct investigations of possible rule violations.

The investigation into whether Manney broke the law was led by the Wisconsin Department of Justice's Division of Criminal Investigation. The agency presented its report to Chisholm on Aug. 8.

Chisholm previously said he is seeking opinions from outside experts on the use of force before deciding whether to charge Manney.

Flynn called the decision to fire Manney "my decision alone."

"We're not talking war crimes here. We're not talking that every cop that makes a mistake has to face grand juries and go to jail, but there has to be a consequence," Flynn said. "We don't need to demonize this officer in order to hold him accountable for his decisions."

Manney is entitled to appeal his dismissal to the civilian Fire and Police Commission.

Additional training

Ald. Bob Donovan said it was "unjust and unfair" for Flynn to fire Manney while Chisholm's review was ongoing.

"Cooler heads need to prevail, and before decisions like this are made, we need to know what the investigation revealed," said Donovan, who is running for mayor. "Even if the officer was guilty of these alleged rule violations, under normal circumstances they would never be considered grounds for firing. To me, this entire matter reeks of politics."

Mayor Tom Barrett denied politics were at play, saying Flynn had made a difficult but necessary decision in light of Manney's failure to act in accordance with his training and department policy.

Manney was not among the approximately 20% of Milwaukee police officers who have completed 40 hours of Crisis Intervention Training, considered the gold standard for teaching officers how to deal with mentally ill people.

The rest of the force, including Manney, attended a three-hour course.

In the aftermath of Hamilton's death, as the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel made inquiries about mental health training for police, officials announced that the department will add more courses for veteran officers and will require the full 40 hours for all recruits.

The department also will conduct an additional 16 hours of mental health training for the roughly 1,450 officers who have not had CIT training.

Barrett also emphasized the Police Department's findings that the officer had not acted with malice.

"I assume there will be unrest that will continue," Barrett said. "I think now the decision is going to be, where do we go from here on this?"

Flynn's decision to fire Manney, and his explanation of why he did so, represented "an important first step in improving police community relations," Chris Ahmuty, the head of the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, said in a statement.

"To the extent that Police Department policies and practices contributed to an officer-involved fatal shooting, the MPD should change its policies and practices and not use the punishment of one or more officers to allow the MPD to escape its responsibilities," Ahmuty said.

Meg Kissinger of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.