A police officer who witnessed Andre Hill’s fatal shooting in Ohio told investigators that he did not see Hill pose a threat before he was killed, according to documents obtained by CBS News. The officer who shot Hill, identified as Adam Coy, was fired on Monday by the city’s public security director after the Columbus police chief called the shooting “horrible” and recommended his dismissal.
Body camera images released earlier showed Coy approaching Hill, a 47-year-old black man, while he was in a garage on December 22. Hill walked towards Coy holding his cell phone and Coy opened fire in seconds. Hill then fell to the floor while Coy shouted for him to show his hands. The video did not show Coy providing any medical aid to Hill, who was treated by doctors a few minutes later. Hill was taken to a local hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.
Coy did not turn on his body camera before approaching Hill – but a 60-second automatic “look back” feature, triggered when Coy turned on the camera after the shooting, captured the incident without sound.
The December 23 interview by police investigators with police officer Amy Detweiler, documented in a summary obtained by CBS News on Tuesday, provides more details about the events that led to the fatal shooting. Detweiler told investigators that he responded to the scene after receiving reports of a person starting and stopping an SUV engine at around 1:30 am. She said Coy, who was already on the scene, told her that Hill had parked the SUV and was entering a garage. She said she saw no conversation between Coy and Hill.
Detweiler said that when she and Coy approached the garage, Hill was inside, without entering the residence. When Coy asked Hill to leave the garage in a “normal tone of voice,” Hill did not respond verbally, but started to leave, she said.
According to the interview summary, Detweiler then told investigators that Hill walked towards him with a cell phone in hand. “She saw no threat from Mr. Hill,” says the summary. Detweiler said that Hill turned to Coy and lowered his left hand. Detweiler told investigators that she couldn’t see her right side, but said she didn’t see a gun.
Shortly afterwards, Detweiler said, he heard Coy shout, “There’s a gun in the other hand, and a gun in the other!” followed by shots. Detweiler did not provide any information about what happened after the shooting.
Benjamin Crump
CBS News also obtained the administrative investigation by Columbus police chief Thomas Quinlan about Coy, which was sent to the city’s public security director as part of a recommendation to have Coy fired. In the report, Quinlan noted that Coy “reacted with great distress using profanity when he realized that Hill was unarmed”, and said that Coy could be heard on his body camera “getting physically ill” after the shooting.
However, Quinlan wrote that “Officer Coy’s use of force was not objectively reasonable, he did not use trained techniques, did not use his BWC properly, and did not provide medical assistance.”
“The way in which Officer Coy handled this race is not a ‘newbie’ error as a result of negligence or inadvertence, but the decisions made (sic) and the actions taken were imprudent and deliberate,” added Quinlan.
Quinlan also said, without going into detail, that “I responded to many shooting scenes involving policemen and spoke to many policemen after these critical incidents. There was something very different about the officer’s involvement after this critical incident that is difficult to describe for this Letter . ”
Quinlan also included an excerpt from a letter he wrote in 2008 while serving as Coy’s patrol lieutenant, in which he wrote: “If sustained improvements are not fully realized, a decision whether Officer Coy can be recovered must follow. interventions described above did not produce the desired results, a change to termination would be justified, as Officer Coy’s service to the Police Division will have lost all future value.Quinlan did not elaborate on what motivated the 2008 letter.
Quinlan publicly announced his recommendation that Coy be fired on December 24. Public Security Director Ned Pettus Jr. fired Coy after a hearing on Monday.
“Adam Coy’s actions do not live up to the oath of a Columbus Police officer, or the standards that we and the community demand from our officers,” said Pettus. Coy did not attend the hearing, according to a representative of his police union.
Civil rights lawyer Benjamin Crump, who is representing Hill’s family, on Monday praised the resignation as the “right decision”. He also released a statement on Tuesday responding to Detweiler’s claim that Coy said Hill had a gun before shooting, writing that “The rampant police mentality of shooting first and asking later when it comes to a black person is evidence undeniable that black life doesn’t. This is important for many police officers. ”
“Although Officer Coy vowed to protect and defend, he chose to take another innocent black life. Forget the rights of the Second Amendment, blacks don’t even have the right to carry a cell phone without facing a deadly risk,” added Crump.
Although the administrative investigation into Coy has been resolved, several other investigations continue. The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation is investigating Hill’s death, that a preliminary autopsy report determined a homicide, and Quinlan is still investigating other officers present at the scene for failing to turn on the body’s cameras or assist Hill.
The city’s assistant director of public security said Detweiler was transferred to administrative duties while the investigation continues.
Coy’s lawyer told CBS News that his team is hopeful that the Criminal Investigation Bureau and the Attorney General’s Office “will complete a fair and thorough investigation that will be transparent and guided by the jurisprudence and principles (sic) outlined by the cases of the Supreme Court that guide the use of force actions. “Coy did not release a public statement about the shooting.
Nathalie Nieves and Erica Scott contributed reporting.