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Volume 41, Issue 12
April 6, 2004
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April 6, 2004
Police shootings in Mesa focus of ad
hoc committee
Mike Helm
Mesa Legend
In the early morning of Aug. 25, 2003, Martha Madrigal phoned Mesa police
to report that her 15-year-old son Mario Madrigal Jr. was drunk, holding
a knife and threatening to kill himself.
Twenty minutes later, he lay dead after being shot 10 times by Mesa police.
This incident, along with three shootings involving Mesa police in August
and September 2003, has the public crying foul. The officers in the Madrigal
shooting were eventually cleared of any wrongdoing in the case, but citizens
have voiced skepticism at investigations being run by the county attorney’s
office.
The pressure was on the Mesa City Council to do something to show the
public they were attempting to resolve the issue. “There was a lot
of community concern, community outcry, over what was happening with the
investigations that were being done by the county attorney’s office,
and it created challenges for the city because we couldn’t respond
until they produced the results of the investigation,” Vice Mayor
Dennis Kavanaugh stated.
At issue for some community members is whether an investigation conducted
with the help of Mesa police could have been impartial.
On March 24, the Ad Hoc Committee to study police oversight reconvened
to discuss the results of online surveys and meetings with the public.
The committee has been meeting since the events last summer in an attempt
to gauge public and police force interest in forming an oversight committee.
“It wasn’t necessarily a greater number (of shootings) than
we might have over the course of a year, but it happened in such a concentrated
period of time. Those incidents kind of crystallized at least some questions
that people in the community had,” Kavanaugh said.
Kavanaugh was referring to the fact that although Mesa is the United States’
40th largest city, it lacks a review board for police action that most
communities – large and small – have.
This is not the first time Mesa has looked into the issue of a police
oversight committee.
“We had looked at this about 10 years ago during a similar time
and they appointed a committee much like this that made a whole series
of recommendations on training and complaints investigations. At that
time the city council adopted some of the recommendations of the citizen
community but not all of them,” Kavanaugh stated.
The concern among committee members is that during any period of time
in which police actions are highly publicized, especially concerning deaths,
the community reacts strongly. Often they demand oversight such as what
is being considered now, but the outcry eventually dies down and the issue
drops from the forefront. Kavanaugh said he believes that Mesa should
take advantage of current public attention on the issue and follow through
with the full plans for police oversight.
Problems have occurred recently in the latest attempt to get an oversight
committee formed. Many people claimed that they were disappointed at the
level of public turnout for the town hall meetings that have been held
concerning the issue. Some citizens that did show up, the council members
reported, had a “lack of understanding of the priorities and role
of the police,” as pointed out by committee attendee Patrick Pomeroy.
A significant problem facing supporters of a police oversight committee
is the current city charter, which prohibits such review boards. The reason
for this is that in 1967 the original city charter, which was adopted
by voters, prohibited these review boards because of fears at the time
that they would lead to problems. Kavanaugh pointed out that this was
the time of the famous Watts riots and it was feared that the civil review
boards would lead to second-guessing of the police department.
“It’s unusual to have a prohibition like that in your city
charter but that got put in there 37 years ago. Pat Pomeroy was on the
committee at that time so that’s the input we’ve got from
him, to show us why they did it,” Kavanaugh said.
He explained that the charter could be changed, but because it takes so
long, they are working with the city attorney to see if Mesa can set up
a review board without having to change the charter.
Kevin Kotsur, who is now the chief of the Avondale Police Department,
was brought into the meeting to describe how Tempe created their police
oversight committee when he was with that department.
In Tempe, Kotsur explained, “The main reason was that we were watching
things nationally, recognized that these might be coming and felt like
we were professional and we have nothing to hide. Why don’t we set
something up that benefits the entire organization, city and primarily
our confidence level with our citizens. We were one of the first ones
to do that.”
As many council members pointed out, the main objective is to ensure the
public has confidence in the departments and can feel safe in their own
neighborhoods. The members also want to show that the public feels they
have input into matters involving the police.
Kotsur explains this desire when discussing Tempe. “We were already
accredited, we felt we had great people on board, we had mistakes and
corrected those so we saw no reason why a citizen couldn’t sit at
the table with us and watch how things work and give us input,”
he said.
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