City Blames Otto Zehm For His Own Restraint Death

By Dave Reynolds, Inclusion Daily Express

SPOKANE, WASHINGTON--In a classic case of blaming the victim, attorneys representing the City of Spokane told a court Friday that Spokane Police were not responsible for Otto Zehm's March 20, 2006 restraint death.

Otto Zehm was.

How?

By failing to take his medication.

And by failing to drop a plastic soda pop bottle when told to do so.

Since his death, the city and its police department have tried to shift the focus away from officers' actions and toward Zehm's behavior and disabilities.

Zehm, 36, reportedly had an intellectual disability and schizophrenia. He had worked as a janitor at Fairchild Air Force Base under a contract with Skils'kin, an employment services agency known until a few years ago as Pre-Vocational Training Center.

Zehm died two days after officers beat him, restrained him on his stomach, shocked him repeatedly with a Taser stun gun, and placed a plastic "partial non-rebreather mask" over his face without supplying oxygen.

Zehm's mother, Ann, and the Center for Justice have filed a civil rights lawsuit against the city.

On Friday, city attorneys asked the federal court to dismiss the case.

"Otto Zehm knew or should have know that he was being detained by a peace officer and had the duty to refrain from using force to resist such detention," they wrote. "Any injury or damage suffered by Mr. Zehm was caused solely by reason of his conduct and willful resistance."

Following up on a 9-1-1 report of a "suspicious person" acting "in a bizarre manner" at a bank ATM, police tracked Zehm two blocks to a Spokane convenience store.

Video from security videos show Zehm walking to the back of the store and getting a 2-liter bottle of soda pop. One officer is then seen quickly walking up to Zehm, who held the plastic bottle with both hands at chest level. Zehm is seen moving away from the officer, who advances and strikes Zehm with a nightstick and knocks him to the floor in an aisle.

Other officers join in, restraining Zehm, handcuffing and hogtying him. Flashes from the Taser are clearly seen on the video. At some point, officers placed the clear plastic mask with a nickel-sized hole over Zehm's face to prevent him from spitting. After about 15 minutes, officers discovered that he had stopped breathing.

Zehm lapsed into a coma and died two days later at a local hospital.

He had not taken any money from the ATM.

Following an autopsy, Spokane County Medical Examiner Sally Aiken determined that Zehm's death was a homicide and that he died from a heart attack "while restrained in a prone position for excited delirium". Toxicology tests showed that he had no drugs in his system.

Immediately after the incident, acting police chief Jim Nicks claimed that Zehm "lunged" at the officer that tried to arrest him. He suggested that Zehm was using the plastic bottle as a lethal weapon against the officer. Nicks also said that Zehm was lying on his side most of the time he was on the floor.

The video, which contridicted much of Nicks' statements, was not released until a court ordered the city to do so several months later.

In April, questions were raised about a request by the Spokane County Sheriff's Department, which conducted an investigation into any wrongdoing by Spokane City Police officers, to obtain a search warrant for Zehm's medical, mental health, and employment records. The county detectives said they needed the information to follow up on the city officers' claims that Zehm assaulted them. Some legal experts said that it was highly unusual for investigators to probe the past of a dead person who cannot be charged with a crime.

In court documents filed Friday, the city maintains that Zehm "defiantly and angrily" rejected the officer's orders to drop the pop bottle, "at first by stating, 'No,' and thereafter by making loud growls, roars, and loud guttural sounds as Mr. Zehm physically resisted the officer’s efforts to get him under control."

The city attorneys also wrote that Zehm "had functioned moderately well in the community despite the severity of his mental illness, so long as he took his prescribed psychotropic medication and utilized the support provided by various social service agencies, and including those provided by his most recent employer."

"Mr. Zehm stopped taking his prescribed psychotropic medication in or about February, 2006, contrary to the advice of his medical providers, leading to a significant deterioration of his functioning capacity, including but not limited to episodes of major confusion and paranoia."

The city also contends that Zehm had "a history of being physically resistive and aggressive with law enforcement officers." The document describes an incident in 1990, in which a county sheriff's deputy tried to detain Zehm after seeing him "wandering along an arterial in a confused manner wearing ripped clothing". Zehm reportedly refused to go with the deputy. According to the deputy's report, when he tried to wrestle Zehm to the ground, Zehm tried to reach for the gun in the officer's holster.

No charges were filed, but Zehm was referred for involuntary mental health evaluation and treatment.

The paper does not say whether the officers involved in the March 2006 incident knew anything about the 1990 report.

The U.S. Department of Justice is doing its own investigation into whether Zehm's civil rights were violated during the incident that resulted in his death.

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