Sonoma County sheriff gives notice of firing to deputy involved in arrest of Bloomfield man who died in custody

A Sonoma County sheriff’s deputy involved in a violent confrontation with an unarmed Bloomfield man who died after the deputy wrapped his arm around the man’s neck while trying to pull him from his vehicle has been told he will be fired, Sonoma County Sheriff Mark Essick announced Friday.

Essick made the announcement at the tail end of an almost 17-minute video released by his office Friday morning, which through body-worn camera footage from another deputy provided the first public view of the Nov. 27 in-custody death of David Ward, 52.

The video, which the Sheriff’s Office was required to release under a months-old state law, showed how Deputy Charles Blount first tried to pull Ward from car by his left arm and then bashed Ward’s head into the side of the vehicle after saying Ward bit him.

Blount, who was joined by ?other authorities during his struggle to get Ward out of the vehicle, then placed his arm around Ward’s neck in what police initially described as an attempted carotid hold, a controversial restraint scarcely used by deputies at the Sheriff’s Office. Blount kept the man in the neck hold for more than a minute.

“Stop moving,” he commanded.

A second deputy who would twice fire his Taser at Ward by the end of the incident, Jason Little, and two Sebastopol officers first sought to stop Ward early Nov. 27 after learning he was driving a green Honda Civic reportedly stolen by an armed man days prior. Deputies did not know Ward owned the car or that he had apparently recovered the vehicle earlier that morning, a fact revealed to Blount by a deputy who arrived to the scene after Blount’s struggle with Ward.

“Oh well,” Blount, a 19-year veteran of the Sheriff’s Office, responded to the deputy. While a search of the car later turned up a folding pocket knife near the front seat of the car, there was no indication Ward had used or threatened authorities with it, Essick said.

Once removed from his car by the officers, Ward was handcuffed facedown on the ground and later stopped breathing. The cause of Ward’s death has not been publicly disclosed.

“When they’re trying to extract Mr. Ward from the car, the force that is used on him doesn’t appear to be reasonable, and I’m specifically talking about Deputy Blount,” Essick said.

Essick said he decided to begin Blount’s termination process after two internal affairs investigators at the Sheriff’s Office dedicated hundreds of hours reviewing the in-custody death ahead of the video release. Though Essick said the investigation led to findings that Blount violated general rules for Sheriff’s Office employees - conduct that discredits the county, willful disregard of department policy and carelessness or violation of safety rules - he declined to specify whether investigators found Blount violated office policies during Ward’s arrest and, if so, how.

Their inquiry included a review of the agency’s policies on the use of force, dealing with people who are barricaded, conducting high-risk stops and using firearms, Essick said. He cited personnel records privacy laws for not disclosing more, though he said the contents of the internal review would be made public at a later date, as required by a different state law.

Internal affairs investigators had not completed all the necessary interviews by Wednesday, the reason the agency didn’t make the video public sooner, and Essick’s termination notice was sent to Blount a day later, Essick said. Both Essick and Jerry Threet, a Sonoma County attorney who previously worked as the county’s law enforcement auditor, described Essick’s decision to fire Blount as an unusual disciplinary measure within the law enforcement profession. Karlene Navarro, the current auditor, called the incident “upsetting and traumatic” in an email Friday, but did not elaborate on Blount’s conduct.

“This shows that I have set high standards for the Sheriff’s Office and our employees,” Essick said. “When they do not meet those high standards, I’m not afraid to call them out on it and take action, and I did.”

Blount, who The Press Democrat could not reach for comment, did not activate his body-worn camera during the incident, Essick said.

Attempts to reach the Sonoma County Deputy Sheriff’s Association, the union that represents Blount and other deputies, were also unsuccessful.

The facts surrounding Ward’s death, paired with information about prior allegations of excessive force launched against Blount, two of which resulted in settlements, has led Ward’s family to seek legal representation from local civil rights attorney Izaak Schwaiger, said Catherine Aguilera, Ward’s stepsister.

Aguilera said she had not watched the body-worn camera footage released by the Sheriff’s Office on Friday because she didn’t think she was emotionally ready to view it.

“It just seems like police operated out of an adrenaline rush,” Aguilera said of Ward’s contact with law enforcement. “There could have been a different way that the whole scenario was handled.”

She added that Ward, who almost died when he was knocked off his motorcycle by a drunken driver several years ago, had trouble walking and relied on a wheelchair to move around. He also had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and a heart condition, which meant he needed an oxygen tank. Schwaiger, who has represented families in several cases launched against Sonoma County law enforcement agencies, confirmed he was hired by Ward’s family on Friday and would be looking into possible civil rights violations in the Nov. 27 incident.

“The callousness of Deputy Blount, the violence is so striking,” Schwaiger said. “He has zero regard for the man. How about taking some time; what was the rush?”

Plumas County Sheriff’s deputy and use-of-force expert Ed Obayashi countered Schwaiger’s statement, saying that it is not obvious Blount’s actions were unreasonable based solely on what was depicted in the body-worn camera.

“We don’t let dangerous individuals decide the speed and the method of how they are going to get out of the car,” Obayashi said, underscoring the fact that deputies did not know Ward was the rightful owner of the vehicle and had reason to believe he might be the armed man who Ward had reported had stolen the car several days prior.

Obayashi, like Essick, also questioned whether the neck hold Blount used to restrain Ward was a carotid hold. The tactic requires deputies to wrap an arm around a suspect’s neck to reduce blood flow to their brain, though if done incorrectly can block the person’s airways instead.

Essick said the hold, which is allowed under the Sheriff’s Office policies to take control of a potentially violent people, has been used by deputies on the street and working in the jail 10 times in the past five years.

“It just looks like he’s using the neck area as a vantage point,” Obayashi said.

Threet, the county’s former law enforcement watchdog, said the video raised several concerns, among them when the footage showed both Blount and Little shouting competing instructions at Ward while they tried to get him to open the car door.

“We don’t know anything right now about Mr. Ward’s mental capacity,” Threet said. “I didn’t see any real attempt to open the door from the inside.”

It appeared to him that Blount, who arrived after the initial car chase, almost immediately approached Ward in a forceful way, while in contrast, Little attempted to ask Ward questions after Ward’s car came to a stop.

“The force escalated very quickly and appeared to do so for very little reason,” Threet said. “I think the most basic question is whether the incident justified any use of force.”

Friday’s video release was the third such video the Sheriff’s Office has made public in accordance with a new state law requiring law enforcement officials to release body-worn camera footage in certain instances, including when an officer fires their weapon at a person, or when their contact results in serious injuries or death.

The law, which took effect in July and requires law enforcement agencies to make public the footage within 45 days unless they can show good cause, added a time crunch for the Sheriff’s Office to complete their internal inquiry into Blount’s actions, Essick said. The Sheriff Office’s video release was followed by a second disclosure by the Sebastopol Police Department, whose officers also turned on their body-worn cameras during the incident.

“It will force police chiefs and sheriffs to expedite their investigation into the matter,” Essick said of the law. “The public is going to see the video and the public is going to demand an explanation for what they see in the video.”

Essick assured that the law did not, however, degrade the thoroughness of the internal affairs investigation.

“I am very pleased in the work product that we put in this case,” he said.

Essick declined a request from the Community Advisory Council, an arm of the county’s independent auditor’s office, to ban the carotid hold from the office’s use of force policy, as well as a request from Navarro, the current auditor, to put a moratorium on the tactic since Ward’s death. He called the decision premature given that the cause of Ward’s death was not yet known. While the hold is allowed at the Sheriff’s Office, deputies are told to avoid using the tactic on vulnerable populations, such as pregnant women or the elderly.

Blount has been placed on administrative leave since the incident and has 10 days to file a formal opposition to Essick’s termination letter, Essick said. Blount’s termination will be official by the end of that time frame if no appeal is filed, Essick said.

The Santa Rosa Police Department’s criminal investigation into Ward’s death was still underway as of Friday, Santa Rosa Police Lt. Dan Marincik said. The department will forward their findings to the Sonoma County District Attorney’s Office, who will determine whether the responding deputies and officers acted lawfully during the vehicle stop and subsequent struggle with Ward.

Little remained on administrative leave Friday, Essick said. He expressed sympathy for Ward’s family in the video, and noted that one person’s actions do not reflect the entire agency he oversees.

“I’m sincerely sorry for your loss. Our thoughts are with you during this extremely difficult time,” Essick said at the video’s conclusion.

You can reach Staff Writer Nashelly Chavez at 707-521-5203 or nashelly.chavez@pressdemocrat.com.