The Associated Press
North Bend, Ore. (AP) -- The Coos Bay police officer who shot and killed an unarmed student at Southwestern Oregon Community College won’t face criminal charges or professional discipline for his actions.
Detective Hugo Hatzel told investigators that he feared for his life when he shot robbery suspect Steven Garner. He said the 34-year-old Garner had charged at him as though he were brandishing a weapon; it turned out to have been a Sharpie marking pen.
Coos Bay Chief Deputy District Attorney Paul Frasier said the shooting was justified, and that other police officers nearby also thought Garner had a weapon.
“Mr. Garner chose to ignore repeated commands to stop and get on the ground,” Frasier wrote in a 16-page report based on an investigation by the North Bend Police Department. “Mr. Garner chose to make threatening gestures simulating that he was armed with a knife ... any reasonable person facing the same circumstances as Detective Hatzel would have believed that his life was in imminent danger.”
An autopsy revealed enough methamphetamine in Garner’s system to prove he was high at the time of the shooting, Frasier said. Garner also tested positive for benzodiazepines, often found in antidepressants, along with marijuana and opiates.
Garner’s mother didn’t return phone calls seeking comment from the (Eugene) Register-Guard newspaper, but Frasier described family members as “not happy” about Garner’s death.
Police were tracking Garner after his fingerprints matched those on a note used to rob a Wells Fargo Bank in Coos Bay in early May.
State law allows citizens to defend themselves when someone is attacking them, Frasier said, but they must reasonably believe that the other person is committing or attempting to commit a felony involving physical force or deadly force.
Hatzel has been on administrative leave since the shooting and will return to work later this month. He didn’t return telephone messages from the newspaper left via his attorney for comment.