By Greg Jonsson, Shane Graber and Leah Thorsen
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Copyright 2006 St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
JERSEYVILLE- Police here are calling for a state investigation into the death of a 17-year-old who died after police shot him twice with a Taser.
An internal investigation found that police offiers had followed departmental policy on the use of Tasers, said Jerseyville Police Chief Brad Blackorby.
Still, he said that he had asked the Illinois State Police to conduct an independent investigation into the death.
Two officers involved, Todd Wagner and Matt Witt, have been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the state police inquiry.
A friend of the youth described the victim as troubled but deeply religious.
The friend, Nathan Pfeiffer, 20, said Roger Holyfield was “always wanting to find God.”
In fact, at the time Holyfield was confronted by police, he was walking down a street in Jerseyville yelling “I want Jesus.” In one hand, Holyfield was carrying a Bible. In the other, he had - for some reason - a cordless home telephone.
Pfeiffer said Holyfield suffered from mental illness and had never gotten over the death of his father a couple of years ago.
But despite the problems, Pfeiffer said Holyfield never acted violently. That’s why Pfeiffer said he couldn’t understand why police would fire a Taser at the diminutive Holyfield. Pfeiffer estimated that Holyfield weighed about 130 pounds and stood barely 5 feet 7 inches tall.
In a press conference Tuesday, Blackorby said the struggle began when a police officer called to the scene attempted to put his hand on Holyfield’s shoulder to calm him down.
“Holyfield hits his arm away from him and the struggle was on,” Blackorby said.
Holyfield was warned several times to stop being combative or a Taser would be used, Blackorby added. The officers put Holyfield in handcuffs, but when he continued to resist, he was hit with Taser jolts twice, the chief said.
Holyfield was taken to Cardinal Glennon Children’s Medical Center in St. Louis, where he died.
Dr. Phillip Burch, St. Louis’ deputy chief medical examiner, said Holyfield might have died from excited delirium, a highly active mental state where a person is no longer able to control him or herself.
Excited delirium could be brought on by mental illness or drugs.
Holyfield lived with his mother and stepfather in Dow, a village of about 250 people four miles south of Jerseyville. A woman who answered the door at the family’s gray mobile home Tuesday declined to comment.
Dow has a post office and an elementary school. Its only store is Linda’s Market, a lean-to about the size of a single-car garage attached to the side of a mobile home.
Said Pfeiffer: “It still tears me up, because he was a really good friend.”