Mark Larabee and Maxine Bernstein, The Oregonian
At the request of Portland Police Chief Mark Kroeker, the FBI on Tuesday opened a preliminary investigation into whether a Portland officer violated the civil rights of Kendra James when he shot and killed her during a traffic stop May 5.
“In a case where there are questions that are lingering in the community, I thought we could benefit from an independent review of all that we do to make sure we haven’t overlooked something,” Kroeker said Tuesday afternoon.
“It’s healthy to have an independent look, although I have full confidence in the integrity of our investigation.”
This week, a Multnomah County grand jury is holding hearings into whether Officer Scott McCollister acted legally when he fired one shot from his 9 mm handgun, hitting James in the side.
Investigators have said that James jumped behind the wheel of a car after officers removed the driver and another passenger, and that as two officers struggled with her, she started the car and tried to drive away. One police union official suggested that McCollister thought that his life or the other officers’ lives were in danger when James started the car and began to drive.
Federal “color of law” inquiries, most of which center on whether the police used reasonable force, are not unusual. Whether it’s unusual for the agency in question to ask for an investigation of itself is a matter of opinion.
“There’s the thin blue line; there’s the us-and-them attitude,” said Charles Turner, a former U.S. attorney for Oregon. “It’s very unusual for a police agency to ask for investigations of itself.”
But Kroeker said his request was not unusual. His office also asked the FBI to review the April 2001 shooting of Jose Santos Victor Mejia Poot. A Mexican national, Mejia was shot to death in a Sellwood psychiatric hospital after advancing on officers with a metal bar he ripped off a door.
Sam Adams, chief of staff for Mayor Vera Katz, said the chief told the mayor at their weekly meeting Monday that he wanted to have the FBI conduct its own review, and she agreed. Adams said the FBI can be one more set of “outside eyes and ears and brains to get to the facts of the matter.”
Kroeker said he will await the grand jury findings before releasing further details about the shooting. Following the criminal investigation, the Portland Police Bureau will conduct its own inquiry into whether the three officers involved in the James case followed proper department policies.
According to the FBI, under federal law a peace officer who “willfully subjects or deprives” a person of rights can be fined or imprisoned, FBI Special Agent Jane Brillhart said.
The results of the preliminary inquiry, when completed, will be reviewed by the U.S. Department of Justice, which will determine whether a full investigation should be conducted, she said.
According to information available on the FBI’s Web site, “color of law” means that the person under investigation is using power given to him or her by a government agency. While color of law inquiries could be conducted against anyone acting in an official capacity, the vast majority of the allegations investigated by the FBI are against police officers.
From 1997 to 2000, the FBI investigated an average of 3,500 civil rights cases each year. Of those, about 73 percent were color of law investigations, the FBI said. Within those, about 82 percent were allegations of abuse of force with violence.
“While some types of force used by law enforcement may be violent by their very nature, they may be considered ‘reasonable,’ based upon the circumstances,” the FBI Web site states. “However, violations of federal law occur where it can be shown that the force used was willfully ‘unreasonable’ or ‘excessive’ against individuals.”