Chattanooga Times Free Press
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Police Lt. Tyrone Collington yelled to the masked bank robber to drop his gun and loosen his grip on the teller’s neck. “It’s not worth it, man. Let the girl go,” he shouted.
In an instant, as television cameras rolled, the robber slipped on a patch of ice, the hostage broke free, the robber raised his gun and Collington fired.
“I had to muster all of my skills and my courage to save this life,” said Collington, who was the first of six officers to shoot the gunman that morning in a snowy parking lot in Takoma Park, Md. “But I also had to take a life.”
There has been an unusual spate of fatal police shootings over the past year in the Washington region — 18 cases in which officers killed suspects in 2011, more than four times as many as in the previous year, when there were four.
Cops shooting bad guys are a mainstay of police television dramas. But in real life, that moment of confrontation is extraordinarily rare. When it does come, the emotional toll can last a lifetime.
Those who kill in the line of duty often have daunting personal and professional hurdles to overcome. They pull the trigger to protect themselves and others, then live in isolation, suspicion and personal sadness as their actions are scrutinized and investigated, often very publicly.
District of Columbia Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said no officer wants to use deadly force. “It’s very traumatic emotionally for the officers. It’s devastating,” she said.
About 95 percent of police officers who carry guns will never use a firearm, law enforcement experts say.
None of the officers who shot and killed someone in 2011 has been charged with a crime, but even when the shooting is justified, it is difficult to take a life.
“I still pray for her and her family,” said Lt. Dan Sheffield, a Prince George’s County, Md., officer who fatally shot a 16-year-old girl who pointed a gun at him during a standoff in 1996.
It was a November day in 1996, and Sheffield and other officers were standing outside a Laurel, Md., apartment building as a teenager inside was threatening to shoot people. The officers begged the girl to come out.
When 16-year-old Julie Meade finally appeared, she raised what looked like a handgun at Sheffield and the other officers. Sheffield said he felt “helpless.” The officers opened fire, and Meade was killed. Sheffield learned later that the gun was not real.
The shooting was about 15 years ago, but it still weighs on Sheffield. “It’s not supposed to work this way,” he said.
Across the country in 2010, police killed 387 people in justified homicides, according to FBI statistics. That same year, 153 officers were killed in the line of duty by firearms.
Some cases appear to be clear-cut examples of “suicide by police,” in which someone refuses to drop a gun knowing full well that officers will fire.
Others bring widespread outrage, court filings and political blow-back, such as the 2007 death of DeOnte Rawlings. The 14-year-old was pursued and killed by an off-duty Washington, D.C. officer who was combing a neighborhood for his stolen minibike. Rawlings’ family sued the city, and the case was settled out of court last year.
Many, though, are very tense situations in which an officer must make a split-second decision when confronting someone who is willing to kill.
Such was the case involving D.C. Police Sgt. Gerald “GG” Neill. It happened 17 years ago when Neill was heading into work on his day off to fill out timecards for his officers in the gun-recovery unit. Neill talks about it vividly.
Joseph Cooper Jr. flagged Neill down, and the officer stopped to see whether Cooper needed help. When Neill opened his car door, Cooper attacked him, possibly trying to steal the vehicle. The two wrestled in and out of the car in a “life-and-death struggle,” Neill said. Neill was losing the fight and felt forced to fire his weapon to save his life.
“Everything seemed to go real slow,” Neill said. “Only by the grace of God was I able to survive.”
He was angry for months after the incident, wondering why he had been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
“I thought, ‘Why me? Why did I get chosen?’ I was minding my own business trying to do the right thing,” Neill said.
The only people he could talk with about it were his attorney and a psychologist from the department’s employee-assistance program. With everyone else, he just tried to mask the trauma.
“People ask how you’re doing, and you tell them you’re doing fine — but you’re not,” Neill said.
Neill, 59, retired several years ago after 30 years with the department. He said he doesn’t like to talk about the shooting out of respect for the man he killed.
“I empathize with his family. He was a father, a brother, a son,” Neill said. “It’s sad all the way around. It’s tough.”
It had such a profound effect on his life that he became president of the D.C. police union so he could speak out for officers who found themselves in similar situations.
“You know what they’re going through. You know they’re being isolated,” Neill said. “They’ll say it’s just part of the job, but you know they don’t mean that. You say a little prayer and hope they’ll be okay.”
Copyright 2012 Chattanooga Publishing Company