Utah standoff suspect’s determination surprised police

December 15, 2008 11:02 AM

By Nate Carlisle
Salt Lake Tribune

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah — Police officers would say later they had never seen anything like it.

They sprayed Brian P. Wood with tear gas but he did not surrender. Officers hit Wood, 37, with pepper balls and rubber bullets and he didn’t do anything more than say “ouch.” One officer stunned Wood with a Taser but he did not fall down right away.

SWAT officers closing in on Wood pleaded with him to drop his gun. Instead, some officers would say later, they saw Wood point his gun as if he was preparing to fire.

Wood’s Sept. 22 standoff at his Farmington home is recited in about 400 pages of reports and audio recordings released last week. They portray Wood, a part-time Farmington firefighter who had a previous arrest for domestic assault, as belligerent and determined not to allow the standoff to end peacefully. Meanwhile, police commanders were worried Wood had an assault rifle and SWAT teams would lose sight of Wood in the dark.

“The subject refused all of our many offers to provide him a chair, water and food,” Salt Lake City police Sgt. Scott Teerlink wrote in a report. “When we asked the subject what he wanted, he would simply stare and not respond. The subject made no demands and only stood waiting as if he was waiting for us to do something.”

An attorney representing Wood’s survivors declined comment last week because she had not yet reviewed the documents. The family previously has criticized the use of force -- both lethal and nonlethal -- against Wood and said the situation could have been resolved peacefully if friends and family had been allowed to speak with him. The Utah Attorney General’s Office ruled the use of force was legally justified.

Wood’s wife has denied her husband assaulted her that day, as he claimed in a phone call to police that initiated the standoff at about 9 a.m. that day. But the reports show when police arrived at their home near 100 E. 100 North, she told an officer Wood had hit her “all over.”

At about that same time, Wood was seated in his pickup truck. Other vehicles were blocking the truck in the driveway. Wood fired a shot from a .38 Special revolver into a utility trailer parked on the passenger side.

Farmington police called for reinforcements and soon SWAT teams from the Davis County Sheriff’s Office and the Salt Lake City Police Department arrived.

Negotiators took turns throughout the day trying to speak with Wood by telephone or by shouting. Wood appeared to cooperate with negotiators sometimes, even laughing and joking with them, various officers wrote or told investigators later.

But Wood repeatedly said he could not go back to jail. Other times, Wood was seemingly distant and wouldn’t speak . He would just shake his head no.

Davis County Sheriff’s Lt. Arnold Butcher told investigators negotiators made numerous offers to end the standoff peacefully, but Wood said to let him leave “or haul his dead carcass out of there.”

At one point, police allowed Wood’s father to talk to him over a loud speaker. Police said this agitated Wood and he asked his family no to do that again because he didn’t want the neighbors to hear. Police were afraid to let Wood speak with family for fear he would say goodbye and commit suicide.

The reports say Wood never let go of a silver .45-caliber semi-automatic pistol. Often he pointed the gun at his head or chest.

Police also were worried, documents say, Wood had an AR-15 assault rifle in his truck or under the carport. Police found magazines for the weapon in the house but could not find the rifle.

At about 2 p.m., police fired tear gas and pepper balls at Wood. This forced him out of his truck through the passenger door. He spent his last few hours standing or crouching in his driveway.

By 8 p.m., police were noticing Wood -- who had gone all day with no food or water -- was starting to nod his head as if he were falling asleep. Darkness was falling.

Steve Major, a deputy Davis County attorney who was advising police, said the Salt Lake City SWAT leaders were worried they would not be able to keep sight of Wood in the dark. Police commanders devised a plan to get Wood on the telephone then send three teams toward him firing nonlethal devices. Snipers had positions across the street at the Farmington Fire Department.

The operation began at about 9 p.m. Police threw concussion grenades and hit Wood with rubber bullets. Throughout the episode, officers were yelling and pleading with Wood to drop the gun.

Wood took cover behind the utility trailer. The smoke from the grenades and Wood moving behind the utility trailer took him out of sight of the snipers. Davis County Sheriff’s Deputy Josh Boucher, who joined the SWAT team in April, ran from the fire station up to the SWAT teams so he could see Wood.

Salt Lake City Officer Brett Olsen climbed above a fence and shot Wood in the back with a Taser. When Wood yelled to stop “Tazing” him, Olsen wrote, Olsen determined the charge wasn’t taking effect. Olsen pulled the Taser’s trigger again and kept giving Wood charges until he moved out from behind the trailer and to the ground.

To Boucher, it looked like Wood was charging at officers. Boucher would later tell investigators he couldn’t believe the sight -- and it scared him.

Then Boucher heard a gunshot. Wood fired a shot in the direction of one of the SWAT teams, according to documents. The bullet lodged in the headlight of a pickup.

Boucher, who was not wearing body armor like the other SWAT officers, moved in front of Wood and saw him on his knees positioning his pistol to fire at one of the SWAT teams.

Boucher aimed his .308-caliber rifle at Wood’s head and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. Boucher left up the bolt of his rifle to prevent an accidental discharge.

Boucher closed the bolt, and took another aim. This time, Boucher said, he saw the muzzle of Wood’s pistol pointed at him. With his scope, Boucher could even see the grooves inside Wood’s barrel.

Boucher said he thought of his wife and daughter and that he had acted too late to protect himself and the other officers. But Boucher again took aim at Wood’s head. This time his rifle fired. The bullet pierced Wood’s carotid artery and the vertebrae in his neck. He died at the scene.

Police found the AR-15 rifle in a bag in the rear of the carport, along with a .22-caliber rifle.

Salt Lake City police Sgt. Josh Scharman told investigators the nonlethal munitions should have forced Wood to surrender.

“Sgt. Scharman said in all his barricade incidents, he has not had one with as much determination” as Wood showed.