Officer cleared in fatal shooting of knife-wielding woman
Knife-wielding woman had attempted to climb into police vehicle: ASIRT report
The Alberta Serious Incident Response Team has cleared a Calgary police officer in the 2016 shooting death of 27-year-old Jessica Patterson.
The executive director of the civilian oversight agency, Susan Hughson, said the incident began at 2:34 a.m. on Nov. 29, when someone phoned the non-emergency line and told police that a woman had been screaming for about half an hour outside apartment buildings in the area of 11th Avenue S.W. and 16th Street.
Police dispatched two officers to the area, then received a second call at 2:37 a.m., reporting a woman running in and around the intersection and swinging two knives. The caller initially called the nonemergency line, then switched to 911 upon seeing the knives.
However, that information could not be shared with the dispatched officers before they got to the scene because another incident unfolding at the same time was being communicated on the officers’ assigned channel, Hughson said.
When officers arrived, they saw a woman run to an apartment building ’s main entrance carrying two large knives. The officer in the passenger seat drew her firearm and loudly directed the woman to stop, ASIRT said. Surveillance video from the building obtained as part of the investigation recorded the woman stabbing at the door.
“Immediately thereafter, the woman turned and ran toward the police vehicle in what was described as a sprint, out of view of the building’s security camera,” Hughson said at a news conference.
“The officer standing outside the police vehicle yelled commands to drop the knife. After the first command, the woman yelled ‘help’ but did not drop the knives and continued moving toward the officers. The same thing happened after the second command to drop the knife.”
Hughson said the woman then tried to enter the passenger side of the police vehicle, where an officer was still in the driver’s seat.
“The first officer was about to direct the woman to drop the knife for the fourth time when she saw the woman move toward the interior of the police vehicle and her partner, causing her to fire two shots from her service pistol,” Hughson said.
Patterson, whom family members identified as the victim, died from her injuries. ASIRT, which did not release her name, said an autopsy confirmed she died as a result of two gunshot wounds. Toxicology results showed “significant concentrations” of methadone and cocaine.
The entire incident unfolded in about 17 seconds, according to ASIRT. Hughson said while it was clear the woman was in “some form of crisis,” she described her state as “dangerous and unpredictable.”
“Given her state, the speed with which the situation deteriorated, her apparent irrationality, her close proximity, and her failure to respond to clear simple commands while armed with weapons capable of lethal injury, the officer had no other reasonable options to address the immediate threat,” Hughson said.
In a statement, Calgary police said ASIRT’s decision reaffirms their members took appropriate action.
“It is clear that the responding officers and bystanders were at serious risk of harm as a result of the state of this individual. This dynamic incident took place in a matter of seconds and is merely one of many that our officers face every day,” said CPS.
CPS said they respond to calls thousands of times a year related to addiction and mental health issues. Most of the calls, the service said, end with de-escalation of the situation and further engagement with appropriate agencies to assist in getting help to the most vulnerable.
“Our officers displayed great courage, respect and compassion for the individual involved in this incident,” said CPS, adding this has been a lengthy process and the members involved, who remain on active duty, have the complete support of the service. “The grief being endured by the family is not lost on the members of the Calgary Police Service. In our duty to protect public safety, we always strive for a resolution that preserves life.”
Hughson called Patterson’s death “a tragic loss” for those who loved her.
“She had a family and friends,” Hughson said. “A determination that her death was not criminal does not lessen the magnitude of their loss or the tragedy of her death. The death of this woman was not the outcome anyone, including the involved officers, wanted or expected when police responded to the call.”
Patterson’s mother, Trena Patterson, told Postmedia in January 2017 that it’s hard to recognize her daughter in the police descriptions of what happened that night.
“She was very smart,” she said in 2017. “She wasn’t a druggie … She was doing well. She was doing the best she’s ever done.”
Hughson said when she met with the young woman’s family to go over the results of the investigation, she apologized for the delay in the findings. She said ASIRT has been dealing with a “disproportionate increase in workload.”
Even with the addition of another legal counsel in the ASIRT office, the watchdog is “stretched to the limits,” she told reporters.
“We seem to close one file and in the same day we’ll get another investigation,” she said.
Knowing that family members and officers are waiting for answers is difficult to deal with, Hughson said.
“These are families and officers and their families who are waiting for an outcome, and it’s difficult even just waiting to know what happened,” she said. “So in no way, shape or form is 18 months or 19 months or 20 months an acceptable length of time, in my opinion, for families and officers to wait for a decision.”
She added ASIRT has made “significant headway” on its backlog in cases.