Claim filed in deadly police shooting
Sister seeking answers into killing of mentally ill man in apartment
A state district judge on Tuesday appointed the sister of a mentally ill man who died following a violent encounter with Santa Fe police on July 19 as personal representative of her brother’s estate in investigating and pursuing a wrongful death claim.
Judge Sarah Singleton approved the petition by Roseanne Lopez, the adult sister of Anthony Benavidez, 24, who died after police assaulted a mid-town apartment where he had barricaded himself inside after using a knife to wound a mental health worker.
The appointment is a first legal step toward the potential filing of a lawsuit over the death of Benavidez in an encounter that is under investigation by state police and the subject of a Santa Fe Police Department internal investigation.
Video released by police show one city officer fired 16 rounds from a handgun and a second officer fired one round from a rifle through the window of a room where Benavidez was subsequently found on the floor.
The mother of the dead man has also raised questions about his release from a hospital a day earlier after sheriff ’s deputies took him to Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center for a mental health evaluation.
Shannon Kennedy, a partner at the Albuquerque-based civil rights firm that filed the court petition, said it is her understanding that hospitals have a duty under state law not to release a patient who is found to be a danger to themselves or to the community. She said the family has requested medical records to determine what led to Benavidez’s release from the hospital.
Kennedy also said the family has questions about why the body camera worn by Officer Jeremie Bisagna stopped recording minutes before Bisagna fired 16 successive shots from a handgun through a window after SWAT officers moved to arrest Benavidez.
Kennedy said attorneys have yet to review all the records in the case. But even without the context new records can provide, she said, the video footage from other officers’ cameras is “really shocking” and a cause for concern about why police did not de-escalate the situation.
Generally, under state law, officers are allowed to use deadly force against someone if they perceive an immediate and deadly threat to officers or to the public. State police, who are investigating the shooting, have said members of the Santa Fe police SWAT team decided to move in and arrest Benavidez after he threw two nonfunctioning explosive or chemical devices in the direction of officers, who were not harmed.
“My understanding is officers are trained to shoot twice and reassess,” Kennedy said. “And there doesn’t seem to be reassessing the appearance of any immediate threat of deadly force.”
Police believe Benavidez, after being released from the hospital, broke into his old apartment at Tuscany at St. Francis, where he had been evicted for nonpayment of rent. The next day, police brought a social worker to the scene to try to talk Benavidez out of the apartment. But he stabbed the social worker with a knife and barricaded himself inside as police tried to negotiate for an hour.
Recordings released by Santa Fe police show the SWAT team move in and break a window while shouting commands at Benavidez to show his hands. Seconds after the window was smashed, Officer Bisagna fired 16 shots through the window and Officer Luke Wakefield fired one.
A short time later, Bisagna is heard on a
recording telling another officer he thought Benavidez was going to shoot and kill officers. But in the recordings of the incident, no officer is heard saying anything about Benavidez having a gun.
Minutes before the shooting, Bisagna’s body camera was shut off after a gloved hand passed over it. The Santa Fe police chief has said an internal investigation will be conducted into whether Bisagna intentionally turned the camera off, which would be a violation of department policy.
A Christus St. Vincent spokesman has not responded to The New Mexican’s request to explain the hospital’s general policy for determining whether someone is a danger to themselves or the community and has cited patient confidentially laws in not commenting on Benavidez’s release.
Lopez, Benavidez’s sister, filed the claim through a law firm known for civil rights litigation over incidents of police misconduct. The Kennedy, Kennedy & Ives firm represented the family of James Boyd, a 38-year-old schizophrenic man who died after a March 2014 shooting by Albuquerque police, a case that raised questions about whether Boyd was preparing to surrender and sparked protests and reform over how police interact with people with mental illness. The city of Albuquerque entered a $5 million settlement with Boyd’s family in 2014.
Kennedy stressed that Lopez’s appointment does not mean a lawsuit will be filed; rather, it represents questions raised by Benavidez’s family.
“That’s a part of the paradox, that you have to file litigation to get answers,” Kennedy said.