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Atlanta Mayor On Shooting: 'It Pissed Me Off'
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Saying there is a "fierce urgency within our communities" to address police reform, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms on Monday announced a series of measures aimed at changing police policies on the use of force.
The mayor made the move after the city erupted this weekend following the fatal police shooting of Rayshard Brooks, a 27-year-old black man who was gunned down in a Wendy's parking lot after a scuffle with police.
"It is clear that we do not have another day, another minute, another hour to waste," she said. "We understand in Atlanta and across the nation that this is the beginning of a great deal of work that lies ahead."
In an impassioned speech, Bottoms said she shared the anger of demonstrators who marched to the Capitol by the hundreds earlier in the day calling for social justice and police reforms. “My anger and my frustration matches theirs," the mayor said. "The difference is that I am using the bully pulpit that I have as mayor to effectuate long-lasting change in this city."
She summed up her feelings about the shooting by saying, "It pissed me off and makes me sad, and I am frustrated."
Mayor @KeishaBottoms announces additional public safety actions. #OneAtlanta https://t.co/rH227eX1gA— City of Atlanta, GA (@CityofAtlanta) June 15, 2020
She said she was heart-broken watching police body and dash camera videos over the weekend of the encounter between Brooks and two officers. A father to three daughters and a stepson, Brooks at one point told an officer it was his daughter's birthday the day before.
"To watch Mr. Brooks on Friday night talk about wanting to go home for his daughter’s birthday," the mayor said, "it breaks my heart.”
She recalled losing her own father at age 24 and how she still cries "about my daddy."
"There is nothing that I can and do as mayor that can bring (Brooks) back," she said. "What it does mean I will work each and every day to make sure it doesn’t happen again."
Watching the officer open fire on Brooks while he fled with a Taser, the mayor said she couldn't help but wonder about how the city's officers are trained. "If someone has your Taser, do our policies then allow you to respond with a weapon?" she asked.
"What happened on Friday became clear there is a need to take an immediate look at our training policies," she said. "It didn't have to end that way."
Then, she repeated, "It didn't have to end that way."
In announcing the new initiatives, Bottoms said officers will be required to use de-escalation tactics “generally and specifically prior to the use of deadly force.” All uses of deadly force must also be reported to the city’s citizens review board, the mayor said.
Officers who see another officer use force “which is beyond reasonable under the circumstances” must intercede and report it to a supervisor, she said.
“It is very clear that our police officers are to be guardians and not warriors within our communities.”
The mayor said she also was signing an additional executive order to convene a body to "succinctly articulate our grievances and what we see as our solutions."
"We hope that this will be a framework in Atlanta and possibly the nation," she said.
Atlanta Police Chief Erika Shields resigned Saturday in wake of the shooting. A national search for a new chief has begun. The officer involved in the shooting, Garrett Rolfe, was fired. A second officer, Devin Brosnan, was placed on administrative duty, pending further investigation.
Bottoms acknowledged the morale of the police force is "bad" following the shooting and weeks of protests after the police killing of George Floyd in Minnesota.
"What I would say to our officers is there is a shift of expectations across this country and that shift will be no different here in Atlanta," the mayor said.
Videos showed the officers and Brooks interacting cordially. But when officers attempted to handcuff him, Brooks tried to flee. He fell to the ground, wrestled with the officers and grabbed one of their Tasers. As he fled, Brooks appeared to turn with the Taser and tried to fire it at Rolfe before he was fatally shot, according to the videos.
GBI Releases Surveillance Video Of Fatal Police Shooting Of Rayshard Brooks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnHecVdUysQ&feature=youtu.be
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