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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCITIZEN REVIEW BOARD - MINUTES - 07/09/2025 (2) Citizen Review Board REGULAR MEETING July 9, 2025 – 5:30 PM 222 Laporte Ave, Colorado River Room (Main Floor) 1. CALL TO ORDER: Called to order by Shamera Loose at 5:33 PM 2. ROLL CALL a. Board Members Present – Shamera Loose, Valerie Krier, Amy Hoeven, Michael Ruttenberg, Melissa Rosas, Veronica Olivas, Mike O’Malley b. Board Members Absent - None c. Staff Members Present – Lieutenant Jackie Pearson, Assistant City Attorney Sara Arfmann, Jessica Jones d. Guest(s) – Gloria Rosas 3. AGENDA REVIEW 4. CITIZEN PARTICIPATION 5. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: a. June 11, 2025: Correction to Sara Arfmann’s last name, and clarification that Veronica graduated from the Larimer County Sheriff’s Academy. Amy Hoeven motions to approve the corrected minutes, which was seconded by Melissa Rosas. Motion passed. 6. UNFINISHED BUSINESS 7. NEW BUSINESS a. Introduction of Lieutenant Jackie Pearson b. Voicemail: 1 voicemail from Deborah Polis; Mike O’Malley spoke with her and provided her with an overview of CiRB functions and resources to get more information. c. E-mail: None d. CIRT Training with Lt. Sara Lynd Sara Lynd is a Lieutenant in the Investigations Unit, in charge of Crimes Against Persons and supervises the Victim Advocates and Property and Evidence. Critical Incident Response Team is run by the DA for the Eight Judicial District. All law enforcement agencies in Larimer and Jackson counties are a part of CIRT. Each year, CIRT Lead rotates between the Larimer County Sheriff’s Office, Fort Collins Police Services, and Loveland Police Department. The Lead Agency’s role is to assign the Investigation Team Lead agency, assign the Crime Scene Team Lead agency, and coordinate CIRT training, meetings and activities. In practice, all three agencies discuss who should handle the Lead on a case-by- case basis. CIRT began in 2005, and its protocol has been modified as of 2015, 2018, and 2022. Topics include invocation, incident command, crime scene management, investigation management, DA responsibilities, interaction is IA, media, victim advocacy, peer support, and various checklists. Critical incidents are incidents occurring in the Eighth Judicial District, involving two or more people, in which a policy agency employee is involved as an actor, victim, or custodial officer and where fatal injury or serious bodily injury (SBI) occurs. Serious bodily injury is defined as a bodily injury which, either at the time of the actual injury or at a later time, involves a substantial risk of death, serious permanent disfigurement, protracted loss or impairment of the functions of any part or organ of the body, or burns of the second or third degree. What is not on here are fractures, but these incidents often end up being reviewed by CIRT anyway. Board Member Question: For CIRT investigations involving an employee acting in a private capacity as a citizen is a judgement call? Yes. There is discretionary CIRT. What usually happens is that there will be a phone call, and all of the facts will be reviewed. Body Worn Cameras help, because they allow supervisors to review all events. The Chief of Police can weigh in, along with the DA. Venue agency is the agency within whose geographical jurisdiction and primary boundary the incident occurred. The involved agency is the agency with which the involved employee is employed or affiliated with. A CIRT protocol may be scaled as appropriate and agreed upon. The involved agency will not be the lead investigative or crime scene agency, and involvement will be minimal. Administrative investigations are subordinate to criminal investigations. Board Member Question: Was the decision to remove fractures from the definition of serious bodily injury for CIRT to save time? How often, prior to the change in 2022 were fractures being investigated? It wasn’t a large chunk of CIRTs conducted, but the DA wanted the ability to scale that response. If someone is struck by a baton, it may cause a fracture, but that is very different from a shooting or another more serious incident. Board Member Question: For crime scene processing, does FCPS still submit DNA to CBI and do they experience backlogging because of what is going on with them right now? There is a proposal that CBI not do law enforcement work, and instead have it be farmed out to an independent company. When an agency is the crime scene lead, they are the ones who handle the submittal of evidence to CBI. FCPS hasn’t recently had any cases where they had to submit DNA, but in general, they would use labs all over the state, because of the backlog. More often, it is firearms or drugs instead of DNA. Even if something happens a week after an incident occurs, it is still screened by CIRT. Board Member Question: Would a should dislocation be considered as SBI? Just a shoulder dislocation may not rise to the level of a CIRT. It depends on the situations. The total facts of the incident would have to be examined. It would definitely be reviewed, if someone is concerned enough to call about it, the CIRT team would talk it through. Board Member Question: If a shoulder dislocation occurs and the officer is not concerned about it, but then a concern comes up later, where is the catch? It sounds like there is reliance on the officer to raise the flag. Sometimes, an officer may be relying on what the doctor tells them, and injuries are caught later, after reports are reviewed. Any injury would be looked at on a lot of different levels, including a supervisory review for any use of force, so there are a lot of points in which injuries can be caught. Officers are prohibited viewing of body worn camera prior to an interview, after a critical incident occurs. Additionally, the requirement to collect a handgun in any/all cases has been removed, and is now only removed when the handgun itself is of evidentiary value. Board Member Question: For body worn cameras, since the officer can’t view it: physiologically, a person’s body goes through distortions, tunnel vision, etc., so would an officer be told that they were lying, or is that taken into consideration? No, the reason they are not allowed to watch the video, because an officer’s perception is more important than what a camera catches. Cameras can be distorted as well, and there have been many studies done in which objects appear to be in a different position because of the camera lens. The officer has an opportunity to view it after the interview, and then can add additional info that comes back to them. The investigation team lead is responsible for all follow up investigation, canvasing, writing applicable warrants, interviews, and preparing the investigative summary report. Crime scene leads are responsible for all crime scene investigations, including indoor/outdoor crime scenes, hospitals, ambulance, medical/fire personnel, vehicles, involved and witness officers, suspects, and autopsies. Board Member Question: Do you run GSRs on officers? The protocol says that it is necessary, but if the officer admits that they fired the gun, and there is video evidence, there is no reason to further verify that that is true. CIRT has used it for suspects, or if there is a question of whether a gun was fired. All public information is released on behalf of the CIRT, not the individual agency, which requires a great deal of coordination amongst the agency PIOs and District Attorney. Officers and detectives should not make public statements or release info about CIRT investigations. CIRT for Karen Garner in Loveland was done by FCPS; this is an example of a case that can be investigated at any point, once it is discovered. It was an officer involved incident use of force. 2025 has had 5 CIRTS, which is more than they have had in the past two years. 2022 was one of the worst years, with a total of 10 CIRTs. CIRT is known for its collaboration and communication. The agencies are lucky to have frequent, clear channels to communicate, which allows the team to be effective, even in chaotic situations. Board Member Question: If there is a dangerous suspect at large, how quickly can FCPS get information out to the public? For example, with the shooting at the mall? Is the Real Time Information Center going to be helpful, when it is here? The mall shooting was chaotic, and it is important to be careful not to put out info too fast, which could be wrong. It was very confusing, because there are no cameras in the area where it occurred, so officers had to use the best info they had. FCPS has the capability to do a reverse-911 call to put out an automated message in a neighborhood to let people know. With a Real Time Information Center, it uses existing cameras in Fort Collins, in conjunction with information that people gather from radios, drones, etc. It is very complex and costly, but FCPS hopes to use it in the future. Board Member Question: Based on the speediness of things, does it put pressure on the CIRT to investigate quickly? Is there a turnaround time goal to press charges? During investigations, an officer may know quickly that night that a person is going to jail because it is very clear what happened. They can get a warrant right then if necessary; sometimes, the suspect is injured, which means there is more time, and sometimes they are deceased. It depends on what the best timing, depending on the situation, but the teams feel pressure to move through investigations to ensure that is thorough. Board Member Question: What is the average turnaround time? They are all different. Some are very complex, and some are very cut and dry. There is a balance, but it is difficult to give an average. It can take time for each portion of the investigation to come together. If there is curiosity over how it turned out, every CIRT letter put out by the DA is posted online for everyone to read. Board Member Question: Crimes Against Person Sgt. Wooten came to speak to the board about a tool that was used to determine the lethality of DV situations. Since he is gone, is the tool still used? Yes. It is called the DALE and FCPS is still using it. Kelsey Pitman is one of FCPS civilian employees who is instrumental in using it, and Brandon Wooten is still very engaged in the use of the tool as well. Loveland PD is interested in using it, so FCPS is helping them as well. 8. BOARD MEMBER REPORTS 9. STAFF REPORTS 10. OTHER BUSINESS a. Board members can either fill out the form or email Jackie Pearson if they are interested in participating in a Ride-Along. 11. ADJOURNMENT a. Mike O’Malley moved to adjourn the meeting at 6:45 PM, which was seconded by Amy Hoeven. Motion passed.