An independent investigation released on Monday found that Aurora, Colorado, police officers had no legal basis to stop, frisk, and use a chokehold on Elijah McClain. McClain, a 23-year-old Black man, died after an August 2019 encounter with police and paramedics during which he was restrained and sedated. The report was commissioned by the City Council of Aurora and written by a panel of three experts in policing, constitutional law, and emergency medicine. The panel reviewed evidence including body camera footage from police officers involved in McClain’s death and interviewed personnel from Aurora Police and Aurora Fire.
According to the panel, officers decided to stop McClain because he was wearing a ski mask in warm weather and acting “suspicious” in an area with high crime rates. The report concludes that officers’ decision to “turn what may have been a consensual encounter with Mr. McClain into an investigatory stop … did not appear to be supported by any officer’s reasonable suspicion that Mr. McClain was engaged in criminal activity.” After making contact with McClain, officers decided to frisk him for weapons. The panel was unable to find evidence to justify a pat-down search. Officers then attempted to lay McClain down in a nearby grass area using “forceful techniques” inappropriate unless officers have “probable cause that a crime was committed by the subject.” The panel found no such probable cause.
Officers used “pain compliance techniques” on McClain, applying two carotid holds, sitting or kneeling on McClain, and threatening to have a dog bite him. According to the report, the “vast majority of this treatment occurred after Mr. McClain was handcuffed and lying on the ground,” while McClain apologized to officers, cried, and vomited. Paramedics from Aurora Fire arrived but did not aid McClain for “several minutes.” Paramedics eventually “administered a ketamine dosage based on a grossly inaccurate and inflated estimate of Mr. McClain’s size.” Four minutes after Paramedics administered the ketamine, McClain suffered cardiac arrest. He was declared brain dead several days later.
The panel neglects to make a final determination on whether officers or paramedics violated department policy or the law. However, the panel suggests that implicit racial bias may have caused officers to stop McClain and may have caused paramedics to overestimate his size when determining ketamine dosage. The panel recommends that Aurora review its policy and training on implicit bias, crisis intervention, use of force, police accountability, and the transfer of individuals from police to paramedics.
Other investigations into McClain’s death persist, including a civil lawsuit against the city and individuals filed by McClain’s family.
