Spokane7
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August 21, 2011 in City
Timeline of events in Otto Zehm case
• March 18, 2006: Otto Zehm, 36, a mentally ill and unemployed janitor, is beaten, Tasered and hogtied inside a Zip Trip convenience store by seven Spokane police officers after being wrongly identified as a suspect in a possible theft. Acting police Chief Jim Nicks says Zehm was combative and “lunged” at the first officer on the scene, Karl Thompson, forcing the use of defensive tactics. Officers say Zehm has a prior arrest for assaulting a police officer.
• March 20, 2006: Zehm dies at Deaconess Medical Center. Police acknowledge that the potential theft report that led to the confrontation was unfounded.
• March 22, 2006: Thompson gives a two-hour, off-the-record interview to Detective Terry Ferguson. They return, after lunch, for a taped interview in which Thompson describes Zehm as having refused orders to drop a plastic soda bottle, prompting the use of a police baton to ward off an expected assault.
• March 23, 2006: Nicks reviews security video from the Zip Trip with detectives. He cites the ongoing investigation in refusing requests to make copies of the video footage publicly available.
• March 24, 2006: Police acknowledge that earlier statements about Zehm having a history of assaulting law enforcement officers were incorrect.
• March 29, 2006: Detective Ferguson obtains a statement from an ambulance technician who wrote that Thompson told Officer Tim Moses he’d hit Zehm in the head and neck with his baton. That report – which indicates Thompson may have used unjustified lethal force – was never turned over to county prosecutors.
• March 30, 2006: Spokane County Prosecutor Steve Tucker orders that security footage of the Zehm confrontation remain sealed for investigative purposes.
• April 6, 2006: The FBI, without explanation, retracts a statement from two days earlier that agents have begun a preliminary inquiry into Zehm’s death.
• April 14, 2006: The City of Spokane blocks access to public records surrounding the Zehm case, with Nicks explaining he’s angry about The Spokesman-Review’s coverage of Zehm and an earlier case involving a Spokane firefighter having sex with a 16-year-old girl.
• May 30, 2006: Spokane County Medical Examiner Sally Aiken lists “homicide” as the cause of Zehm’s death. Nicks says in response, “I’m very comfortable that the officers confronted a hostile individual, somebody who wasn’t listening for whatever reason.”
• May 31, 2006: Detective Ferguson finishes her investigation into the fatality, concluding that none of the seven officers who struggled with Zehm committed a crime. Ferguson determines the use of force was appropriate, citing the plastic soda bottle held by Zehm in concluding Thompson was justified in using his baton “to pre-empt an anticipated assault.” Ferguson never mentions in her report the plastic mask that an officer placed over Zehm’s mouth and nose.
• June 7, 2006: Attorneys representing Zehm’s family, after a private viewing of the still-sealed security video, demand an official retraction of the city’s description of events. “It is clear from the Zip Trip video that Mr. Zehm never made any movements towards the officer, and only retreated from the officer’s advances,” the attorneys write.
• June 21, 2006: Assistant City Attorney Rocky Treppiedi disputes the Zehm family’s assertions, writing, in part: “What you have characterized as misrepresentations appear to be your own subjective view of the video and facts.”
• July 10, 2006: Spokane County Deputy Prosecutor Jack Driscoll directs police to check the plastic Pepsi bottle that police said Zehm was wielding for fingerprints. Zehm’s fingerprints were not found.
• July 13, 2006: Under threat of lawsuit, Tucker authorizes public release of the security video, which shows no “lunge” and appears to contradict other key assertions in the city’s official version of events.
In a personal notebook, now on file in U.S. District Court, Nicks writes that he learns for the first time that officers had placed a mask on Zehm’s face while hogtied. “This was a surprise to me,” he writes, later directing officers to send it to the medical examiner.
• July 14, 2006: Nicks publicly backs Thompson’s actions despite acknowledging his previous incorrect descriptions of the events. “As time goes on, and we talk to more and more people, it supports Karl’s account of the incident,” Nicks said. “The only thing that matters is what was in Karl Thompson’s mind at the moment.”
• July 17, 2006: Mayor Dennis Hession announces that he’ll seek an outside agency to investigate the Zehm case. Hession says the Police Department has lost the trust of the community because of credibility and integrity issues. Hession also discloses that the FBI, despite its earlier denial, is in fact conducting a civil rights investigation into Zehm’s death.
• July 25, 2006: Tucker says he rejected requests from “others” to allow a prosecutor from another jurisdiction work on the Zehm case. “I said, ‘No. I can do it,’ ” explained Tucker, a former Washington State Patrol trooper. “It’s my job to make the decision.”
• July 27, 2006: Don Pierce, executive director of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, is hired by the city to review the Spokane Police Department’s policies and procedures. Pierce pulls out less than an hour later after questions arise over his controversial departure in 2004 from his job as chief of the Boise Police Department following a mayoral corruption scandal.
Hession also announces that he has hired a consultant from Louisville, Ky., to review both the Zehm and the firehouse sex cases.
• Aug. 2, 2006: Nicks writes in his notebook that Rocky Treppiedi, the assistant city attorney who had been called to the Zip Trip by Nicks the night of the confrontation, tells him detectives obtained third and fourth camera angles from the Zip Trip. “According to Rocky, the video cameras showed nothing of value,” Nicks writes.
• Aug. 3, 2006: After learning that some Spokane media outlets are pursing footage of the additional security camera angles, Nicks instructs Ferguson to review the tapes again. Within the hour, Ferguson tells Nicks that the fourth camera angle shows Zehm holding a Pepsi bottle, which did not appear in any other camera angle.
The video shows Zehm on his back and using the bottle to protect his face from Officer Thompson’s blows. Police Cpl. Tom Lee acknowledges that earlier descriptions of Zehm “swinging” the bottle at Thompson probably used too strong a word.
• Aug. 29, 2006: Tucker announces he will wait to decide whether criminal charges should be filed in the Zehm case until after Sept. 11, when new police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick takes over. Tucker also says Aiken had not yet finished her second review of the cause of death. She had been asked to consider what role the mask may have played.
• Oct. 4, 2006: Tucker puts his review of the case on hold, explaining that the FBI found a witness who had not been interviewed by Spokane police, and that federal agents had obtained different stories than those detailed in Spokane police reports.
• July 23, 2007: Attorneys from the Center for Justice file a $2.9 million claim against the city, alleging officers used excessive force and caused Zehm’s death.
• October 2008: Federal investigators inform Chief Kirkpatrick of their criminal investigation. Kirkpatrick volunteers to impose a department-wide gag order preventing officers from talking to other officers before their grand jury testimony to help maintain the integrity of the federal investigation.
• October 2008 to June 2009: Treppiedi, according to court records, begins preparing “the majority” of Spokane police officers for testimony before the federal grand jury and debriefs them afterward about what they said. This also includes non-police witnesses.
• Oct. 20, 2008: The City Council votes to spend as much as $45,000 to pay attorney Carl Oreskovich to represent the city and its officers in the claim filed by the attorneys for Zehm’s mother and estate. At about the same time, Oreskovich says Thompson hired him to represent him in the criminal matter.
• Nov. 21, 2008: Nicks testifies under oath to the grand jury. He refuses to answer a question by Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Durkin about conversations with Treppiedi prior to his testimony.
• March 1, 2009: Mayor Mary Verner and Chief Kirkpatrick publicly declare their support for Officer Thompson. “I’ve looked into the details surrounding this incident,” Verner says in an interview with The Spokesman-Review, “and I just don’t think the behavior of the officer rose to a criminal behavior.” Says Kirkpatrick: Thompson “has my unequivocal support. Based on all the information and evidence I have reviewed, I have determined that Officer Karl Thompson acted consistent with the law.”
• March 14, 2009: Attorneys representing Zehm’s estate and mother file a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city, Nicks, Thompson and Officers Steven Braun, Zack Dahle, Erin Raleigh, Dan Torok, Ron Voeller and Jason Uberuaga and Detective Terry Ferguson.
• May 26, 2009: The Spokane City Council increases to $200,000 the amount it’s willing to pay Oreskovich to represent the city and its officers.
• June 18, 2009: The city files its answer to the civil lawsuit, essentially blaming Zehm for his own death.
• June 19, 2009: A federal grand jury meeting in Spokane indicts Thompson on charges of using unreasonable force and lying to investigators.
• June 22, 2009: City Attorney Howard Delaney says he doesn’t believe that Thompson “acted to willingly deprive Mr. Zehm of his constitutional rights.” He adds, “I have not necessarily seen everything that the grand jury has.”
• July 9, 2009: U.S. Magistrate Judge Cynthia Imbrogno declares Thompson indigent and appoints Oreskovich to represent him in the criminal case, despite Thompson’s $73,000 annual salary and interest in a $675,000 home in Hayden.
• Oct. 21, 2009: U.S. District Judge Lonny Suko puts the civil case on hold pending the outcome of the criminal case against Thompson.
• March 25, 2010: Nicks is identified in court documents as a potential prosecution witness, the first indication that a high-ranking city official was prepared to contradict at least portions of the city’s official version of events.
• April 13, 2010: Court documents filed by federal prosecutors indicate Detective Terry Ferguson is expected to testify “that there were many glaring missteps and omissions during the course of the SPD’s ‘independent investigation.’ ” Prosecutors also note that Spokane detectives tried to discredit a witness to the Zehm confrontation who they considered to have “an anti-law enforcement bias,” and that other witnesses who reviewed the way Spokane police summarized their statements said incriminating information was left out.
• June 4, 2010: Thompson’s defense lawyers, after interviewing Nicks about his grand jury testimony, ask the judge to prohibit Nicks from testifying in the Oct. 11 trial.
• Aug. 5: Documents are filed in U.S. District Court signed by Nicks indicating that Thompson violated several use-of-force policies in his initial contact with Zehm and that the department’s investigation into the fatality was poorly done.
• Aug. 8: Mayor Mary Verner says she is aware of the new filing describing Nicks’ testimony and will read it to see out how it “affects the city’s position in the civil and criminal case.”
• Aug. 9: Verner announces that the city will review its legal strategy as a result of the declaration by Nicks.
• Aug. 12: Attorney Courtney Garcea, who works with attorneys representing Thompson, files the declaration of Dr. Daniel Davis, who lists Zehm’s “proximate cause of death” as compression asphyxia caused by officers pressing down on him while he was hogtied on his stomach. “After pressure was removed, it was noticed almost immediately that (Zehm) was unresponsive.”
• Aug. 15: The City Council is briefed on a proposal to spend as much as $75,000 on a Seattle-based attorney to represent Jim Nicks.
Compiled by Thomas Clouse
1992 murder trial begins against sex offender 
DHF on August 21 at 5:29 a.m.
After reading this It shows a long convoluted attempt to cover up what happened to Mr. Zehm from the Mayor down. I trust that a jury will see this in the same light.
Ron_the_Cop on August 21 at 5:53 a.m.
DHF,
I agrees with your opinion and would encourage others to read
Shawn Vestal’s excellent latest column that so concisely exposes this cover up:
Many things Jim Nicks didn’t do in Zehm case
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2011/aug/19/many-things-jim-nicks-didnt-do-in-zehm-case/
Ron_the_Cop on August 21 at 7:01 a.m.
I commend the S-R for assembling this timeline. It’s also very important for citizens to see the connections between the firehouse sex scandal and the Zehm case e.g. the then Acting Chief Nicks now Asst. Chief and Sgt. Joe Peterson and other related information.
The following are direct quotes or paraphrases from my earlier posts:
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2011/aug/19/many-things-jim-nicks-didnt-do-in-zehm-case/?comments#c333768
SPD Major Crimes Unit Supv Sgt. Joe Peterson:
This firehouse sex scandal occurred on Chief Nicks’ watch and he approved the only minimal discipline in this case. Why the light discipline in this case? Was it because the City Attorney was complicit in this case too to minimize the City’s liability exposure and the dets were following orders from above?
Chief Nicks also apparently tried to cover up the arrest of his daughter for DUI. Further I’m told that Chief Nicks and former City Administrator Lynch stymied the prosecution of a sitting federal court judge for public indecency in Riverfront Park.
The Zehm case also occurred on Chief Nicks’ watch. It’s very important to note that Chief Nicks not only met with detectives as described in the S-R’s timeline to view some of the video with dets on March 23, 2010 but two other high ranking officers were also present. Chief Nicks’ subordinates could have mislead him but the feds uncovered this in their investigation:
City elected and appointed leaders either knew or should have known that a cover up was in the works. Yet they sat idly by and did NOTHING and continue to do NOTHING!
It is inconceivable to me that the Mayor Verner did not know a cover up was underway by high ranking police officials and the City Attorney’s Office in April of 2010. Mayor Verner may have been following the recommendation of the City Attorney’s Office however Mayor Verner is also an attorney and should have known better. See my comment here http://tinyurl.com/3kv56ry
Det. Ron Wright (Retired - 35 yrs Riverside PD, CA)
Principal, Ron Wright Investigations LLC
Ron_the_Cop on August 21 at 7:45 a.m.
CAUTION -
In my post above I may have confused apples with oranges. I said it was Chief Nicks that attempted to cover up his daughter’s arrest and the indecent exposure by a sitting federal court judge. This may have actually been Chief Oldenthal that was quietly ushered out the door. Chief Oldenthat was also present when the video was view on March 23, 2006.
I will reconfirm with my source and post an update.
Ron_the_Cop on August 21 at 9:24 a.m.
UPDATE -
Yes I checked with my source. It was Chief Odenthal who attempted to cover up his daughter’s DUI arrest and acted with former Asst City Administrator Lynch regarding not submitting the indecent exposure case involving the sitting federal judge for prosecution.
I erred above in linking Chief Nicks to these incidents.
brianrbreen on August 21 at 9:32 a.m.
Good job Mr. Brundt et al! I have a pretty good idea where you got some of it (I’m sure you know what I mean). There is a lot more out there, keep working it please.
brianrbreen on August 21 at 11:05 a.m.
One should take special note of this. I suspect Treppiedi will deny he said there was nothing of value.
• Aug. 2, 2006: Nicks writes in his notebook that Rocky Treppiedi, the assistant city attorney who had been called to the Zip Trip by Nicks the night of the confrontation, tells him detectives obtained third and fourth camera angles from the Zip Trip. “According to Rocky, the video cameras showed nothing of value,” Nicks writes.
First mistake Chief Nicks, even though you were aware that Chief Bragdon was trying to micro manage the issues in the Major Crimes Unit and likely told you to be careful of what goes on there, you didn’t bother to confirm every aspect of what you were being told.
Second mistake, given what you knew or should have known from previous experience never rely on a city attorney’s (Treppiedi in this case) review of critical evidence, do it yourself.
Perhaps some day you or Chief Kirkpatrick will be in a position to explain why one of the people involved in the Zehm case is no longer with the department.
DickAdams on August 21 at 11:27 a.m.
Its not like me to give credit to the Spokesman Review but the timeline column published today was very nicely done. After my perusal of it, its amazing to me that Rocky Treppiedi hasn`t been fired and that Mayor Verner and the city attorney put up with his ruthless tactics. On second thought both have consistently supported the way he handles his work for the city and have condoned it.. I hope Treppiedi doesn`t sue me for posting my comment.
misjustice on August 21 at 12:23 p.m.
“June 21, 2006: Assistant City Attorney Rocky Treppiedi disputes the Zehm family’s assertions, writing, in part: “What you have characterized as misrepresentations appear to be your own subjective view of the video and facts.”
Dick, this is for you…
a link to the letter:
http://autoreviewonline.com/sections/zehm/documents/071206_justicecenter.pdf
Ron_the_Cop on August 21 at 1:00 p.m.
Ms. Justy,
Good for you! Dick and all of us can’t afford to pay to defend against the frivolous suits Treppiedi lobs over the transom to make folks go away and shut up.
I will be posting my recommendation to Council on what should be done re SPD et al in Brunt’s main story thread in today’s S-R.
Justy - Don’t you find it interesting that as far as I know the City hasn’t said anything that it was looking for a new chief of police. Chief Kirkpatrick announced several months ago that she was leaving. What do you suppose the Mayor has up her sleeve? Sorry Mayor I’m going to put you in check on this one:-)
Brian do you see this same move coming?
I will be emailing my recommendation to Council and will deliver it at tomorrow night’s Council meeting discussing the OPO ordinance. Hopefully I will be able to deliver it without President Shogan ruling me out of order again:-)
Jesty - Do you think I should have my bail money in hand in case Shogan tries to have me arrested for disturbing the Council meeting? Actually I would dare Shogan to do it as I could use a little pocket money from this gravy train that we taxpayers are going pay to in settle this case. Too bad those involved in this cover up won’t have to pay out of their own pockets.
Squid on August 21 at 1:15 p.m.
Jason Uberuaga who was a big part of Otto’s death went on to rape a woman in his patrol car and take naked pictures of her on his police cell phone, while he was out drinking and driving in his patrol car.
Dan Torok, who also had a big part in this murder, and Jason Uberuaga later murdered a man in the Intermodal shooting.
Uberuaga was later fired, but later rehired.
misjustice on August 21 at 1:19 p.m.
Have your bail money in hand, Ron! And remember, you only get 3 minutes!
Maybe Anne is still here only because no other city will take her; I mean she’s too young to retire and too much of a liability for another city/town to assume, IMO. So, we are stuck with her.
Interesting that she originally got into law enforcement (in Memphis) because she couldn’t find a job in business admin, her undergraduate major…
This is the stellar resume that she used to get Mayor Hession et al to hire her…
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/sections/chiefsearch/documents/062806_reskirkpatrick.pdf
brianrbreen on August 21 at 1:34 p.m.
@Ron_The_Cop
Yep! But I doubt you will see any moves until after the trial. Right now their biggest concern is what will come out at trial. I’m sure there is lots of stuff that isn’t in the public domain they have a big concern about. If the feds are consistent with the way I’ve seen them handle cases in the past I would bet that right now there are some people downtown scurrying around trying to figure out what they are going to do and say.
Ron_the_Cop on August 21 at 2:40 p.m.
Brian,
Brilliant minds think alike. BTW I forgot to mention the email thing. Consider the Federal Wire Tap and Electronic Communication Act re our discussion the other day. Hence my drawing of the line in the sand to Garve Brackel to do the right thing:-)
DickAdams on August 21 at 8:58 p.m.
Thanks MisJ re the letter. I`d read it sometime ago and like many of us have Rocco`s minus number. His kind make excellent ambulance chasers.
misjustice on August 21 at 9:02 p.m.
Ahhh, I might have known that a guy like you, in the loop and all, would have already read it…I posted it just in case you hadn’t, and for others that may not have had access…
You gonna be at the big meetin’ tomorrow night?
misjustice on August 26 at 2:29 p.m.
Timeline? Where is the posting/timeline saying the two girls that accused Zehm of the theft were dropped from any prosecution? Why were they dropped? If it wasn’t for them making false statements about someone him, he may still be alive today.
I’m sorry for Mr. Zehm, but these girls need to be prosecuted for filing a false police report which ultimately caused the death of someone!!