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Otto Zehm

Otto Zehm, 36, died March 20, 2006.

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Track the trial of Officer Karl F. Thompson

A jury convicted Spokane Police Officer Karl F. Thompson Jr. of needlessly beating Otto Zehm and then lying about it to cover up his actions. The verdict was delivered in federal court in Yakima on Wednesday, Nov. 2, 2011 – five years and seven months since Zehm’s life ended and questions of police accountability began.

Prosecutors are expected to seek a sentence of 6 to 8 years in prison for Thompson, who will remain free until a hearing can be scheduled.

The 2006 police confrontation that led to the death of Zehm, a Spokane man with schizophrenia, also spurred an unsettled civil lawsuit, and led to the creation of a police ombudsman position and changes to police protocol.

Thompson’s trial began Oct. 12, 2011, in Yakima. The venue was moved there over concerns about pretrial publicity in Spokane and how that may prejudice the juror pool.

On March 18, 2006, officers responded to a Zip Trip in north Spokane after two young women erroneously reported that a man had tried to rob them at a nearby automatic teller machine. At the convenience store, officers confronted Otto Zehm, 36, who was holding a pop bottle.

Zehm was beaten with a baton, shocked with a Taser and left “hogtied” on the floor. He lost consciousness at the scene and died two days later in a hospital. In May 2006, Spokane County Medical Examiner Sally Aiken ruled that Zehm died as a result of homicide, with lack of oxygen to the brain as the official cause.

Public outcry over Zehm’s death and others prompted outside review of the Police Department, changes to protocol and the creation of a police ombudsman position. The latter has drawn criticism.

In March 2009, the Center for Justice filed a federal civil rights suit against the city of Spokane and nine of its police officers on behalf of Zehm’s family. The lawsuit alleged that officers used excessive force and that the police department and its former acting chief, Jim Nicks, engaged in a conspiracy to portray Zehm as the aggressor. That lawsuit has been on hold pending the outcome of Thompson’s criminal trial. In June 2009, a federal grand jury handed down two indictments against Thompson, the first officer to respond to the Zip Trip. The federal charges accused Thompson of violating Zehm’s civil rights.

Documents filed in April 2010 raised serious new allegations in the case. In them, federal prosecutors suggest members of the Spokane Police Department tried to cover up their handling of the confrontation with Zehm and that the agency’s investigation clearing officers of wrongdoing was incomplete and inaccurate.

In August 2011, documents were filed indicating that Nicks would testify that Thompson violated several use-of-force policies and that the department’s investigation was poorly done, prompting Mayor Mary Verner to say the city would re-evaluate the “city’s position in the civil and criminal case.”

A timeline of the case shows five years of complex legal wrangling involving the criminal case against Thompson and a $2.9 million civil claim by Zehm’s mother and estate against the city of Spokane.

Updated Nov. 2, 2011

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