Questions have been raised over the police actions leading to the falling of porn actor and murder suspect Stephen Clancy Hill (aka Steve Driver) off a cliff in California. Police reportedly tasered Hill despite the fact that he was perched on the cliff, but the video below is unclear whether he jumped or fell.
Hill fell down a 40 foot hillside to his death after spending an hour threatening to kill himself. Some reports state that police justified using the taser out of concern that he was about to hurt himself. However, tif the reported use of the taser is true, it seems quite reckless in this circumstance — regardless of whether it was the cause of the fall.
Hill had a sword with him — possibly the sword that he used to in an attack at a DVD production center that left one person dead and two people injured. Hill, 34, had reportedly been told that he was going to be laid off as a porn actor and told that he could no longer live at one of the studios. The sword was a prop from the production studio. The fatality was Herbert Hin Wong, 30, who was killed trying to help one of the other victims.
Warning: Graphic Video:
We have seen the use of tasers in ill-advised circumstances recently including people covered in fuel. It is also reminiscent of the New York case where a man died after being tasered while standing naked on a perch.
There could be civil liability for the company in this tragedy. The question will be whether there was forewarning about a possible violent outburst after Hill was told that he was both fired and put out on the street. Companies have been sued over the failure to prepare for such reactions — the violent side of the premise of the recent movie Up In The Air. Hill had been convicted previously on a gun charge.
For the full story, click here.
I don’t mind being accused of having good taste. 😀
Former Federal LEO:
“I would have enticed him off the cliff by waltzing Joslyn James…”
I was thinking about things we are conditioned to want that have eye appeal and a recognizable odor. A couple of buckets of KFC extra crispy couldn’t have hurt either. I’m not sure pheromones count but with this kind of situation thinking outside of the box is a virtue. That’s the only problem with BIL’s suggestion IMO: everybody recognizes a Pizza Hut box and smell- GOOD pizza, not so much. I’d rather eat a pizza BIL would select but I’m not sure it would be the best psychological lever 🙂 (Of course adjustments would have to be made for regional fast-food favorites.)
Oh well. One less piece of scum. Let’s not forget that he took an innocent persons life.
Pizza would likely have worked; however, since the guy was in *that* kind of entertainment, I would have enticed him off the cliff by waltzing Joslyn James–or an available facsimile thereof–in front of him–at a safe distance, of course. That might have also kept those impatient, lazy LEOs from thinking about getting home to Miller Time and that fast approaching end-of-the-day time clock and those firehouse TV dinners…
The above suggestions all assume a suspect who isn’t lactose intolerant.
LK,
Good call. And not Pizza Hut either. Really good small batch ‘za made the old fashioned way. Maybe some homemade ice cream for dessert.
It seems to me that time is a valuable and underutilized tool in many stand-offs. Why did they move up on him? He was trapped.
At some point the suspect would have passed out from exhaustion, hunger, dehydration etc. If he fell off the cliff or even jumped, at that point it would be unfortunate but an unintended consequence, not necessarily a predictable outcome of using the least force necessary and the least risky methods to subdue him and take him into custody.
Using tactics that encourage risk to a suicidal suspect doesn’t make sense. If I had been the officer in charge I’d have moved my people back, given it about 6 hours and then ordered up a bunch of pizza’s and eaten them in front of him to motivate him to give up. There are more tools in the kit than hammers.
My understanding is that the stand-off may have lasted as long as eight hours, and that the fire department told the police that trying to place an airbag device would not have worked on the terrain. So it seems the police were backed in to using a technique that involved employing a potentially non-lethal, minimal level of force, that would not have involved injuries to officers. As FFLEO commented, suicide by cop.
The subject jumped to his death and this was “suicide by cop”.
However, the taser *should not* have been used because of the evident likelihood of the subject *falling* off the cliff resulting from his losing control of his body from the taser’s effects that are clearly known by all who were on scene.
I understand that he had cut a number of folks with a sword. The police moved closer and he jumped.
Tasing a guy on the edge of cliff over concern that he might hurt himself, only to have the man subsequently fall to his death? Am I missing something here or is it as completely irrational as it appears?