No charges against Denver deputies in suffocation death of black inmate
By Keith Coffman
DENVER (Reuters) - Five sheriff’s deputies will not face criminal charges after a black Denver jail inmate died last year while they restrained him during a schizophrenic episode, the district attorney said on Thursday.
Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey said in a letter that while he sympathized with the family of Michael Marshall, he could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the deputies acted criminally.
“Absent that certainty of proof, criminal charges are not appropriate and are not justice,” Morrissey said. “There is no evidence suggesting any force was used for the purpose of harming Mr. Marshall.”
The death of the 50-year-old Marshall in November came amid scrutiny of police killings and in-custody deaths of young black men since mid-2014. Those killings have triggered waves of protest and fueled a civil rights movement under the name Black Lives Matter.
Autopsy results released this month by the Denver medical examiner’s office ruled the death a homicide. The report concluded that the 5-foot-4 (1.6-meter), 112-lb (51-kg) Marshall choked on his own vomit and died from asphyxiation "while being physically restrained by law enforcement.”
A lawyer for the Marshall family, Mari Newman, said she was not surprised by the district attorney’s decision.
“Morrissey has never prosecuted any law enforcement for killing anyone, and this empowers Denver law enforcement officers to act recklessly, knowing that they will never be held accountable for their conduct,” Newman said. “This is a broken system and it needs to be changed.”
Marshall was being held at the city’s main lockup on a trespassing charge, and for two days leading up to the incident refused to take his schizophrenia medication and became aggressive with another prisoner, the district attorney’s statement said.
Marshall refused repeated commands from officers, became combative with them, and despite his diminutive stature “deputies described Mr. Marshall as surprisingly strong,” the decision letter said.
“No choke holds or carotid restraints were used. Tasers were not used. The physical force used by the deputy sheriffs during this incident was applied by holding Mr. Marshall and by preventing him from getting up,” the letter said.
Morrissey noted that Marshall suffered from emphysema and heart disease, and that his "agitation from psychosis" was not caused by the deputies.
“Sadly, this situation is an example of how difficult it is for society as a whole, including deputies in a jail, to handle the complex issues presented by those suffering from severe mental illness,” he said.
(Reporting by Keith Coffman in Denver; Editing by Dan Whitcomb and Lisa Shumaker)
