Hamden police officer guilty of assault, faces prison for shooting during 2019 traffic stop
A Hamden police officer was found guilty Thursday and faces 18 months in prison for firing 13 times on a car and injuring a woman passenger in what state prosecutors later concluded was an unjustified shooting.
Officer Devin Eaton pleaded no contest in Superior Court to a charge of first-degree assault for the April 2019 shooting in New Haven. Under his plea bargain agreement with state prosecutors, Eaton will be given a five-year sentence, suspended after 18 months, and three years of probation. He has the right to argue for leniency when he returns to court for sentencing on April 8.
With a no contest plea, Eaton, 32, neither accepts nor denies responsibility for the shooting, but agrees to accept sentencing . It has the same effect as a guilty plea, but cannot be used against him should be be sued civilly for the shooting.
The shooting took place during a traffic stop at about 4:30 a.m. on April 16, 2019 on Argyle Street near Dixwell Avenue in New Haven. Eaton and Yale Police Officer Terrance Pollock stopped a red Honda Civic following reports from dispatchers that the car was involved in an armed robbery, possibly with a gun, at a gas station in Hamden. The car was driven by Paul Witherspoon and Stephanie Washington was his passenger.
Eaton was charged after a lengthy, use of force investigation by the New Haven State’s Attorney and the Connecticut State Police. The investigation report cleared Pollack of “any criminal wrongdoing.” It concluded that Pollock fired three times at the red Honda, but didn’t hit anything, The report also said that Pollock suffered a minor graze wound form one of Eaton’s shots and that Eaton also hit Pollock’s police car.
The shooting appeared to have started based on the mistaken belief that Witherspoon “displayed a firearm” while following the commands of the officers to get out of his car during the traffic stop.
“It was subsequently determined that, at the time of the shooting, neither Witherspoon nor Washington were in possession of a firearm,” the report said. “Stephanie Washington was struck by gunfire as a result of Eaton’s actions and was treated at Yale New Haven Hospital for serious but non-life threatening injuries. Witherspoon did not sustain any injuries.”
The report said Eaton began firing after Witherspoon got out of the car with his hands up. Several shots were directed seconds later at the passenger side of the car, where Washington was sitting.
Washington told investigators that she thought she was going to die.
“I was trying to take cover from the gunshots, so I was leaning in between the driver and passenger seats, towards the back seat,” she said, according to the report. “It was like being in a nightmare. I thought I was going to die. As the gunfire was going on, I started to feel a tingling, burning pain and numbness in my legs, looked down and saw blood and glass, and I remember thinking that I was shot.”
Hamden tried to fire Eaton from the force following the shooting, but was prevented from doing so after the police union obtained a court order blocking the dismissal until after the conclusion of the criminal case. Hamden officials did not respond to repeated calls to the Police Department and mayor’s office for information about his employment status.
Under his plea agreement, Eaton promises to never again attempt to become a police officer.
“As a binding part of his plea agreement with the State, Eaton has agreed that he will not now, nor ever in his lifetime, seek or accept employment or reemployment as a sworn law enforcement officer in the State of Connecticut, or any other state or territory of the United States,” state prosecutors said.
