State's attorney: Rantoul officer's use of lethal force was legally justified

Jun. 28—RANTOUL — The same officer who shot Jordan Richardson as he ran because he refused to drop a gun also tried to save his life.

"He just wouldn't drop the (expletive) gun. I don't understand," Sgt. Jerry King said to a fellow officer as he applied pressure to the chest of the 18-year-old he shot seconds earlier.

On Wednesday, State's Attorney Julia Rietz concluded that the actions of the 10-year officer on the afternoon of June 7 constituted a justifiable use of lethal force.

"Sgt. Jerry King's use of deadly force in firing his weapon in Richardson's direction while Richardson was in possession of a firearm and disobeying commands to drop the weapon were legally justifiable given the totality of the circumstances," she said.

Rietz said she reviewed body-camera footage, security video from nearby homes, autopsy results and reports from officers from five police agencies in coming to her conclusion.

Mr. Richardson's mother and aunt, she said, were briefed Wednesday morning by representatives of the multi-jurisdictional investigative team led by Illinois State Police. Rietz said they were given the opportunity to watch the police videos of what happened before the information was made public.

Rantoul police set up a page on the city's website that includes a synopsis, a timeline, the reports from all officers involved body-camera and home-security footage, and a METCAD radio recording.

Police Chief Tony Brown said King, who has no disciplinary issues in his record and was the 2018 Officer of the Year, has been on administrative leave for three weeks and is expected to return to duty immediately.

Brown said the department will continue its own internal review to make sure the response was consistent with department policy and training.

"While this incident is undoubtedly tragic, it underscores the difficult and complex decisions law-enforcement officers face daily in the line of duty. The safety of our officers and the community remains our utmost priority, and we continuously strive to improve our training, policies and procedures to minimize such occurrences," said Brown, having to address his community for the second time in 2023 over an officer-involved shooting.

"I want to express my gratitude to the community for their patience and trust throughout this process," he said.

Synopsis

In reports and video made public Wednesday by Rantoul police, it was revealed that King fired two shots at Mr. Richardson in a driveway of a house in the 400 block of Belle Avenue, one of which penetrated his chest, killing him.

The shots were fired approximately 45 seconds after the 18-year-old got out of a car that had been stopped by another police officer a block to the north in the 400 block of East Campbell Avenue and ran south. He had been in the passenger seat.

Officer Rene Wissel, who made the stop of driver Jheremia McKown, radioed for help, alerting fellow officers that the person running had a gun that he dropped then picked up as he continued to run.

Officer Tyler Johnston, who arrived to help Wissel, also saw Mr. Richardson stop in the front yard of a house, reach down and pick up an object, then continue running. Johnston gave chase, yelling "drop the gun, drop the gun, police, stop," having no apparent effect on Mr. Richardson.

King, meantime, was in his squad sport utility vehicle when he saw Mr. Richardson carrying an olive-green handgun and running between two houses in the 400 block of East Belle. He ran right in front of King's vehicle, still carrying the gun.

State police investigators learned later that the gun found near Mr. Richardson's body that had his fingerprints on it had been reported stolen May 20 from a car in Colorado Springs, Colo.

"As he passed the front of my patrol car, I feared that Jordan would begin firing at my squad car," King wrote in his original police report.

Mr. Richardson turned his head to look at King as he ran past his car, which caused him to stumble and drop the gun at the edge of a driveway. Again, he picked it up and ran.

Jumping from his squad, King drew his gun, aimed at Mr. Richardson and yelled three times, loudly enough for Mr. Richardson to hear him, to drop the gun or risk being shot.

"Jordan had made it approximately 70 feet up the driveway before once again stumbling and falling forward onto the ground. I was now approximately 50 feet from Jordan," King wrote in a report prepared after reviewing his body-camera footage. "Jordan was now still on the ground with his left hand on the ground supporting him and his gun in his right hand but facing away from me. I gave another command, 'Drop the gun!' and at the same time, Jordan began spinning around towards me holding his gun.

"It was at this moment, with Jordan turning towards me while armed with the handgun, that I felt he was going to shoot me," King wrote. "I fired two rounds in quick succession at Jordan as his body, and more specifically his arm holding the gun, was spinning towards my direction."

Mr. Richardson's last audible words were "I'm hit."

Rietz noted that the time between when King gave his first command to when he fired was approximately six seconds.

Quickly pulling on gloves, King pulled up Mr. Richardson's sweatshirt and undershirt to find the wound and applied pressure to his chest while calling for more help. Screaming relatives of Mr. Richardson can be heard on his body-camera footage.

King held the pressure and began CPR until paramedics arrived to take over.

How it began

In his report, Wissel said he had stopped the Dodge Avenger in which Mr. Richardson was a passenger because that same car, which had expired plates, had fled from him in April.

McKown, 20, its driver, got out as soon as Wissel pulled up in the 400 block of East Campbell and admitted being the owner but claimed his cousin was the one who fled from Wissel earlier.

As McKown made a move to get back in the car, Wissel told him not to, displaying his Taser as he gave him the order.

It was at that point he saw Mr. Richardson in the passenger seat and told him to put his hands on the dash. McKown is heard saying, "Bro, you're good. Go."

McKown then began "actively" fighting with Wissel, hitting the officer in the mouth so hard it broke one of his teeth. During the struggle, Wissel saw Mr. Richardson run from the car, drop a handgun on the sidewalk, then immediately pick it up.

Another officer ran after Mr. Richardson as Wissel continued his struggle with McKown.

Once they got McKown under control, police found cash and a bag of pills in his pockets.

In the front and back seats of the Dodge, they found a total of six large bags of cannabis, estimated to weigh 6 pounds. Under the driver's seat were two loaded Glock handguns. Police found about $2,600 in cash in the car and more on Mr. Richardson.

McKown told Wissel he didn't know his passenger and didn't know who owned the guns or the cannabis.

Later, at the Rantoul Police Department, McKown "somehow got out of the holding cell and into the general holding area. Jeremiah tried to open the back door to the lockup to presumably escape custody. Jeremiah was resecured in a cell," Wissel wrote.

Detective Matt Bross wrote that as he was tending to Mr. Richardson after the latter had been shot, cash fell out of his hooded sweatshirt. Bross said he recognized him from having investigated him for an unrelated crime in Rantoul and also believed the gun that was on the ground near his body was the same one he had seen posted by Mr. Richardson in a photograph posted to Instagram that showed him with three guns.

Independent video

Rietz said she also reviewed security footage obtained from three different homes in the 400 block of East Belle and the 400 block of East Campbell that corroborated what the officers were reporting.

That is, that Mr. Richardson was carrying a gun with an extended magazine visible in his right hand, that pursuing officers were telling him to drop the gun, and that he dropped a large item and a smaller item in one yard, leaving the smaller behind but picking up the larger item and continuing to run.

The residents of one of the houses on Campbell found a bag of pills in the area where the smaller item was dropped that were determined to be Xanax, a popular anti-anxiety medication.

Rietz legal analysis

In her conclusion about the legal appropriateness of King's use of force, Rietz said the law "requires that the decision by a peace officer to use force shall be evaluated from the perspective of a reasonable officer, based on the totality of the circumstances known to or perceived by the officer at the time of the decision, rather than with the benefit of hindsight, and that the totality of the circumstances shall account for occasions when officers may be forced to make quick judgments about using force."

She said King "reasonably believed," based on Mr. Richardson running with a gun in hand in a residential neighborhood during the day, that Mr. Richardson posed a threat to the public and himself. King was in full uniform, was driving a police vehicle and gave repeated commands to him to drop the gun before he fired.

"Sgt. King was faced with making a split-second decision to use deadly force due entirely to Jordan Richardson's repeated refusal to obey lawful orders, both from Sgt. King and from Officer Johnston, to drop the gun," she wrote.