In the first official response to a use-of-force report by Independent Police Auditor Anthony Finnell, Akron Police Chief Brian Harding rejected calls to discipline the officer who body slammed and arrested Dierra Fields earlier this year, along with the sergeant on site who didn’t intervene.
Finnell has been waiting for a response to his recommendations since the Citizens’ Police Oversight Board approved his first challenge of the department nearly six months ago. The board and Finnell’s position were created by the passage of Issue 10 in the wake of Jayland Walker’s killing in 2022.
In a letter penned by Harding and approved by Akron Mayor Shammas Malik, the police chief emphasized that officers should not be punished for using force viewed in hindsight as inappropriate if a “reasonable” officer could view it as appropriate in the moment.
Malik forwarded Harding’s response to Finnell on Monday. Signal Akron requested a response from the mayor’s office three times beginning Monday afternoon, asking if Harding’s position should be considered the mayor’s position. Signal Akron also asked for an interview with the mayor, but received no response until 8:21 p.m. Tuesday.
Malik’s spokesperson, Stephanie Marsh, texted Signal Akron: “Please feel free to use the following as clarification from Mayor Malik: ‘I respect Chief Harding’s role and judgement in this process, and don’t have further comments on the specific incidents beyond what was shared in the cover letter.’”
In the letter, Harding stated it was reasonable that Officer Thomas Shoemaker “took Ms. Fields to the floor,” as Harding described the body slam, and because the force was reasonable, Sgt. Timothy Shmigal had no duty to intervene as Finnell suggested.
“Everyone is disgusted by what happened to Dierra except for the police department,” said attorney Imokhai Okolo, who successfully represented Fields in her criminal jury trial for resisting arrest and obstructing official business. “This is not some tricky situation. This just requires a level of humanity, a level of care for the people of Akron.”
Finnell: ‘I still consider this a win. I consider this a success.’
Signal Akron previously reported on the January body slam and arrest of Fields, on Finnell challenging the APD for the first time over the inappropriate force and arrest, on Fields’ acquittal by an Akron jury in June, on Issue 10’s intentional lack of any enforcement mechanism in the oversight systems, on the auditor’s frustrations over not getting a response, and on the mayor’s pledge to eventually respond to the auditor.
“I know people are going to have their reactions, and I respect everybody’s opinion and response to it,” Finnell said, “but I want people to recognize that this really has never happened before, where we’ve had any type of dialogue like this. I still consider this a win. I consider this a success.”
“They had no obligation to even respond,” said CPOB Chair Kemp Boyd. “We’re seeing transparency. But that doesn’t mean we’re going to always like what we see.”
The saga of the Fields’ case began in January when Shoemaker and Shmigal responded to a chaotic family argument inside a Kenmore home. During the encounter, their body-worn cameras show Shoemaker approached Fields and attempted to handcuff her. He told her she wasn’t under arrest.
When she turned her torso to question the officer, Shoemaker lost his grip on one of her wrists. The officer immediately grabbed each of her arms from behind, pulled her in, bent his knees, pulled her to his right side, sprung her up in the air and violently slammed her face down on the ground.
Fields was charged with resisting arrest at the scene and faced a charge of obstructing official business later on. Okolo said he believed officers accused her of that as an after-the-fact justification of their use of force and that city prosecutors only pursued the case because a conviction — whether through a plea or jury verdict — would make a civil lawsuit harder for Fields to win.
Officer’s use of force originally found to be ‘objectively reasonable’
In documents obtained by Signal Akron, the sergeant investigating found Shoemaker’s force to be “objectively reasonable” and said that “Shoemaker’s actions were not only justified, but reserved as well. It would have been very easy for someone in the same situation to lose their patience and react in a way that would reflect poorly on the Akron Police Department.”
After Signal Akron reported the story in April, Finnell, less than a month into the job as the first independent police auditor, challenged the APD for the first time. Shoemaker’s force, Finnell said, should be listed as “not objectively reasonable” and he should be disciplined for it.
“Officer Shoemaker lost his patience with the situation and used force that was not justified against Dierra,” Finnell wrote in April. He also said there was no probable cause to arrest Fields for either charge she faced.
Finnell recommended the APD conduct an internal affairs investigation into Shoemaker and Shmigal. Shoemaker, he said, should be investigated for not following domestic violence procedures, for violating de-escalation policies, for failing to document or report reportable use of force (he pushed another family member inside the house), and for issues with “custody, detention, and arrest.”
He said Shmigal should be investigated for violating de-escalation policies, for failing to document and report a use of force, and for failing to “intercede” when Shoemaker body slammed Fields.
Handcuffs can be used as weapons against officers
In his rejection of Finnell’s recommendations, Harding echoed Shoemaker’s statement in his January use-of-force report that “multiple” people who turned away from him while getting handcuffed “have attempted to hit me and/or flee” and therefore it was necessary “to take Dierra to the ground” to finish handcuffing her.
“Officer Shoemaker stated that when he placed a handcuff on Ms. Field’s left wrist, she pulled her right hand away and turned toward him,” Harding wrote. “In the past other people have performed a similar move and then attempted to assault him or flee.”
He also echoed arguments made by Assistant City Prosecutor Laci Volcheck who unsuccessfully tried to convince an Akron jury that Fields, when Shoemaker lost his grip on her arm while handcuffing her, could have used the handcuff against the officer.
In his report, Harding stated, “Note – Handcuffing is a dangerous time for an officer, especially when you have one handcuff on and are trying to place the second cuff. The handcuff may be used as a weapon. Most of the time a person being placed in handcuffs does not pull away. At this point Officer Shoemaker took Ms. Fields to the floor and then onto the furniture to finish handcuffing her. I concur with the investigating supervisors and find this to be reasonable.”
Harding emphasized that the 1989 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Graham v. Connor is in the department use-of-force policy. That decision, he wrote, “said an officer’s actions must be considered from the perspective of what any other ‘reasonable’ officer would have done under the totality of the circumstances, without 20/20 hindsight.”
Harding rejected Finnell’s recommendation that Shmigal be investigated for not intervening in the force. Policy, he wrote, dictates officers only have a duty to intervene when another officer is using force “clearly beyond that which is objectively reasonable under the circumstances.” Because he deemed Shoemaker’s force to be reasonable, “Sgt. Shmigal did not have a duty to intervene.”
The chief also rejected Finnell’s assertion that Shoemaker violated policy by not reporting that he pushed another person inside the house. “A push, without an injury or complaint of injury, is not a reportable use of force,” he wrote.
In an April statement to Signal Akron, Malik said, “In consideration of the police auditor’s review and a pending criminal case, my comments on this specific incident will remain limited for the time being. I anticipate sharing more of my own perspective once the auditor’s review has been completed and the criminal case is completed.”
The auditor’s review was completed later that month, Fields was acquitted in June, and the APD has now issued its response, but Malik has not yet shared his perspective.
“This becomes a challenge to the mayor’s office to pick a side because leadership in the police department is always going to back their officers,” Okolo said on Tuesday. “This could not have been an easier layup to go ahead and be on the side of the community, but they still couldn’t do that. This mayor is going to have to make a decision to believe the community or the police department.… You’ve got to pick a side. I’m tired of this fence sitting.”
