With unhealed wounds from the Jayland Walker protests and simmering anger over policing in general, some community members unleashed their frustrations about the Akron Police Department during a forum hosted by a national policing consultant and a University of Akron law professor.
The heavy-handed police suppression of an April 2023 protest on Copley Road was top of mind for many attendees Tuesday night, who highlighted the use of tear gas and mass arrests by the APD.
“That got pretty ugly for no reason,” attendee Duane Strong told the audience inside the Garfield Community Learning Center auditorium. Strong said that when he was a sergeant in the military during deployments in Afghanistan, he was responsible for the culture within his unit, but that there’s no accountability for what he said is a culture problem within the APD.
The event was among the first steps the City of Akron is taking to satisfy its settlement agreement with the Akron Bail Fund. The group sued the city in federal court in the aftermath of that Copley Road protest and other protests where they alleged unconstitutional policing during protests over Jayland Walker’s killing and the exonerations of the APD officers who killed him.
The two sides agreed to overhaul the department’s crowd management policy intended to protect the constitutional rights of protesters, with the details worked out through a “democratic process” in the city.
Akron Bail Fund and the city agreed to hire national policing consultant Spencer Fomby to lead the effort. Fomby is a retired police captain who previously led the training, education and development division of the police department in Boise, Idaho. He was also the “public order instructor” for police in Berkeley, California, and is a member of the National Tactical Officers Association.
Consultant tasked with drafting Akron’s new crowd management proposal
Fomby was tasked with holding a public forum soliciting feedback from community members on desired protest policing policies — that happened in theory on Tuesday night — before redrafting a new crowd management proposal that people can comment on before it is implemented.
Fomby told the crowd inside the auditorium that he “guaranteed” there will be another “controversial officer-involved shooting” and that there will be more protests over that hypothetical shooting, but his goal is to ensure that the APD’s protest-policing policies are consistent with national best practices, with better guidance for how officers should respond while protecting safety and constitutional rights.
“We wouldn’t need crowd control if [police] would stop killing us,” one woman told Fomby. “No offense to your job, but we wouldn’t need you if they stopped … just stop killing people and we wouldn’t need crowd control.”
Some expressed the belief that nothing good will come from forums and that policing in general is fundamentally corrupt. One audience member evoked the Holocaust and slavery in reference to the APD and complained about “wasting money on bullshit like this.”
An attendee questioned whether Fomby had read the Akron Bail Fund complaint against the city. He read the settlement agreement that initiated the review process but “skimmed” the complaint listing the alleged constitutional violations, an admission that led to one person yelling, “How are you here?” and involved in the process “if you don’t know the details of the case that brought us here?”
At times, Fomby appeared frustrated by the rhetoric directed by attendees toward him over incidents he had no role in and was not hired to address, such as the killings of Jazmir Tucker and Jayland Walker. He told attendees that he could write a protest policing policy for the APD in line with best practices regardless, but he was hoping for more community feedback in it.
Nobody from the city spoke during the forum, but many key officials attended, including: Police Chief Brian Harding; Deputy Chief Michael Miller, Fire Chief Leon Henderson; Law Director Deborah Matz; City Council Member Brad McKitrick; and other city attorneys and mayoral staffers.
In a text message to Signal Akron after the forum, Akron City Council candidate Fran Wilson, who served as a representative of the Akron Bail Fund during the litigation against the city and attended the forum, criticized the administration of Dan Horrigan, the mayor before Shammas Malik took office in 2024.
“The last administration turned our city into a war zone between police and protesters because it couldn’t grapple with the change that was needed,” Wilson wrote. “Neighbors were clear tonight: the city needs to take action against the police violence in all forms.”
Consultant identifies likely areas of emphasis in new policy
While much of the two hours focused on complaints, Fomby indicated broad areas likely to be emphasized in a new policy that he said are “grounded in constitutional policing.”
He highlighted the need for dialogue between officers and protesters to “minimize intervention from the police” and for “self-policing” among protesters.
Fomby emphasized that officers should single out people in crowds who are breaking laws, detaining them instead of punishing everybody around them, too. A new policy will give more guidance to the police about when they should disperse crowds and when they shouldn’t.
He also said that officers should be easily identifiable for complaints. He said there can be a balance between protecting officers getting “doxxed” — which he said he’s experienced as an officer during protests — while still allowing them to be held accountable for their individual actions. Large, conspicuous ID numbers can be displayed on uniforms so people can know who to file complaints against.
After protests are over, Fomby said it’s important for all uses of force to be documented and to track all of the crowd control munitions that were used.
Despite the contentious nature of much of the forum, and despite the anger directed toward Fomby, Signal Akron saw Fomby approach a group of women most vocally critical of the process in the Garfield CLC parking lot long after the event ended. He gave one of the women a hug before engaging in a long conversation with them, alongside Fire Chief Leon Henderson.
The next step in the settlement-spurred process is for Fomby to draft a new crowd management policy for police. The mayor’s office will release that draft publicly and will solicit feedback for at least 60 days before implementing any changes.
The mayor’s office created a new email address to receive comments on the draft crowdpolicy@akronohio.gov — which is now live.
