SIS Officers Justified in Shooting, Court Told
A law enforcement expert testified Wednesday that undercover detectives in the Los Angeles Police Department’s Special Investigations Section acted properly during a 1982 surveillance of two bank robbers, and were justified when they shot the pair, killing one and wounding the other.
“They had a real life-threatening situation unfolding before them. . . .” said Lt. Joe Callanan, a retired Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who is now a police training consultant. “I think that any officer looking at those facts . . . would respond with the use of deadly force.”
Callanan testified on behalf of six current and former SIS detectives who allegedly violated the civil rights of Jane Berry when they shot her and killed her partner after watching them rob a bank.
James Fyfe, a criminal justice professor at American University in Washington, testified earlier that he believed the officers had repeatedly violated accepted standards of police practice.
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