Fatal Police Shooting Protested

Minutes after filing a federal civil rights complaint seeking a review of the fatal police shooting of his 19-year-old cousin, a Riverside pastor Monday implored several hundred protesters to seek justice peacefully.

Some of those upset by the shooting of Tyisha Miller last week carried placards outside police headquarters reading “Murdered by the Riverside Police,” “Guns Don’t Kill, Cops Do,” and “Help! 911 Killed Me.”

“We’re not seeking the path of violence,” shouted the Rev. DeWayne Butler, Miller’s cousin and a father figure to her. “We can be upset and angry, but let’s turn it to achieve our goal. We don’t think police can police the police. Our goal is justice.”

Miller was shot 12 times and killed by police who were responding to a 911 call that she appeared unconscious in her idling car. She had a .380-caliber semiautomatic handgun in her lap while parked at a Riverside gas station.

Police said the Rubidoux woman failed to respond to officers until they broke a car window. At that time she grabbed for her gun and the officers fired, police said.

Some protesters said they believe police overreacted, at least in part because Miller was black.

Four officers, three white and one Latino, and a white sergeant were at the scene.

In a statement, Police Chief Jerry Carroll said Monday that, at the completion of his department’s own investigation, “we welcome any review by an outside agency.”

Carroll met with rally leaders and family members after a march from City Hall to the Police Department headquarters a block away. He assured them that his investigation would be thorough, if not as speedy as community members would like, participants said. It was his second meeting with family members in a week.

“He explained that there’s a process and procedure that has to be followed, but we impressed upon him the importance of getting that information to us as soon as possible,” said Don Bardo, who attended the 40-minute session with Carroll as president of the Urban League of Riverside and San Bernardino counties. “We needed answers yesterday.”

“He assured us that if these policemen were in fact guilty [of shooting Miller without provocation], they would be brought to justice as soon as possible,” Bardo said. “And he applauded [protest leaders] in keeping it peaceful because he said he knew situations like this could get out of hand.”

The two-hour rally generated much criticism of the police. “It was a senseless killing,” said the Rev. Ron Gibson. “We don’t need an investigation. There is no justification. We don’t want to play the race card . . . although we know people of color are the most exploited people in the world.”

The Rev. Bernell Butler, another of the victim’s cousins, said, “We can’t fight fire with fire, bullets with bullets. We have to fight this with prayer.” He then chastised the department for placing the police officers on paid administrative leave.

“We don’t want these police officers on a paid vacation,” he shouted. “I’d like to see them in jail.”

But he added, “We didn’t come here to attack [all] the police. We need police. But we want good police. It’s hard for me to believe they followed policy. We want them held accountable.”

In court papers filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Riverside, DeWayne Butler said he feared a police cover-up of the shooting and alleged that his cousin’s death was the result of “Riverside’s failure to properly train and supervise their police officers.”

The shooting was the seventh in 1998 involving Riverside police, including four fatalities.

Tyisha Miller, described as athletic, energetic and an active member of her church’s youth group, had parked her car at a Riverside gas station in the early hours of Dec. 28 after having a flat tire, relatives said.

According to authorities, two people who were with Miller had left her inside the idling car for a time, and found her apparently unconscious--and the doors locked--when they returned.

They called family members who went to the scene and, unable to get a response from her, called 911 for help.

When police responded, she still appeared asleep--with the gun in her lap--and they were unable to awaken her, authorities said.

The officers broke the window of her door, and what happened next is the matter of the investigation.

A police spokesman initially said that Miller fired the first shot, but later said it was unclear why gunfire erupted. One investigator who did not want to be identified said that as one of the police officers leaned inside the car to remove the handgun after breaking out the window, the woman grabbed the gun, prompting another officer to open fire.

Results of toxicology tests, which might explain why Miller appeared unconscious, are expected within two weeks, said Mark Wasserman, a spokesman for the county’s sheriff’s and coroner’s departments.

In his affidavit, Butler wrote of seeing his cousin’s body days after her death at the coroner’s office:

“Tyisha was virtually unrecognizable and riddled with the bullet holes left by the police bullets that massacred her. I gently rolled Tyisha over and carefully held her in my hands, while holding and cradling the back of her head. At that tragic moment, I all at once felt feelings of rage, fury, sorrow and despair.”

Butler’s court papers asked that a federal magistrate be appointed as a special master to oversee investigations by the police, the coroner’s office and the Riverside County district attorney’s office.

Riverside Mayor Ron Loveridge said Monday, “We’re attempting to have the most open investigation possible of what took place. This is a difficult event which I understand and respect, a tragedy for the woman, her family, the community and the Police Department.”