On Jan. 28, 2012, Scottsdale Police Lt. Ron Bayne shot and killed Jason Prostollo. Prostollo was highly intoxicated, reportedly five times the legal limit to drive, and had a piece of broken pool cue in each hand as he walked towards Bayne and other officers, including a K-9. According to news reports, Bayne fired two shots into Prostollo, one of which hit the K-9 that was attacking Prostollo.
Officer-involved shooting investigations are lengthy and complex and can take months to complete. They involve a criminal portion to determine if any laws were broken and an internal inquiry to determine if the shooting was within departmental policy.
The day after the shooting, and before any investigations and reviews by Scottsdale Police and the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office were completed, Scottsdale Police Sgt. Mark Clark, the police information officer, told the media the department’s version of events. Some would refer to Clark’s explanation of what happened as “spin.”
In the Jan. 30, 2012 Arizona Republic story, “Man killed by Scottsdale police was former Marine,” Clark used colorful and leading language like “split-second decision” and “officers felt their lives were in danger,” even though he was the only officer who fired. He even went so far as to proclaim “a Taser or pepper spray was not used because of the windy conditions that morning.” It was as though he was justifying the use of deadly force instead of reporting the facts and waiting for the investigation to be completed.
While Bayne’s use of force may be justified, spinning a story in a particular direction can be dangerous and damaging to the public’s trust when an investigation later shows an officer wasn’t justified in their actions.
Spinning is what Clark and a host of other police lieutenants, sergeants, officers and highly paid civilian staff, some who are former television celebrities, sometimes do in their PIO duties.
Too often the story told is about making an agency or its boss look good and not the facts.
In the July 4, 2012 East Valley Tribune story, “Tempe crime down; Ariz. Mills not auto theft haven it once was,” statistics attributed to the Tempe Police Department website show how crime in Tempe was down 41 percent of the last decade.
Sounds good, doesn’t it?
Yet according to the FBI, Tempe’s serious crime rate is up 4.8 percent from 2010 to 2011 — in 2011 there were 59 serious crimes comitted per 1,000 residents — and Tempe continues to have the highest serious crime rate in the East Valley at a rate that’s over double the average crime rate for other East Valley cities.
Crime is down nationally and across Arizona.
Crime being down is no cause for alarm, but when crime is actually climbing and significantly higher than everyone else’s, there’s cause for serious concern. High crime rates are seldom talked about publicly by police officials.
I still can’t get an answer from police on why Tempe crime is so high.
PIOs also control the information that is released to the media and access to those who can answer questions. For a state with a public records law that’s designed to keep the public informed, it’s sometimes very difficult to get information when a police agency doesn’t want to talk or takes the position they have to be sued to get them to obey state law.
Scottsdale and Tempe aren’t the only agencies with PIOs who spin information.
While a PIO spin show designed for the media and to placate the public may be good for a department’s image, it’s not good for a public that needs to believe and trust the police.
The public’s right and need to know shouldn’t be what police officials want us to know. It should be the facts that allow us to make decisions about crime in our community, police conduct and how best to support law enforcement or demand change.
Crime grows best when the public is kept in the dark.
While PIOs can do an important job, the bottom line is they should stick with the facts and skip the spin.
chatmandu002 posted at 9:25 am on Fri, Sep 7, 2012.
Bill,
You spin the spin story. Blaming officers making public information releases that may not be true before an investigation is complete, then turning around and saying the investigation could take months, then turning around again and saying the people need the information about their police departments. Public Information Officers, PIOs are just that, public information spokesman. They can't wait for the final report, the public and press want answers now. A preliminary record may contain information about the suspect, weather, wind and other factors about the incident. The PIO has to work with what they have to satisfy the public and press's need for information. You comments about embellishment by the PIOs is wrong in the fact that the news sources may have done some of the embellishing.
Again you attack the Tempe Police Department, I wonder if there some kind of revenge or payback between you and the Tempe Police Department. The statistics you refer to is about a decade of crime statistics reduction in Tempe and then you report about a FBI statistic for one year. Are you implying that Tempe Police Department is lying in their decade report? One or two incidents can affect the statistics of a city police department for a year, but a decade report shows a better pattern of just what crime levels are.
Dale Whiting posted at 9:32 am on Fri, Sep 7, 2012.
Bill,
Perhaps police PIO's are the worst. But government PIO's in all branches are covering thinigs up too. They are as bad as are political campaign managers and their communications directors on both parties.
"Spin" is the name of the game. "Truth will out" is a lost concept! Just look at how well Karl Rove burried the truth about the war in Iraq, weapons of mass destruction and the alleged connection between al Qaeda and Saddam. Police PIO's could not look to any better examples. In shame, Colin Powell quite after four years of B.S.
Perhaps ASU ought to offer a new major?
billrichardson posted at 10:12 am on Fri, Sep 7, 2012.
Chatman,
Tempe's Part 1 crime level in 2011 is almost 60 per 1,000 residents. Part 1 crimes are serious felonies. In Gilbert the number is 19, Chandler and Scottsdale are around 32 and Mesa comes in at 36. Wild West counties like Maricopa and Pinal come in at below 30. Phoenix is 46.
Those number are from what the cities and counties report to the feds and state.
At one time Mesa's crime rate was at 100 per 1,000.
It looks to me like Tempe has a very serious crime problem and they can't seem to get a handle on it for whatever reason.
PIO's can to wait for the facts. The public doesn't need to be entertained. They need to be told the simple facts at the time of an incident and full disclosure when an investigation is complete.
Leon Ceniceros posted at 7:11 pm on Fri, Sep 7, 2012.
Richardson is so good at "dissing" other Police Departments. I have asked him over and over and over to tell the readers of the EVT what the "solved" rate was of the over 1500 rapes cases committed in the City of Mesa. Almost the exact same number of rapes (in a couple years it was "EXACTLY" the same, 124) year in and year out for the past decade. I didn't make these "Rape Numbers" up. These were the number of Rapes reported to the Arizona Department of Public Safety by the City of Mesa Police Department.
1500 Rape Cases in the past 10 years = how many were solved, how many of the rapists were convicted.......simple questions needing simple answere......we're waiting.