We have a high bar for stories involving police misconduct. Many stories aren’t retold, especially if they involve simple or common mistakes. The Dec. 13 shooting of motorist Jason Arrington by Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office officer Mindy Cardwell is different. Quite simply, it may be one of the dumbest things a cop has done in quite a while.
Arrington was pulled over around 5:10 p.m. for allegedly running a red light. After telling the officer that he was armed, Arrington was told to get out of the vehicle. Arrington, it should be pointed out, was legally allowed to carry a concealed firearm, and officers later described him as being “very compliant.”
Arrington got out and put his hands on top of his SUV, while Cardwell attempted to remove his handgun, which was on his right side in an IWB holster. Officer Cardwell can be seen struggling to remove the handgun.
During her internal affairs interview, Cardwell admitted that her finger accidentally slipped into the trigger guard inside Arrington’s pants “while she was using her non-dominant hand to remove the gun.”
“Unfortunately combined with the holster and the pants, it just was not coming out freely,” Cardwell said, according to the internal affairs report. “I think, not being aware of where my fingers were on the inside of the trigger, obviously an accident happened that I’m at fault for. In hindsight, I wish we could have slowed it down and done a thousand things differently.”
The weapon discharged and the round went through Arrington’s right thigh, which he later claimed left him with “lasting physical impairments that affect his ability to work as a crane operator.”
Officials determined Cardwell was “grossly incompetent” and she was fired, but investigators declined to pursue criminal charges.
Several days later, the Sheriff’s Office sent out memos to its staff reminding them that concealed carriers are not a threat, and that “officers should not seize a detained person’s gun or remove it from a holster or vehicle without ‘articulable suspicion’ that the person presents a threat to the safety of others, including the officer.”
“The mere fact that a person is carrying a concealed firearm does not automatically mean that a person poses a threat or is ineligible to carry a concealed firearm. Unless an officer has articulable suspicion that the detained person presents a threat to the safety of citizens or officers or has knowledge that the detained person is ineligible to carry a concealed firearm, officers should not seize a firearm (i.e. remove it from holster, vehicle, pocket, bag, etc.) from someone awfully carrying it,” the memo states.
Arrington was very clearly not a threat. He complied quickly with everything the officers asked him to do.
Takeaways
The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office responded about as well as they could to a no-win situation. Officers rendered good first aid…a tourniquet and an Israeli compression bandage. They told their superiors it was a negligent discharge quickly over the radio. Their administrators put out the facts as soon as they were ready. However, their now former officer’s misdeeds left the agency totally exposed to the lawsuit that Arrington will undoubtably and very deservedly file.
Former officer Cardwell shot an upstanding citizen with his own handgun because of her own incompetence. Carrying a concealed firearm, which the 39-year-old did lawfully, is certainly not a crime. Arrington was extremely polite and compliant throughout the interaction, even after he was shot. He only swore once as an officer tightened the tourniquet on his wounded leg.
The officers may be forced to explain why they decided to disarm him during a minor traffic violation. That’s a question that should be asked and answered. They should have issued a citation for the red light and simply let him drive away.
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Staring Stupid.. in ‘Stupid Is As Stupid Does The Movie’)
They walk among us….some carry badges.
I saw this headline on Instapundit and scrolled past it several times. But I finally had to look and see just how bad it was. And learned it was even worse than I had dreamed. And it’s topped off by “I think, not being aware of where my fingers were on the inside of the trigger, obviously an accident happened that I’m at fault for. In hindsight, I wish we could have slowed it down and done a thousand things differently.” Not even the slightest hint that he should have been ticketed and waved on his way.
Pfui.
That’s one of the “thousand things”.
Well, Arrington’s about to get rich, at the expense of the Jacksonville taxpayers.
Jacksonville/Duval County SO has had the nickname “The Wolf Pack” for decades. Their officers routinely infringe on the constitutional rights of their victims. They are one of the leading LE organizations that top police brutality investigations for decades. It doesn’t surprise me something like this happened there.
It sure looks like she managed to get two fingers on the trigger!
“The mere fact that a person is carrying a concealed firearm does not automatically mean that a person poses a threat or is ineligible to carry a concealed firearm….officers should not seize a firearm (i.e. remove it from holster, vehicle, pocket, bag, etc.) from someone awfully carrying it,” the memo states.
In other words, the male officer that made the decision to disarm this guy is at fault. He seemed to be in charge. Everyone is talking about the female officer’s failure, but I don’t hear anyone talking about the guy that got this ball rolling by going against their own policy. Was he fired too??
The only “highlight” that I can see in this event is that the negligent discharge did not prompt the other multiple officers on scene to draw and shoot the injured driver.
The lesser “highlight” is that officers actually took responsibility (after the fact) for what they did rather than trying to claim that the injured driver “made a furtive movement” which justified shooting him (or some such nonsense).
I hope the driver fully recovers after surgery and a pint or two of replacement blood and gets a tasty $100,000 + payout from that department…