Oakland Police monitor, police commission calls for firing of five officers in Joshua Pawlik shooting

OAKLAND – In a stunning rebuke of Oakland Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick, both the federal monitor overseeing her department and the city Police Commission have called for the firing of five officers in the March 2018 fatal shooting of Joshua Pawlik for violating use of force policies.

The recommendations are contained in documents Oakland released Thursday afternoon under Senate Bill 1421, the state’s new police transparency law.

Monitor Robert Warsaw had already expressed his displeasure over Kirkpatrick’s light discipline against the officers, but the extent of the discipline he wanted in the shooting was previously unknown. Likewise, the commission’s decision on the matter was not public until Thursday.

Officers William Berger, Brandon Hraiz, Francisco Negrete, Josef Phillips, and Craig Tanaka, face termination. All five fired rifles at Pawlik, who was lying on the ground between two houses and stirring awake as the officers shouted commands at him. He was holding a pistol.

Police commissioners determined that Pawlik never raised the weapon toward the officers, documents show.

The Police Commission in May rejected a recommendation made by investigators for the Community Police Review Agency, which had found the shooting in policy.

Civil Rights attorney Jim Chanin who has been involved in the monitoring of Oakland Police for 16 years said this is a major development and he cannot remember a case like it.

“It is the first time that we’ve ever had the compliance director, which we’ve had since 2012, overrule the chief of police on a discipline matter,” he said. “And then at the same time it was the first time that the Police Commission has overruled the chief on a discipline matter. So I think we’re entering a new day.”

A request for comment from Oakland Police was returned by a spokesman the city administrator’s office, who wrote that the officers will now go through a departmental appeal process of the discipline. The substance of the decision by Warshaw and the commission was not mentioned.

“The City of Oakland supports the due process rights of all employees,” Spokeswoman Karen Boyd, wrote in the statement.

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