Body camera video gives clearer picture of unusual killing committed by city officer | News, Sports, Vacancies

Submitted photo This screenshot shows how a body camera showed an officer preparing to shoot and then shooting a man on Oct. 12, 2023, at a home on Helena Avenue in Youngstown. The body camera does not show the suspect as the officer peered over the wall.

YOUNGSTOWN — When a Mahoning County grand jury in July declined to indict the Youngstown police officer who shot and killed 45-year-old Ricco Acevedo on Oct. 12, 2023, at a home on Helena Avenue on the city’s south side, the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation released body camera video on its website. website.

BCI, part of the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, investigated Acevedo’s death at the request of Youngstown Police Chief Carl Davis. At the end of the investigation, BCI turned its evidence over to the Ohio Attorney General’s Special Prosecution Unit to present the case to a Mahoning County grand jury, which declined to bring an indictment.

It was the first time the Youngstown Police Department had an officer-involved homicide that was captured on a body camera, according to Lt. Brian Butler, chief of internal affairs for the Youngstown Police Department. He said the recordings provided “excellent evidence” showing how this unusual case unfolded.

Few details were provided when the shooting occurred: a 9:13 a.m. call about a burglary, a 9:41 a.m. police radio call about “shots fired,” and the man being killed by police.

But body camera video from the officer who fired the shots explains what turned out to be a 21-minute effort to find out who the alleged burglar was and, more importantly, what he was doing in the home of a man locked out in Mahoning County. jail. The homeowner’s mother, who called 911, said the house was supposed to be empty.

When an officer arrived in Helena at 9:21 a.m., he spoke with the homeowner’s mother, Elizabeth Cuevas, who said she saw a man coming down the steps of her son’s home, whom she did not know.

About a minute later, the officer met Acevedo. Acevedo calmly held a trash bag in the home’s driveway and said he was doing plumbing and drywall repairs for the owner, who was in jail.

The interaction between the officer and Acevedo was cordial, polite and conversational. Acevedo offered to show the officer the work he was doing in the house, and they went inside. The officer told Acevedo that the homeowner’s mother “basically called you in as a burglar.”

“True,” Acevedo said as he walked up the steps.

“To me, you don’t look like a burglar,” the officer said. Acevedo was chattering about the amount the owner was going to pay him—several hundred dollars. Even though the officer was leading the conversation, it was clear that he was questioning Acevedo to see if his story was consistent.

“How long have you not seen him?” Officer Acevedo asked the homeowner. “I saw him about a month ago,” Acevedo said as he showed the officer the bathroom fixtures. They went outside and the officer left Acevedo in the driveway to find Elizabeth Cuevas and talk to her again, this time with Acevedo standing nearby.

“So she knows you and you know her,” the officer said. Acevedo said her son hired him a month ago and gave him the key.

“Well, what do you think? We changed the locks,” said Elizabeth Cuevas, explaining that a few days ago someone broke into the house and stole seven bicycles. — Did you steal the bikes too? she asked Acevedo.

“I’m working,” Acevedo said.

“He doesn’t do housework,” she said, not believing him.

“I promise you, I will do a good job,” Acevedo said.

“No,” said the woman. “I don’t know you from Adam. I want to know how you got into the house if we just changed the lock on the door. This happened just a few days ago. No. He’s lying,” she said.

The officer said, “I’ve never seen a guy break into a house and work there.” To verify his story, Acevedo tried to find the key he said he used to get into the front door that day. Acevedo looked at the keys in the house but couldn’t find any that would open the front door.

Acevedo was so credible that two officers allowed him to enter the house alone because Acevedo said he was going to continue searching for the key. The officers waited outside on the porch, debating whether to believe Acevedo. “But he can’t seem to find the key he used to get in here.” So he’s a little strange,” the first officer said.

Acevedo told the first officer his name was “Rick Burkimer” and provided his date of birth and Social Security number. The information turned out to be false. He said his girlfriend dropped him off. The first officer approached his cruiser and checked the date of birth and Social Security number Acevedo had given, but found no match in the database.

When the officer returned to the house, he told Acevedo that the Social Security number and date of birth “do not come back to anyone named Burkimer” and “do not match the person.” He told Acevedo to put his hands on the wall. Acevedo countered, saying, “I didn’t do anything.” His fellow officer stood nearby. Suddenly Acevedo rushed to the front door. The first officer chased him into the house. Acevedo was heard saying, “I have a gun on me,” which obviously was not true.

“Me too,” the officer said.

Acevedo entered the upstairs room and the officer stood behind the wall at the top of the stairs with a gun drawn and ordered Acevedo to “get down on the ground” and “put the gun down,” but Acevedo said “no.” and “I’m not throwing it away.” Acevedo then told the officer his real name, who told Acevedo, “Don’t (mess) it up.” The situation was tense, although both men spoke in mostly measured tones.

“I don’t care. I have nothing to live for,” Acevedo said, referring to the danger he was in. “I’m just trying to make some (deleted) money. My mom just died. I don’t do that anymore. Really. is that I met Cuevas in prison. He told me to come and do a little… housework.

The officer asked Acevedo why he put himself in this position if he was telling the truth about being allowed in the house, saying “a phone call could have fixed it (removed).”

“Because I don’t trust the police,” Acevedo said.

The officer told Acevedo, “Trust it. Throw away that (removed) gun or this will end very badly for you.”

“I don’t care anymore,” Acevedo said. “I know where I’m going. I respect law enforcement, but this is wrong. Have you ever shot anyone?

“Yeah,” the officer said.

“Well, you’ll have to shoot me.” I’m not going to jail. Can you hear me?

“Gotcha,” the officer replied.

“At least three times. Do you understand?” Acevedo continued. After two seconds of silence, the officer fired three shots.

Another officer’s body camera shows the officer from behind, but neither the shooting officer’s body camera nor the other officers’ body cameras captured those two seconds or showed what the officer saw when he fired.

Three seconds later, as the shooting officer moved forward, Acevedo was visible on a body camera mounted on the hallway floor. He makes sounds but doesn’t move. Officers immediately called an ambulance, handcuffed Acevedo, and the officer applied pressure to the wounds on Acevedo’s chest.

BKI DOCUMENTS

The incident summary/overview provided by BCI to prosecutors following the investigation states that the officer opened fire on Acevedo because Acevedo “ran out of the room he was in and began moving toward” the officer, “attempting to get something from him.” belt.

It says Acevedo “then began to pull what appeared to (the officer) to be a chrome-plated revolver from his waistband.”

After shooting Acevedo, the officer “observed an object on the floor near where Acevedo was lying in the bathroom doorway,” the report said. The officer “believed it was a gun, but when he looked closer, he realized it was not a gun,” the report said.

The summary provides a list of items taken as evidence at the scene. Among them was a “buffing wheel cleaning tool.” The photograph in the property description shows a grinding wheel on a wooden floor, similar to the one where Acevedo was killed. The tool is shaped like a pistol, but has a silver metal wheel on the end where the barrel of the pistol would be.

The location of the photo on the summary suggests it was the item the officer saw on the floor after he shot Acevedo. Later during questioning, the officer told investigators that he had never had any contact with Acevedo before that day.

Acevedo, a Boardman High School graduate whose address was in Boardman, worked in the home improvement and landscaping industry and was also a professional mixed martial arts fighter and boxer, according to his obituary. He won all but three of his 80 fights and became the Toughman champion at Packard Music Hall in 2004, the report said.

He has had troubles with the law, including being sentenced to six years in prison in 2016 for punching and kicking his girlfriend in her Girard home in 2015. She had to have reconstructive surgery on her eye socket, she told a Tribune Chronicle reporter.

BUTLER

Lt. Brian Butler of Internal Affairs said of body cameras: “This technology is amazing. I think I appreciate it more myself because I investigated for 12 or 13 years (internal affairs) without him, and now we have first-person, high-definition, perfect body camera audio.”

Before the advent of body cameras, internal affairs investigators conducted investigations “based on whatever evidence we could gather.” If there was surveillance video of this, that would be great. And that was very rare,” he said.

“This is a great illustration of body cameras and the transparency they provide us,” he said of Acevedo’s case. Butler said it might be difficult to explain to someone all the reasons why this situation unfolded the way it did. Having body camera video and audio makes that job easier, he said.

Regarding the shooting, he found it “quite unusual” in that “this dialogue took so long to develop.” He said that in most cases when an officer shoots someone, it happens sooner, soon after the person sees the uniformed officer.

For example, an officer-involved shooting in Niles in 2019 involved officers shooting a man whose car was pinned between several police cruisers. Officers fired multiple shots from the front and rear of the vehicle as the driver moved his vehicle back and forth.

The episode included body camera video and citizen video, but neither captured the moments before the shooting began.

A 2022 officer-involved homicide in which Struthers police pursued a man in a vehicle quickly ended after the man’s car was blocked on Youngstown’s West Side and the officer opened fire on the suspect’s car. The episode included body camera video and surveillance video.

Butler said Acevedo’s case is the first time YPD has asked BCI to conduct a criminal investigation into an officer-involved homicide. But BCI has since taken on additional cases.