[AZTOY]

Plea for help turns deadly

Parents call teen suicidal, police react to 'threat'

Senta Scarborough
The Arizona Republic
Aug. 26, 2003 12:00 AM


Parents' plea for help for their 15-year-old son, who was holding a kitchen knife and threatening suicide, turned deadly early Monday when Mesa police shot him in front of his family.

Westwood High School junior Mario Albert Madrigal Jr. was shot multiple times in the carport of his home near Dobson and Longmore roads in west Mesa after police said he came toward them with a knife "in a threatening manner."

The boy's parents said their son had dropped the knife after he was shot with a Taser gun moments earlier and was not a threat to officers.

The shooting was strikingly similar to the 2001 death of Ali Altug, 16, shot by a police officer in his Apache Junction kitchen as he wielded a knife.

"I was really literally in shock when I heard. It is so close to what happened here," said Altug's mother, Sande. "How can our society allow that to happen more than once?"

Madrigal's shooting occurred about 1:30 a.m. Monday. His father said he was told by neighbors that his son had consumed six or seven beers.

The officers involved in the Mesa incident were identified as Sgt. Orlando Dean, a 10-year veteran, and Officers Richard Henry and Mark Beckett, who have four and two years on the force, respectively. All three fired their weapons. None was injured and all were placed on paid leave pending investigations, Mesa police Sgt. Mike Goulet said.

Goulet said police were called to the home in the 500 block of South Johnson twice Monday morning.

Police and family versions differed on circumstances leading to the shooting.

Besides police officers, the parents and their 10-year-old son were witnesses.

"They really made a big mistake. I feel the Mesa police department made a criminal action to kill a 15-year old boy unnecessarily," said the father, Mario Madrigal Sr., a U.S. Postal Service worker. "We called for help and they killed him."

Madrigal said his son never threatened officers and was "under control" and started to shake after being shot with a Taser gun when officers started to fire.

"He dropped the knife after the electrical shock," he said. "While he was laying on the floor an officer got close and shot him twice."

Goulet said officers tried to use a Taser gun twice but it was "ineffective."

"He's got the knife and he's advancing toward the officers in a threatening manner. They are telling him to stop and he doesn't obey any of their verbal commands," Goulet said. "He's coming at them regardless of the Taser. At that point they had to discharge their weapons."

Goulet said he did not know how many shots were fired, how far away the officers were or how many times the teen was hit. The investigation is continuing.

Madrigal's father said when he heard the police account, he grabbed a camera, climbed on a neighbor's roof and took his own pictures of the scene, including photos of his son lying dead.

Police first went to the Madrigal home about 12:30 a.m. because the family called 911 when the son and father argued after the teen came home after having "six or seven" beers at a neighbor's home.

"They told us the 15-year-old was involved in a verbal confrontation and had fled," Goulet said. "Officers talked to the family and told them if he returns and there are problems to give them a call."

At 1:13 a.m., 911 got another call from the house.

Madrigal said in a later interview, "I told him (Mario Jr.) that I was going to take him to the crisis center where he can get help to stop drinking alcohol." But, he said, "He took a kitchen knife and says he is going to kill himself and that's when we called police to get help to take him to the crisis center."

About two months ago, Madrigal said police helped take his son to a crisis center to prevent him from drinking alcohol. His son spent six weeks at the center.

"They helped us take him to the crisis center. He was doing very well," Madrigal said. "I was suspecting the same help to take him to that place."

But when police arrived Monday morning, Madrigal said he told police his son was holding a knife and would kill himself.

"My wife opens the door and she was holding my son's hands.

"One of the police officers pushed her away from my son and one of them shot him with an electrical gun," Madrigal said.

"He was already under the effects of the electrical shock when he was on the floor and they started shooting unnecessarily."

His father said the knife was pointing toward the floor.

He said his son spent a lot of time at home, enjoyed fishing, boxing and riding go-carts in the mountains and wanted to join the Army when he graduated.

"He was a normal kid. He was always at home and he would tell us when he wanted to go," said Madrigal. He said his son didn't have a serious drinking problem but he wanted to stop it before it got worse.

In the past two years, about 90 percent of Mesa police have had a four-hour training session on mental illness and retardation to teach officers the signs of mental disabilities and better communicate with those suffering from those conditions, Goulet said.

The Arizona Police Officers Standards and Training Board is developing new training for police academies on the issue and creating an advanced officer training course on dealing with mental illness expected to be taught at departments statewide in nine months.

He was the second Valley civilian shot by police in 24 hours. Phoenix police shot and killed Elias Cabarera, 22, after he shot and wounded two other people at a home on North 50th Drive about 8 p.m. Sunday.



Reporter Brandon Babcock contributed to this article.

Reach the reporter at senta.scarborough@arizonarepublic.com or (602) 444-7937.

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/0826shooting26.html :cuss: :cuss: :cuss:

[swingset]

There's a lesson here.

Don't charge a police officer holding a gun with a knife. It gets you killed.

[Erik]

Yes it does.

[inthefork]

The lesson here is: Folks have been conned into depending on the "law" to solve all thier problems. I say reap the rewards of the socialist system youve been conned into depending on.

m16

[c_yeager]

Seems like we have two wildly different stories here. If the parents are to believed then the cops screwed up. If the cops are to believed then they didnt. There is really no way to say who is right or wrong onthis untill more information comes to light. Of course one would wonder why the parents would fabricate a story. Its possible and understandable that they may have misinterpreted events while under considerable stress. One would also wonder why a cop would shoot the kid if he was unarmed and not resisting. The fact is that SOMEONE is either lying or badly mistaken. And without more information its impossible to say who.

[resmeth]

Many parents can't handle the truth that they raised a violent drug abusing punk. Denial is much easier than fessing up to raising a POS. Part of that denial could be blaming the cops for killing there poor innocent child who would never do anything wrong.
Then again if they are telling the truth, those cops need a good frying.
With such a wild difference in stories the autopsy (bullet entry and exit points) should clear a lot up.

[Sportcat]

I agree with others. Cal the Cops to take care of your "innocent baby." Two sides to this story; hopefully the truth will come up.

Makes you wonder if video cameras will now be standard issue on all uniforms. Kind of like the Marines in "Aliens."

[c_yeager]

Many parents can't handle the truth that they raised a violent drug abusing punk. Denial is much easier than fessing up to raising a POS. Part of that denial could be blaming the cops for killing there poor innocent child who would never do anything wrong.

thats a whole heap full of assumptions. As far as the article goes all we know is that he drank a lot and threatened to kill himself. There could very well be more to it. But, i dont think its safe to assume all that much based on so little information.

[Rock45]

This P.O.S. was taken by force to a crisis center 2 months ago, where he had a 6-week stay. The father said it was very successful...apparently NOT! It's hard to judge this by the info available now, but I would have to give the benefit of the doubt to the cops at this time.

[greyhound]

"He dropped the knife after the electrical shock," he said. "While he was laying on the floor an officer got close and shot him twice."

Lawd knows I'm sometimes very crtical of LEOs, but I cannot believe for one second that 3 police officers shot this kid while he was laying on the ground. A tragic loss, no doubt, but methinks the parents are having a serious case of "the blame game" here.

[FPrice]

"Of course one would wonder why the parents would fabricate a story."

I am not a police officer, nor do I play one on TV. However, in following accounts of police actions and calls, there is a continuing thread that domestic calls are among the most difficult. And when violent action is necessary, the party who called may react negatively towards the police for doing something to their "loved one" who moments ago was a threat to them.

Drawing upon my own experiences with an out-of-control teen-ager, I think the kid may very well have done what the police said and did in fact cause his own death.

[Don Gwinn]

The smartest thing would seem to be to wait for the inevitable trial. We've got two clear stories, and it will be easy to tell who's lying. If the police really shot the boy as he lay on the ground at close range, the evidence will be undeniable.

[C.R.Sam]

Information lacking.
Like cliff jumping; conclusion jumping can be risky.

Sam

[BrokenPaw]

For any given incident involving n people, there will be n different stories[0] of what exactly happened. All of them will be wrong. People see what they expect to see, and backfill events into a patchy timeline in accordance with what they think "must" have happened.

The parents loved their son, and had known him all his life, and they never feared that he would harm anyone (except, after his declaration of intent, himself). They see him as a harmless and innocent victim who was only reaching out for help.

The responding police knew him not at all, and knew only that he was armed and emotionally unstable[1]. There have been many cases where a person intent on suicide has been thwarted in his initial attempts, because of police response, and has decided to finish the job using an alternative method: suicide by cop.

What is the actual truth of what happened? There's no way to be absolutely sure. The cops' stories are at one end of the continuum. The parents' stories are at the other end. Forensics will probably point to somewhere between the two. The truth is likely somewhere between the two, close to where the forensic report points.

When it comes down to it, though: The boy wanted to be dead. Now he is. The cause of death is clear. Everything else is just an exercise in determining by which method were the boy's desires fulfilled.

-BbecarefulwhatyouwishforP

[0] at least
[1] essentially by definition

[DF357]

the father got a video camera and taped the scene ? This guy was really brokenup wasn't he?

Seems like he was immediately more interested in the upcoming trial against the cops than he was about mourning his dead kid.

Anyway, the cops did their job. They stopped the kid from killing himself.

[TheeBadOne]

As said, way too little info to form an opinion on. But I did notice that in one place Dad say's the son was unarmed, had dropped the knife, and in another part said "the knife was pointed down". Which was it? One, the other, neither? I do agree as already stated that if Dad's version is what happened we'll know soon enough, the physical evidence will be as clear as glass.

[Dorrin79]

Parents raised a bad kid.

Bad kid screwed up, fatally.

Parents now looking to collect on their 'investment' via litigation.

Just my intuitions, of course. There's no way any of us can really know from the information given.

[Skunkabilly]

All my friends keep asking me when I'm going to the academy. I'm not. Reason #1 I don't want to be a cop is domestic calls. :barf:

Reason #2 is all the running and pushups :D

[jsalcedo]

Six or seven beers in a 15 year old (depending on his weight and if he consumed food) has the potential to produce a wildly violent 100% blackout
where the kid would kill his own mother and not even remember.


That said..
I've taken knives away from people who were being drunk and crazy.
Maybe I was lucky I didn't get hurt.

Sober people have MUCH faster reaction times than drunks and I find it hard to believe they couldn't disarm him by some other means.

The kid was probably already a total waste anyway but if it were my kid (god forbid) I'd let him stab me in the belly before I called the cops
into my home.

[J Miller]

I lived in AZ for almost 40 years. I have witnessed the mindset of many of the cops in the Valley.
The mind set is: Kill first, lie about it later. The department investagators will clear me.
This has happened many times in Phoenix, Mesa, Tempe, Scottsdale, Awatuke, ect. And even the AZ Dept of Public Safty has the same attitude.
Usually the dept of the shooting officers will clear them, then the AZ DPS will investigate and clear them, then the familys of the murdered people will sue and it will turn out that they did in fact murder the people. Many law suits have cost the depts millions of dollars in settlement money. But the unnessary killings just keep on happening.

You will notice that in both shootings mentioned in this thread, the dead were of Mexican decent.

In AZ the minority groups outnumber the white groups by a large margin.
But the law enforcement agencys and courts treat them as sub second class citizens.

Having lived in AZ for so many years, I tend to believe the family in this one.

[Steve in PA]

Theres a similar story here.......its in a local paper but I can't find a link to it.

In a nut shell.......two PSP Troppers are being sued by a lawyer who makes his living off of suing cops........ for shooting his clients 27 year old son who charged at them with kitchen knives. The Troopers shot him after the male was warned to drop the knives.......failed to do so.......charged the Troopers and got within 7 feet. The homicide was ruled justified by the County DA.

The atty is suing because the dead males civil rights were violated. He also said the Troopers should be able to handle these types of situations without killing. The legal action would seek monetary damages.

Come charging at me with a knife and you won't make it to the 7 foot mark.

Yeah, gimme a few bucks and I'll feel all better. Gimme a break. He (the atty) is a low-life scum who sues, knowing the insurance companies don't want to foot a big bill and will settle. So maybe the familes will get a few bucks.......he's get his grimy paws into it for his share and the family will end up with squat.

[Vic303]

This incident reminds me of an extremely similar incident in Lawrence KS 10-15 yrs ago. Am. Ind. young man went out drinking w/his dad, got drunk & when at home (lived w/parents) later that night got depressed, got a steak knife & threatened to hurm HIMSELF. Mom calls 911, cops kill kid. Ruled clean shoot/suicide by cop.

Sad, very sad.

[jsalcedo]

I remember from my CHL class there is a provision in the Texas lawbooks where you can shoot someone who is about to commit suicide.


§ 9.34. Protection of Life or Health
(a) A person is justified in using force, but not deadly force, against another when and to the degree he reasonably believes the force is immediately necessary to prevent the other from committing suicide or inflicting serious bodily injury to himself.

I wonder if the cops were just trying to save the kids life by shooting him.

[Rock45]

"Yes, Your Honor...I agree that it is unfortunate the all three of us fired at the same time, but we were only trying to save the young man's life."

Sounds good to me!:D

[Quartus]

"I told him (Mario Jr.) that I was going to take him to the crisis center where he can get help to stop drinking alcohol." But, he said, "He took a kitchen knife and says he is going to kill himself and that's when we called police to get help to take him to the crisis center."

About two months ago, Madrigal said police helped take his son to a crisis center to prevent him from drinking alcohol. His son spent six weeks at the center.



Then Daddy says:

"He was a normal kid. He was always at home and he would tell us when he wanted to go," said Madrigal.


But here's the big winner in the Denial of the Month contest:

He said his son didn't have a serious drinking problem but he wanted to stop it before it got worse.



:rolleyes:

Makes one wonder just WHAT would be a "serious drinking problem" in this idiot's eyes.



Hmm. He was laying on the ground and they shot him? That should show up quite clearly in any fair investigation.

We'll see...

[Bottom Gun]

The local news aired some film of what appeared to be bullet holes in the wall just above the floor.

[TheeBadOne]

objectivity:

expressing or dealing with facts or conditions as perceived without distortion by personal feelings, prejudices, or interpretations <objective art> <an objective history of the war> <an objective judgment> b of a test : limited to choices of fixed alternatives and reducing subjective factors to a minimum

[RustyHammer]

:banghead:

[Hutch]

I'm with Quartus on this matter. Any drinking, beyond say, champagne on New Years Eve, by a 15 year old IS a serious problem, whether the parents like to admit it or not. Normal? It's not normal for a 15 year old to spend six weeks in alcohol rehab. I'm sorry for their loss, but unless more evidence is produced, I'd say the parents are trying "The best defense is a good offense" approach.

[KRAUTGUNNER]

The little punk wanted to die!

The cops just made his deathwish come true.

What's the problem?

[Standing Wolf]

"How can our society allow that to happen more than once?"

It's a parenting thing. An awful lot of parents wouldn't understand if you explained it to them.

[Atticus]

I'm wondering why the reporter wasn't asking questions such as:
Where did he get the beer? Can anyone get beer? Why is it so easy? Where did the knife come from? Can anyone get a knife...just like that? Do knives need to be that sharp? Wouldn't this child be alive if all knives had safety devices installed. Who made that knife? What responsibility do they bear in this?
Do police bullets have to be that deadly? Who manufactured the defective Taser? Were the cops fluent in Spanish mental health terminology?

Sorry...I'm growing frustrated these days.

[gunsmith]

a stab wound from a 15yr old
can kill/maim the same as a stab wound
from a 40yr old.
the parents fault/kids fault

[sw442642]

I'm appalled at the callous insults over the death of a person. It is brave to say that
over the Internet. That a kid died is a tragedy for him, the family and the cops who
shoot him. All will suffer. So I regard those who just raved at the kid and seem to
applaud his death as despicable. May you have to deal with an out of control family
member who is suicidial some time.

As far as the story - there is no way to tell yet. Forsenics will quickly determine
how he was shot. If he was on the ground or lunging forward. Cop haters will blame
the cops and mindless cop lovers will blame the kid.

I've been in this one. I have talked to a sucidial knife wielder on two occassions for several hours at
personal risk to myself as I didn't want to call the cops till the persons were disarmed.
I frankly didn't trust them not to cycle into a macho challenge and kill the person.
I could have shot the people myself if that was the preferred outcome. Instead I talked
them down.

If forensics show the shooting was not justified then hang them. If it was justified then we
should pray for all concerned and not be full of such childish hate.

[Autolite]

Someone help me out here. I don't understand why the parents are blaming the cops. THEY called the cops!!! When you call in the police the implication is that the situation is now beyond your control and you are asking for help from an entity who are authorised to employ deadly force at their descretion. If YOU call the cops then YOU are forfeiting your right to determine how the situation is to be handled. It is now up to the police to deal with it as they are trained to do. I believe people need to learn how to solve there own problems amongst themselves. Police are "law enforcement" who protect the "general public" and will use deadly force. If the parents were that worried that their kid might get shot then they should have phone a shrink instead ...

(Not a cop 'lover' but it sounds like they got a call and they did their job).

[denfoote]

I too have been following this, both in the AZ Republic and on KFYI AM 550. Prima facia, it looks like an all to often acted out scenerio: "sucicide by cop".

But with the testimony by the parents, we MAY have a case of police brutality.

However, it has long been established that Arizona LEO's will shoot first and ask questions later!!! A relic from teratorial days, I assume!!

The way Arizona law is written, if a person, not just an LEO, acting as a reasonable persion, perceves that his life, or the life of a third party is in grave danger of loss of life, the use of deadly force is justified!! All people who carry a concealed firearm in the state of AZ are taught this in the mandatory CCW training!!

Whether this youth was sucicidal or not, when he brandished a deadly implement (defined as an ordanary object, such as a kitchen knife, that is intended to be used as a weapon, such that a reasonable person would believe that such impliment would, in fact, be used in such a manner so as to pose a grave threat to the intended victim), the use of deadly force was indeed justified!!

With that said, it becomes a case of "don't bring a knife to a gun fight"!!!

Source:
"The Arizona Gun Owners Guide".
By Alan Korwin
Bloomfield Press
12629 N. Tatum Blvd #440T
Phx, AZ, 85032
Ph (602)996-4020

[BluesBear]

Sounds like another case of someone threatening suicide to get attention. Looks like he got plenty of attention.
And the the state of Arizona just had it's average IQ raised a few points.

But I do feel for the officers who were forced into this.

[Bottom Gun]

Last night's TV report said the autopsy determined the kid had been hit 10 times.
Nothing was said about whether he was standing or on the ground when he was shot.

[Joe Demko]

I'm honored to be sharing the same board with people who are so perceptive that they know the dead kid was "a little punk" and "a bad kid" and that "the state of Arizona just had it's average IQ raised a few points." Honestly, people who can make such penetratingly insightful conclusions from so little information are amazing, even awesome.

[AZTOY]

10 wounds found on boy killed by police
Private pathologist hired for autopsy

Senta Scarborough
The Arizona Republic
Sept. 2, 2003 12:00 AM

Police shot a Mesa teenager 10 times as he held a knife and threatened suicide at his parents' home last week, the family's attorney said Monday.

Edward Fitzhugh, attorney for the family of Mario Albert Madrigal Jr., said Valley pathologist Dr. Richard Trepeta was hired to perform an independent autopsy on the 15-year-old.

The results showed 10 gunshot wounds, Fitzhugh said, most in the upper body with one grazing his arm. The Maricopa County Medical Examiner's Office has not released its autopsy results.

Bill FitzGerald of the Maricopa County Attorney's Office said he would not comment until the investigation is done.

Madrigal was killed Aug. 25 after his parents called police for help with the teenager, who had grabbed a kitchen knife and was threatening suicide. Police and family members dispute whether the boy was approaching police with a knife when three officers opened fire.

Kelvin Smith, president of the Mesa Police Association, said, "I don't think it is unusual for an officer to fire three or four rounds depending on the circumstances."

Smith would not talk specifically about this shooting. But he said, "The number of rounds fired doesn't explain what happened."

He added most Valley law enforcement officers carry semiautomatic weapons, which fire rounds more quickly than revolvers. It is unknown what type of guns the officers used in the shooting.

Smith said it is important that a complete investigation be performed by Mesa police, the County Attorney's Office and the medical examiner.

"Unfortunately that may take a little longer than some people would like," Smith said. "People need to be patient for them to do their job."

Fitzhugh said the big question is: "How could these officers not handle a situation like that with a 5-foot-5, 115-pound boy any better?"

He said that when officers arrived, Madrigal's mother was talking to him, calming him. The officers were outside the house and Madrigal and his mother were inside, he said.

"In Rambo-style, these officers escalated the situation. One of the officers pulled Mario's mother away from him, and right after that the shooting began," Fitzhugh said. "They arrived in a situation where a mother is talking to her son. Even in the most extreme situation, she wasn't in danger."

Fitzhugh said he believes police shot 15 times because 15 shell casings were found, according to a warrant property list.

Fitzhugh also said it is inappropriate for police and the County Attorney's Office to be selective about what information is released in the case, asking why the 911 tape, which is believed to have recorded most of the incident, has not been made available.

But Mesa City Councilman Rex Griswold said he is willing to be patient. "I have a great deal of faith in (County Attorney) Rick Romley and his ability to get to the truth," said Griswold, chairman of Mesa's Police Committee. "He has demonstrated this process many times in the past."

On Friday, the three members of the Madrigal family, including Mario's 10-year-old brother, were interviewed by the FBI as part of the agency's preliminary investigation into possible civil rights violations by the three officers.

"We are very happy that the FBI has been involved at this early stage and will conduct their own investigation," Fitzhugh said.

The parents still want the officers involved in the shooting to undergo blood testing while it is timely, but Mesa police have refused.

The family will hire its own experts to review the evidence from the scene once Mesa releases the results of its investigation, Fitzhugh said.

"They saw no need for what happened to their son," Fitzhugh said, "and they are still asking for a rational, reasonable explanation of why these officers did what they did."



Reach the reporter at senta.scarborough@arizonarepublic.com or (602) 444-7937.

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0902madrigal02.html