Another Black Man Killed South Bend

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“The June 16 incident also involved a second officer, Aaron Knepper, who drove the wounded man, Eric Logan, to the hospital in a squad car. He had called for an ambulance but decided not to wait, according the account he gave officials. (Logan, who was shot once in the abdomen, died later.) Knepper also had a history. In 2016, he was the subject of public protests that called for his dismissal because of a series of incidents over the years. Scott Ruszkowski, Buttigieg’s police chief, pulled Knepper off the streets, citing threats to the officer. Four months later, Knepper was back on the beat.

In August 2012, Knepper was one of three officers who tricked a mentally disabled 7-Eleven clerk into eating a spoonful of cinnamon in 60 seconds. The man became violently ill. His family sued. The city offered a settlement before trial of $15,000, but the family declined it, and the jury awarded $8,000.

“Obviously, I’m not pleased,” Buttigieg said at the time.

That year, Knepper and other officers entered a black family’s home in the middle of the night, and punched 17-year-old Deshawn Franklin six times and stunned him with a Taser. The officers had mistaken him for someone else. A federal jury decided that Knepper and his fellow officers violated Franklin’s constitutional rights, but awarded him and his family $18. More public outrage ensued.

Buttigieg was pressured to fire Knepper, but he said that by state statute only the city’s Board of Public Safety had that authority. “Obviously, a firing-level personnel decision is made by the Board of Public Safety,” he said in 2016. “But just to be clear, I accept responsibility for appointments to the Board of Public Safety and (police) chief.”

In the interest of promoting equity, Buttigieg has appointed three African Americans to the four-member Board of Public Safety (one seat is vacant). At a board meeting in September 2016, protesters interrupted a panel on which Buttigieg sat with Ruszkowski, the former head of the local police union who became police chief in 2015. “I don't think this can be resolved by targeting any individual,” Buttigieg said. “It can only be resolved by making sure we have a higher level of trust in the community that’s borne out by consistently positive behavior and consistently fair discipline.”