Fight inappropriate police behavior with lawsuits, crowd told

By Hector Gutierrez, Rocky Mountain News
August 22, 2003

A Denver minister told a community gathering Thursday he was resigned to the fact that the policeman who fatally wounded a mentally impaired and knife-wielding teenager will be exonerated.

So, the Rev. Paul Martin said, it was time for families who believe their relatives were victims of inappropriate police conduct to hit local municipalities right where they live - in the pocketbook.

"Let's sue . . . out of the city and county of Denver, and let's sue . . . out of the city of Aurora!" Martin said to thunderous applause as the district attorney and Alvin LaCabe, Denver's new manager of safety, looked on.

Martin's words were greeted with a standing ovation by many of the 80 people who attended the forum, the second in three nights, about improving relations between the police and minority neighborhoods.

The meetings were organized after the deaths of 15-year-old Paul Childs, who was shot and killed July 5 by a Denver officer, and Denise Washington, a mentally ill woman who was fatally wounded Aug. 5 by an Aurora policeman.

Martin put the Childs family in touch with renowned Los Angeles lawyer Johnnie Cochrane.

The Denver Police Department was expected to present its case concerning the shooting of the teenager to the district attorney this week.

The Aurora Police Department turned its case over to Arapahoe County District Attorney James Peters last week.

Megen Gilman tearfully recalled how her 20-year-old brother, Shaun Gilman, was shot and killed by several Denver officers in April. Shaul Gilman was mentally ill, suffering bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, she said.

Officers shot Gilman after he pointed a laser-sighted crossbow at them.

Megen Gilman suggested that officers need more sensitivity training to deal with the disabled and that mental health workers somehow need to be brought in to the department to help officers and emergency dispatchers.

LaCabe acknowledged the police department needed to earn the trust of the community.

"The only way that changes is if officers interact with the community every day in every kind of situation outside of the normal police work," LaCabe said.

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