Tacoma City Council asks Inslee for independent review of Manuel Ellis’ death
Manuel Ellis’ death while being restrained by Tacoma police is likely to get an independent review.
On Friday, the Tacoma City Council sent a letter to Gov. Jay Inslee asking for his thoughts on “how the community can be assured of a fair process and how to forge lasting change.”
Mayor Victoria Woodards said she’d already spoken with Inslee about the need for a thorough, independent investigation into the March 3 death of Ellis, a 33-year-old black man. In a live address Thursday evening, Woodards called for the officers involved in Ellis’ death to be prosecuted and fired.
City Manager Elizabeth Pauli issued a statement in support of the mayor Friday but stopped short of saying she’d fire the officers.
“I will act quickly in reviewing any and all information provided and in making decisions necessary to hold individuals accountable for their actions,” Pauli said in the statement.
Council members held a special meeting Friday and voted unanimously on sending the letter, which expressed concern about how Ellis died and asked for help finding the truth.
“African American residents across our City and our Nation know that losses of life in police custody are a traumatic but common occurrence,” the letter reads. “To have lasting change — to try to ensure that other families will not experience a tragedy like this — we must reform our justice system’s standards, policies and procedures.”
Ellis died during a police encounter in South Tacoma.
It was oxygen deprivation due to physical restraint that killed him, according to the Pierce County Medical Examiner’s Office.
His death has been ruled a homicide, which legally means he was killed by another person.
Prosecutors will decide if officers acted lawfully and if the homicide was justifiable or a criminal act was committed.
The Police Department, which on Wednesday placed the four involved officers on administrative leave for a second time, identified them as Christopher Burbank, 34; Matthew Collins, 37; Masyih Ford, 28; and Timothy Rankine, 31.
Burbank and Collins are white. Ford is black. Rankine is Asian.
Ellis’ family, the NAACP and Tacoma Action Collective held a press conference Thursday to demand an investigation by an agency other than the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department, which they consider biased and lacking transparency.
In the letter to Inslee, the council said it heard the family’s plea and wants to answer it.
In addition to the independent investigation, Woodards said she wants to work with Inslee to create the same process for all police-involved deaths.
“We need to change the system,” she said in the special meeting. “And we need to not only give people the confidence in the system in the review of what happened to Manuel Ellis, but we need to give everyone in the entire state an opportunity to have the confidence and the ability to trust the outcomes of these independent reviews.”
Inslee was expected to talk Friday afternoon about how he plans to address the City Council’s request, Woodards said.
Officials have not provided details about which agency would possibly conduct an independent review of Ellis’ death, what that would entail or how long it would take.
The Sheriff’s Department has been investigating the case and plans to turn its findings over to the Prosecutor’s Office by next week. A spokesman said they welcome another independent review.
“This is just the beginning of a long fight and path towards the type of reforms that we need to have in order to restore faith and trust in government to be the right partner for our citizens,” Councilman Robert Thoms said. “Nothing’s more important than making sure that you feel like you’re safe in your own home, in your own community, in your own skin, and that starts with having people that you trust serving you. I appreciate that we’re marching in that direction.”
This story was originally published June 5, 2020 at 2:48 PM.
