‘He was very strong.’ Deputies testify about previous encounters with Manuel Ellis

Lawyers for three Tacoma police officers on trial for the death of Manuel Ellis continued Tuesday morning to spotlight Ellis’s history of drug abuse.

Testimony focused on a 2015 arrest when Ellis was allegedly high on methamphetamine, as he was on the night in March 2020 when he died. After spending Monday dissecting Ellis’s 2019 arrest on suspicion of attempted robbery, the defense continued to amplify Ellis’ lowest moments — some of them years old — to explain what happened on the night he died.

Just before his death, Ellis told police at least five times that he couldn’t breathe while he was restrained under the weight of a number of officers. The Pierce County medical examiner ruled his death a homicide caused by oxygen deprivation from physical restraint. Lawyers for the officers on trial have challenged that ruling and have tried to appeal to the jury that the high level of methamphetamine in Ellis’ system and his enlarged heart were the true causes of his death.

Officers Matthew Collins, 40, Christopher “Shane” Burbank, 38, and Timothy Rankine, 34, are charged with first-degree manslaughter. Collins and Burbank, who told detectives they saw Ellis reach for the door handle of a passing car in an intersection, face additional charges of second-degree murder.

Collins and Burbank tell different versions of how the struggle with Ellis started, but they are consistent in characterizing Ellis as the aggressor. Three eyewitnesses, two of whom provided cellphone videos that have served as key evidence against the officers, say Collins and Burbank were the aggressors and they saw Ellis do nothing to provoke the police.

The videos show Collins place Ellis in a neck hold, slam him to the ground, repeatedly strike him with elbows or fists, and place a knee on his neck while he’s face down on the asphalt. Burbank is shown punching Ellis and delivering a series of Taser strikes to Ellis’s torso as Ellis holds up his hands in what an expert witness for the prosecution called a sign of submission.

Collins and Burbank told detectives they never heard Ellis say he couldn’t breathe, but a home security camera captured audio of Ellis pleading that he couldn’t breathe. Someone responded: “Shut the (expletive) up, man.” Burbank and Collins were the only officers present.

Rankine, who arrived minutes later, sat on Ellis’s back while his hands were cuffed behind it. Rankine told detectives he heard Ellis say he couldn’t breathe but didn’t believe him and continued to sit with his weight on Ellis’s back. Prosecution experts testified that the series of officers placing weight on Ellis’s back while he lay prone killed him.

Defense lawyers for the officers on Monday focused on a 2019 arrest, when Ellis, high on meth, charged at Pierce County sheriff’s deputies and was subdued with a Taser. Tuesday, the defense again focused on Ellis’s past drug use, trying to convince the jury that those events are analogous to the night Ellis died.

Pierce County sheriff’s deputies who responded to a September 2015 domestic dispute between Ellis and his then-girlfriend testified Tuesday that he was high on meth, combative and resisted arrest.

Ellis was placed in handcuffs but complained that he was in discomfort from a prior shoulder injury. Deputies accommodated him by connecting two sets of handcuffs behind his back to make them less restrictive, Deputy Kevin Pressel testified. But Pressel conducted an inadequate search, and after Ellis was placed in the back of his patrol car, he saw Ellis fishing a hypodermic needle from one of his pants pockets.

Pressel said Ellis ignored commands to exit the car, so Pressel pulled him out by his arm and placed him prone on the street. With the help of two other deputies, Pressel tried to restrain Ellis. Pressell and another deputy, Alexa Moss, said Ellis behaved combatively and kicked a third deputy repeatedly in the back as she straddled his hips while he lay face down in the street. Moss testified that Ellis bucked and squirmed while trying to get deputies off of him. The officers who struggled with Ellis on the night he died offered similar descriptions.

“He was very strong,” Pressel said of Ellis. “He was lifting us off the ground.”

Pressel said the struggle with Ellis lasted less than a minute, and the three deputies were able to gain control of him.

The morning’s testimony concluded with Shad Hayes on the stand. Hayes, who lived near where Ellis died, offered to help police, but they declined and said police backup was on its way. Testimony was expected to resume Tuesday afternoon with Hayes on the witness stand.

This story was originally published November 14, 2023 at 12:59 PM.