Cop shot man who was afraid to leave hotel room during mental health crisis, suit says
A man experiencing a mental health crisis told police he was afraid to leave his hotel room during an hours-long law enforcement response that ended with an officer shooting him, a new federal lawsuit says.
Ashton Porter, a father of six from Georgia, survived one shot to his stomach, and another that hit his arm, in Pittsburg, California on Feb. 24, 2022, according to his legal counsel.
Now, Porter and his wife Gianna Porter are suing a few Pittsburg Police Department officers involved in the incident at a Hampton Inn.
A complaint filed May 28 says officers escalated the situation with their weapons — including by deploying tear gas and pepper spray into Porter’s hotel room to force him out — instead of figuring out a “peaceful resolution.”
The couple was joined by five of their children to announce the lawsuit at a news conference held by their attorney Adanté Pointer on May 28. There, one of their daughters discussed how her family called the police to check on her father in February 2022 because he “was very stressed.”
“We just wanted help, to know where he was ... I felt like it was our fault that we called the police and we shouldn’t have,” Porter’s daughter said.
Porter explained he was “going through a really rough time” and was trying to clear his mind in California ahead of the encounter with officers, who he hoped would help.
Pittsburg Police Chief Steve Albanese didn’t immediately respond to McClatchy News’ request for comment on May 29.
The moments before the shooting
When Porter didn’t emerge from his hotel room, police officers in SWAT gear tried to break through the door, then resorted to using pepper spray, followed by tear gas, according to the complaint.
The complaint says “this aggressive and unnecessary escalation stoked Mr. Porter’s fears that the officers were there to harm him and eroded any trust or rapport that had been established.”
The pepper spray and tear gas eventually caused Porter to come out and into the hallway, where he saw officers in SWAT gear at opposite ends of the hallway, according to the complaint.
Then, one shot him with rubber bullets, the complaint says.
Less than two seconds later, Officer Ernesto Mejia-Orozco shot Porter twice, and he fell to the floor, according to the complaint.
“Officers then dragged Mr. Porter down the hallway, into the elevator, and down to the hotel lobby, despite the fact that he had just been shot twice,” the complaint says.
Police body camera footage gets released
The Pittsburg Police Department’s confrontation with Porter lasted more than 20 hours, the department said in a March 2022 news release.
It began with several 911 calls about Porter acting “strangely” at the Hampton Inn on Feb. 23, 2022, according to a video released by the department in which officers’ body-worn camera footage was made public.
Mejia-Orozco ultimately shot Porter after he stepped out of the room with a large knife and approached officers, the department said.
According to Porter’s legal counsel, he was holding a knife over his head, but he didn’t threaten anyone with it.
Mejia-Orozco told investigators he shot Porter because he “began ‘sprinting’ down the hallway directly at him with a knife drawn,” the complaints says.
The complaint argues Mejia-Orozco’s body-camera footage refutes this, and instead shows Porter’s “body twisting in reaction to being shot by the rubber bullets” before Mejia-Orozco shot him.
Porter is seen standing in the hallway as several shots ring out in Mejia-Orozco’s body camera footage. Then he falls to the ground.
Police said two officers fired “two sponge projectiles that struck” Porter before Mejia-Orozco shot him.
According to the department, officers “exhausted efforts to convince (Porter) to exit the room” and deployed chemical irritants ahead of the shooting.
The law enforcement response was led by Lt. William Hatcher, the complaint says. At some point, Hatcher dismissed mental health professionals who had arrived at the scene, according to the lawsuit.
After the mental health professionals left, Hatcher allowed a plan created by Mejia-Orozco and another officer, Sgt. Cory Smith, to “aggressively force Mr. Porter out of his room,” the complaint says.
The city of Pittsburg, Hatcher, Mejia-Orozco, Smith and former police Chief Brian Addington are named as defendants in the lawsuit, which accuses them of violating Porter’s civil rights.
The city didn’t immediately respond to McClatchy News’ request for comment on May 29.
‘What happened was unjust’
On May 6, charges against Porter in connection with the February 2022 incident were dismissed, according to the lawsuit, which says he was facing felony counts of assaulting an officer with a deadly weapon.
Meanwhile, Mejia-Orozco, who no longer works for the Pittsburg Police Department, is facing criminal charges in two unrelated cases, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
He’s charged in connection with a bribery scheme involving other officers in Contra Costa Superior Court, and he also faces fraud charges in a federal case, according to the newspaper. He’s pleaded not guilty to all the charges against him, court records show.
With the Porters’ lawsuit, the couple demands a jury trial and seeks an unspecified amount of damages.
“What happened was unjust. Nothing was okay about it,” their daughter said at the news conference.
“I’m just grateful that he is here,” she said about her father.
This story was originally published May 29, 2024 at 1:17 PM with the headline "Cop shot man who was afraid to leave hotel room during mental health crisis, suit says."
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