A Metro Nashville police officer shot an alleged domestic violence suspect in the leg on Wednesday night, but Nashville’s Community Oversight Board (COB) was only notified of the domestic related incident and not that it was a critical incident involving a police officer shooting.
A notification from the Department of Emergency Communications (DEC) was received on Wednesday night by the Community Oversight staff that did mention a domestic related incident. However, it was unknown to the COB that the incident involved a police officer shooting until this morning. Because of this, the Community Oversight staff was not able to respond to the scene when the shooting occurred. The lack of notification is an issue as it was an agreed upon matter in a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that was signed in January of this year which clearly defined the mutual agreement terms of such notifications and processes.
“Insufficient notification to Community Oversight staff seeks to erode progress while undermining the still healing trust between the Nashville community and law enforcement,” says Community Oversight Board Chair Ashlee Davis. “The Memorandum of Understanding is clear, prescriptive and should be followed by all parties.”
Executive Director Jill Fitcheard says that she has been in contact with Department of Emergency Communications since March asking them to resolve the issue of lack of notifications for incidents that she and the Community Oversight staff had not been receiving. Though she reached out several times, as recent as Monday, the matter had not been resolved and now an officer involved shooting has occurred and they have been left out of the notification process yet again.
“The vague and insufficient notification that was received last evening would be equated to receiving no notification at all,” says Fitcheard. “Our staff has prepared itself to respond to all critical incidents that we are properly notified of and if a proper notification was sent from DEC of this incident we would have responded to the scene. The community expects Community Oversight to be an engaged and active partner in all critical incidents involving Metro Police— especially officer involved shootings— and Community Oversight takes this responsibility seriously.”
Fitcheard has sent communications to Department of Emergency Communications Director Stephen Martini, John Buntin of the Mayor’s Office, and Deputy Chief Hagar requesting that a response be given on why a proper notification was not sent to the Community Oversight Board about this very important and critical incident, and how they would ensure that this lack of notification would not occur in the future. A meeting took place with Buntin and Martini this afternoon to discuss how to resolve the issue and prevent it from occurring in the future.
The Community Oversight staff has opened an investigation and is in the process of requesting the reports that are needed to move forward.