Gresham cat hostage taking incident

The Gresham cat hostage taking incident was an incident involving a woman named Janet Marilyn Smith, who was 28 years old at the time, taking her own Siamese cat hostage in the Fred Meyer store at 2497 East Burnside Road on August 21, 1994, in Gresham, Oregon, United States, before she was fatally shot by police after lunging at a police officer. The cat could not be found after the incident, as she was hiding somewhere in the store. It was the first fatal shooting by Gresham police since the January 4, 1984 shooting of Mark R. Stomps after reports that he was on drugs, had a gun and was threatening to committ suicide.^[1]

Background[]

Smith came to Portland in 1973 from Loleta, California 10 miles south of Eureka. She was a member of the Yurok American Indian tribe,^[2] and attended Lincoln High School in Portland but dropped out around the 10th grade; she also worked at various clerk jobs around Portland, including a Fred Meyer store in North Portland. She and her grandmother had recently moved to Gresham to "find a quieter, safer life," but police were called to Janet Smith’s apartment three times in the previous two months, Sgt. David B. Lerwick said, although he did not know the reason for the visits.^[2] She suffered from schizophrenia,^[3] and her family said she was being stalked by a former boyfriend and was becoming increasingly paranoid,^[2] and in the previous week she had called friends and family members asking for help. She had also complained that her medication made her sick, although the family did not want to talk about her illness medication, she had been taking since her early adulthood, after the incident.^[2] She was at the Providence Hospital in her last ten days before the shooting and shared a unit with her grandmother, then 73-year-old Mary Smith in Wilmar East Apartments,^[1] and had been hospitalized months before the incident. She had apparently been at the store twice before the incident, with cashier Kori S. Ludahl saying "She was in here twice yesterday."^[1] Smith was witnessed saying that she was "a diabetic", and that her grandmother "was a Satan worshipper".^[4][1]

Incident[]

On August 21, 1994, before entering Fred Meyer's store, Smith stood outside her apartment screaming for help, but when a neighbour tried to help she told him to get away.^[2] 28-year-old Smith then entered the Fred Meyer's store between 12:30 and 1 p.m. with her gray-brown Siamese cat named "Blue"^[2] in her arms, holding a folding knife with a 6-inch blade (later revealed to be a kitchen carving knife with about 12 inches long, with a 6-inch blade that tapered the point).^[5][1] She said she was thirsty, went near a cigarette case and to the Rice Krispies in Aisle 7 and got a President’s Choice lemon lime soda (during which the incident she lit the cigarette and drank the soda)^[1] and requested someone to call police for her, because someone was following her. A witness, Mary Bradley, said however, that Smith was frantically yelling “Please help me! Call the police! Please help me! Call the police!” There apparently wasn't any panic, with one witnesses initially thinking it was a prank, but rapidly learnt that it was "serious".^[6] She then sat down against the soda cooler, still clutching the knife and the cat. According to the then 18-year-old cashier Mandy Kerr, she said "she didn’t want to do any harm".^[4] Initially managers talked to Smith before police arrival,^[1] and blockaded the aisle at either end with rows of shopping carts, moved bystanders away, and called police. Five police officers arrived at about 1:10 p.m. Sgt. David Lerwick said that three police officers positioned themselves on the far end of the aisle and another two took position at the front end. When officers asked her to drop the knife, Smith threatened to kill the cat.^[4] “The officers had asked her to put the knife down, and she would not,” Lerwick said.^[1] She then got up, to which the cat got loose, began to walk down the aisle towards the back of the store. Police sprayed her with three cans of pepper mace in an attempt to stop her.^[1] She then raised her knife above her head and charged at the police. She was then shot two or three times by police officer Ron Willis (who had been a member of the Gresham Police Department since 1987)^[5] and was pronounced dead at the scene.^[1] An autopsy said she died from blood loss due to two gunshot wounds to the chest.^[2] According to witnesses, store employee Amnt Chatelin said she was shot in the throat and in the chest.^[4] The family first learned of the shooting by seeing a report on it on television. Mary Smith said that she "called around everywhere. I wanted to go see her. I thought she was hurt,” and which also she called the police and the prison of Gresham, but didn't find anything about Smith. She then thought Smith was dead.^[2]

Aftermath[]

Police spokesman Sgt. David Lerwick justified the shooting, saying they "had no choice" and that "the knife was a deadly weapon. It could kill."^[1][4] He also justified with other statements which included the possibility of the officer missing his target and being hit by Smith.^[2] “Your target is normally the center of mass,” Lerwick said. “You want to make sure when you fire your weapon the bullet strikes its intended target. On a person, that’s the torso," Lerwick also said. He also refused to reveal the name of the officer who shot Smith until that Tuesday. The officer was described as an "experienced member of the force."^[2] He was put on administrative leave while the Multnomah County district attorney’s office investigated the shooting.^[2] Paul Poitras, president of the Gresham Police Officers Association, explained the Gresham police reacted because Smith was "threatening the public." An internal investigation was to be conducted and a grand jury was to hear testimony.^[7] Witnesses discussed whether the police acted properly. “They Maced her first,” said Ken Williams, an operating engineer. “You cannot see when you are Maced. So where’s the threat?”^[1] Animal control officers were called, but they couldn't find the cat immediately after the shooting.^[4] Several Gresham officers felt wronged and angered by the Smith's shooting reactions, saying that the officer who shot Smith was "trained to do", several officers told.^[7] Smith's grandmother, Mary Smith, spent about three hours talking about the shooting saying "I don't know why they had to shoot her. She wouldn't harm a fly."^[4]

In October 1994 60 men and women, including nurses, social workers, friends and kin of the mentally ill came to point out the needs of the mentally ill, to mourn and to protest the closing of Dammasch State Hospital^[8] (which actually did close in 1995). One protester, Harold H. Kulm, carried a placard with a large picture of Smith with the sign asking "Where were the beds?" and said that the shooting would have been prevented "if the victims had been in Dammasch or receiving care at a qualified mental center."^[8]

Accounts confusion[]

Later, police changed their versions of the story on a Wednesday: There were no shopping carts at both ends of the aisle when the five police officers confronted Smith. Instead, Fred Meyer employees moved the carts and blocked the aisle after the officers went into the aisle to talk to Smith.^[9] Lerwick himself said that there were inaccuracies in the version of events released to the public because "he failed to ask investigators the right questions".^[9] He also said he made the assumptions based on his experience and observations after the shooting, not from interviews with witnesses or officers involved. “It’s my fault, and I take all the responsibility,” Lerwick later said.^[9] He also said that the detectives investigating the incident didn’t correct some of the details because "they didn’t expect them to be controversial."^[9] Lerwick also said "said he didn’t know why police went around the carts and entered the aisle before calling mental health professionals or trained negotiators."^[9] He also said that a store manager told him the employees moved the carts, but Lerwick said he failed to ask when the carts were moved, thinking they were put into place before police arrived. A detective investigating the shooting later confirmed the information.^[9] Lerwick told he first got some of his information from a detective the Sunday afternoon. Lerwick said he didn’t talk to the officers involved until the Wednesday to "spare them reliving the event."^[9] The officers also were told not to read newspapers or listen to radio or TV broadcasts, because they would might influence their testimony to the grand jury who investigated the case.^[9]

According to two police officers accounts of the incident, they said that:

The police was dispatched to the store at 1:11 p.m. and four officers and a sergeant arrived two minutes later and saw Smith sitting 10 feet in front of the checkout counters down Aisle 6. As she held Blue and a knife, a police officer believed she was threatening to kill the cat; but the others have since said she wasn’t threatening the cat.^[9] They later told that one officer went to the back of the aisle while four others positioned themselves at the front. Earlier accounts said that two officers were at the front and three at the back. One officer went over to Smith and knelt to talk to her.^[9] She then got up, walked away from the officer, and headed toward the back of the aisle. The four officers followed her, one walking by her side including officer Ron Willis behind her, and the other two somewhere behind Willis. As Smith approached the officer near the back of the aisle, he, the officer at Smith’s side and Willis sprayed her with pepper mace in an attempt to subdue her, but failed.^[9] Smith then charged at Willis, who shot her twice in the chest when she was 5 feet in front of him. “What do you do when you know you’re trapped, when you can’t turn and run?” asked Lerwick after saying that he didn't know whether Willis backed up before firing his gun, but said they were all in the back half of the aisle.^[9]

Officer Ron Willis cleared[]

In late August 1994 at a Tuesday, Ron Willis was not be indicted on criminal charges, the Multnomah County grand jury decided.^[5] The grand jury spent only five minutes deliberating and voted 7-0 to clear Officer Ron Willis of the charge of criminal homicide arising from the Smith's shooting at the Fred Meyer store.^[5] The decision ended with the district attorney's investigation. “The grand jury reviewed the actions of everybody and decided that there’s no basis upon which to bring criminal charges against anyone,” senior deputy district attorney James J. McIntyre said.^[5] However, had Smith lived she would face criminal charges: of threatening an employee who tried to prevent her from entering the store. When the employee blocked her entrance, Smith allegedly threatened him with her knife.^[5] The grand jury had 17 witnesses, of which 12 were shoppers or store employees who saw the shooting. The others were police officers or detectives. McIntyre didn't reveal the testimony, but he said nearly everyone was consistent in their descriptions of what occurred.^[5] Commenting on the situation that Smith got up and began walking towards the officers, McIntyre said that "they couldn’t have her that close to the police officer or let her get to the customers.”^[5] According to reports McIntyre collected, Smith's speed was “anywhere from a lunge to a bent-over run.^[5] It was later revealed that officer Willis wore a bulletproof jacket, but McIntyre noted that a knife would puncture it.^[5]

Possible motives[]

Smith's cousin, Sheryl Matilton, of St. Helens, believed her cousin went to Fred Meyer to get help from police because Smith was once rescued when she was locked inside a house by her former boyfriend and was taken to the Providence Medical Center.^[2] “Maybe that’s why she wanted attention,” she said. “They’d rescued her from a bad situation, probably basically that’s what she wanted this time.”^[2]

References[]