by Dave Waddell
posted Oct. 17
SACRAMENTO – An eight-person jury decided today that the tasing seven years ago of the thrice-shot, motionless Tyler Rushing by a Chico police officer was not excessive force.
Tyler Rushing
Jurors did find negligence in the incident by police, but attached no monetary award to that judgment, said Mark Merin, attorney for Tyler’s parents, Scott and Paula Rushing.
The decision was a victory for the City of Chico and defendant officers Alex Fliehr, Jeremy Gagnebin and Cedric Schwyzer in a civil rights lawsuit brought by the Rushings.
The family is “pretty devastated, as you might imagine,” Scott Rushing said shortly after the verdict. “My anger level is pretty much off the charts.”
Merin and Rushing both said they were perplexed by the jurors’ verdict.
“They looked like another day at the office,” Rushing said. “They were staring like robots. We just don’t understand what they were thinking.”
More coverage of the civil rights trial will follow.
I am devastated by this decision. It was my honor to interview Scott Rushing on the KZFR Peace and Justice Program. In preparation of that interview I watched the horrible bathroom scene capped off by Fliehr tasing Tyler as he lay lifeless on the wet bloody floor. What did this jury see or think that contradicted this basic disgusting act of excessive and unnecessary cruelty and force? Now these monsters will be enabled to kill again. My condolences all over again to the Rushing family and also Desmond’s dad David Phillips.