Columbia Police Department addresses deadly officer-involved shooting

Almost two weeks after a deadly officer-involved shooting in central Columbia, the Columbia Police Department is speaking up about what happened.

Columbia police officers and Boone County Sheriff’s deputies were called to the situation May 13 when witnesses said a man was threatening people with a gun.

Clarence Coats, 41, died from injuries he suffered from when a Columbia police officer shot him, returning his gunfire.

The Highway Patrol has taken over the investigation into the shooting.

Race Matters, Friends and Councilman Ian Thomas have both called on the department to have an open discussion about police protocol in these situations, especially because Coat’s sister said the suspect was suffering from a mental illness of some kind. But police Chief Ken Burton said the department couldn’t comment specifically on the incident because of the Highway Patrol’s investigation.

He read a prepared statement. You can find the full video and text of the statement below.

He made clear the incident was a tragedy for the Coates family and everyone involved but stressed that it was an active-shooter situation and law enforcement officers were there to protect the citizens around the area first and foremost.

Deputy Chief John Gordon discussed the department’s safety prioritization list, abbreviated as HIPS. It’s an acronym for the order of who’s safety officers protect first. Hostages come first, innocent civilians second, then police and finally the suspect or subjects of investigation.

“In this particular case, there are some people who are kind of asking us, why didn’t we place the subject or suspect of this active shooter situation higher in this prioritization than the officer itself,” he said. “We can’t do that. The officers have a right to go home, too.”

Burton directed anyone who wanted to know more about the active-shooter or officer-involved shooting protocol to the department’s website. You can find that here.

STATEMENT TEXT:

“So what I’ll do is just go ahead and say what I want to say here. Um, I’m not prepared to respond to that. I think there are some people in the community that are trying to make this a racial issue and it’s simply not. What I will say about this incident is that it was an active shooter. Google active shooter and it will tell you what kind of situation we had out there.

“To my knowledge, there have been no other situations like that in the City of Columbia. Obviously you think back to Columbine, Colorado, and those kinds of things – those are active-shooter situations as well. It was also a tragedy – a tragedy for the Coates family, our officers and their families, our department and our community as a whole.

“It’s important for everyone to remember that there are two parties involved that are most important and that’s the Coates family and our officer and his family. Both deserve due process. For the sake of transparency, the Missouri State Highway Patrol has graciously agreed to conduct this investigation. Every decision that we have made since our initial release of information at the scene has been in the interest of protecting the integrity of the Highway Patrol investigation and to allow them to do their job without any influence or interference from our department.

“It is not appropriate for me, or any of my staff, to engage in discussions regarding this incident and risk the integrity of the investigation. When the appropriate time comes, we will be able to discuss it further and the impact this incident has had on our community.

“That’s my – those are my comments. I know there people out there that are clamoring for information – they’re curious about our use-of-force policy – I would refer them to the website, it’s all there. But I want to emphasize that this is a situation we have never experienced before in Columbia – it was an active shooter. An active shooter is an extremely dangerous situation for everybody involved and the officers actually went into a Guardian mindset trying to protect the citizens that lived in that community, and I think they did a remarkable job of it.

“It did end in a death, which is always unfortunate. But unfortunately with active-shooter situations that is usually how they turn out – either the shooter ends up dead or innocent people end up dead. And so, that’s where we are. It was an active shooter.”