Ogden PD probe finds officers’ actions justified in Washington Blvd. incident
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- Ogden Police Chief Eric Young watches video from police body camera footage of the arrest of Shawn Sims on Washington Boulevard on Saturday, April 22, 2023. Young addressed a press conference on the matter on Tuesday, April 25, 2022.
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- In this image taken from body camera footage, an Ogden police officer wrestles with Shawn Sims while trying to arrest him on Saturday, April 22, 2023. The incident occurred in the 1700 block of Washington Boulevard and police held a press conference about the case on Tuesday, April 25, 2023.
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- In this image taken from body camera footage, Ogden police wrestle with Shawn Sims while trying to arrest him on Saturday, April 22, 2023. The incident occurred in the 1700 block of Washington Boulevard and police held a press conference about the case on Tuesday, April 25, 2023.
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- Four Ogden police aggressively struggled with Shawn Sims, pictured, while arresting him on Saturday, April 22, 2023. The incident occurred in the 1700 block of Washington Boulevard and police held a press conference on the case on Tuesday, April 25, 2023. This image comes from a screengrab of police body camera footage of the incident.
OGDEN — The use of force by four Ogden police officers while apprehending a man on Washington Boulevard who ignored their commands has been deemed justified after an internal investigation.
“The Ogden City Police Department after-action use-of-force investigation has been completed and all four officers’ use of force has been found to be justified,” Chief Eric Young said at a press conference Tuesday. The incident occurred in the 1700 block of the busy thoroughfare.
At least two of the four officers involved struck the man, Shawn Sims, 30, several times and used a Taser on him twice. But Young said the action was within police department policy and state code governing use of force during arrests when officers face resistance and aggression.
Notwithstanding the internal probe, Young said he has asked the Weber County Attorney’s Office to also investigate the incident to determine if any of the officers involved are criminally culpable. A bystander filmed part of the encounter and it spurred a quick and strong response from many after the video was posted to social media last Sunday.
Young said Sims — who potentially faces multiple criminal charges in the incident — had ignored commands to stop, put his hands in his waistband as if retrieving a gun and even pointed his finger at officers through his shirt, as if pretending to have a gun. The confrontation transpired in the middle of Washington Boulevard late Saturday afternoon after officers attempted to stop Sims because he was walking on the side of the street, precariously close to traffic. It echoed a similar encounter Sims had with Ogden police on March 18, according to charging papers in that separate case, which led to five misdemeanor charges.
“Officers commanded Sims to stop. Sims turned and ran from officers, continuing to push his hand into his waistband and, as officers began to approach, he bladed his body towards officers, pushing his hand into his waistband and taking a stance that led officers to believe he was about to withdraw a weapon and fire,” Young said.
It turned out Sims, though apparently on drugs, according to a probable cause affidavit in the incident, was not armed.
Even so, the officer who first approached him feared he had a gun, and since the man wasn’t following commands, the officer “decided to take Sims to the ground and commanded him to release his hands from his waistband,” Young said. Sims rolled onto his stomach, reached both hands into his waistband and wouldn’t take them out.
The three other officers quickly moved in and also couldn’t get Sims to remove his hands from his waistband. Then, in the span of about 10 seconds, “officers struck Sims with fists in the head, shoulder and back area numerous times to try to gain compliance,” Young said.
An officer deployed his Taser twice, when the police were finally able to pull Sims’ hands from his waistband and handcuff him. After that, Sims was more compliant.
Ogden police released video of the incident from the body cameras worn by two of the responding officers. The video shows a quick, chaotic exchange, with Sims resisting and the officers forcefully trying to get him to comply with their orders, striking him and using a Taser on him, as described by Young.
“Why are you reaching like you got a gun, dude?” one of the officer asks in the video soon after Sims is cuffed and sitting on the curb of Washington Boulevard.
“My problems aren’t your problems, bro,” says Sims, his face bloodied.
“You trying to make me do something stupid to you?” the officer responds.
Young said Sims was taken to the hospital for treatment and then the Weber County Jail. He suffered facial fractures in the incident and bleeding behind one of his eyes.
While in jail, Sims spoke with his mom, Marsha Quintana, via phone and police officials played a recording of the exchange at the press conference.
“I did the stupid-ass finger gun thing again, honestly, I think,” Sims told his mom, according to a transcript. He also said he was “pretty (expletive)-up. I was basically on everything under the sun from meth to MDMA.”
Young said Sims’ resistance and aggression, as outlined in policy stating when use of force is justified, took the form of putting his hands in his waistband as if he had a gun, pretending to have a gun and getting in a fighting stance, or blading, among other things. “So officers are able to respond with whatever force necessary at that time to bring the situation under control,” Young said.
Police department policy calls for internal investigations when force is used by officers as in the Sims incident. The probe in the incident had started and was nearly done when the video made by the bystander, Keaton Fuller, was posted on social media last Sunday, shining more public attention on the incident.
According to a probable cause affidavit in the incident, Sims, was arrested on eight counts. They include an infraction for walking in Washington Boulevard, a misdemeanor count for interfering with an arresting officer, another misdemeanor count for not stopping on the command of a law enforcement officer, four felony drug possession charges and a misdemeanor count for intoxication.
Sims told medical officials treating him he had taken methamphetamine, heroin, cocaine and fentanyl, according to the affidavit.
Formal charges had not yet been filed stemming from the Saturday confrontation as of Tuesday afternoon, according to online 2nd District Court records.
In the separate March 18 incident, Sims pleaded guilty last week in 2nd District Court to a count of possession of a controlled substance and a count of interference with an arresting officer, misdemeanors. Sentencing in that matter is set for May 31.
In the probable cause statement in that incident, the reporting officer wrote that Sims was found walking in Washington Boulevard near 24th Street at around 11:40 p.m.
“The defendant exhibited irrational behavior by cursing (and) flipping the officer off after asking him to get out of the roadway,” reads the statement. Sims was ultimately forcibly arrested by the officer.