Ronald Frashaur stays fired and Americans stay free - How's that for a Wednesday?
Officer Ronald Frashaour is officially off the street again. This time for good we can only hope.
Portland’s finest – lawyers this time – successfully, dare I say victoriously, defended Mayor Sam Adams' unusual decision -- under challenge from the police union -- to buck the arbitrator's reinstatement ruling in March.
Frashour shot Campbell in the back with an AR-15 rifle on Jan. 29, 2010, after Campbell had been struck with multiple beanbag-shotgun rounds and turned to run toward his girlfriend's apartment building. Campbell was unarmed, but Frashour said he thought Campbell was reaching for a gun.
Reaching for a gun? Reaching for a gun? Frashour, responding to reports of a distraught man grieving over the death of his brother, showed up at the scene and Wait! What’s this? He just happens to have an AR-15 in the trunk of his cruiser. Now, an AR-15 is no ordinary gun. It is a high-powered sniper rifle used to take down targets at great distances – not virtual point blank range as was the case here.
The mayor and Police Chef Mike Reese fired Frashour. But on March 30, Arbitrator Jane Wilkinson ordered the city to reinstate Frashour with lost wages, saying a reasonable officer could have concluded that Campbell was reaching for a gun.
Going National...
- KBOO