Ann Arbor Independent & ACLU Press Police to Release Public Records About Rosser Shooting

The Ann Arbor Independent filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the incident report filed by AAPD officers after the shooting of Aura Rosser. The ACLU of Michigan has been in contact with the AAPD, as well, urging the release of records.

by P.D. Lesko

THE ANN ARBOR Independent filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Ann Arbor Police Department on Nov. 16. In the request, the newspaper asked for a variety of public records related to the shooting of Ann Arbor resident Aura Rosser, including the incident report filed by the officer(s) involved in the shooting. On Nov. 19, the ACLU of Michigan sent a letter to Chief John Seto.

A copy of the letter was provided to the paper in which the organization used FOIA to request “written reports, recordings, computer disks, affidavits, investigative records, videotapes, digital video discs, correspondence, memoranda, court documents and records…email messages, activity logs, etc…” relating to the Nov. 9 shooting.

In Ferguson, Mo., the Missouri ACLU attempted to use FOIA to obtain a copy of the incident report filed after the shooting of Michael Brown. After the FOIA request was denied, the Missouri ACLU filed suit against the police department for violating that state’s Sunshine Laws. The incident report was released to the ACLU shortly after the suit was filed.

The ACLU of Michigan’s 8-page letter to AAPD’s Chief Seto begins, “The ACLU of Michigan has grave concerns about the recent death of Aura Rosser at the hands of one or more members of the Ann Arbor police Department.” The letter goes on to say that while the ACLU of Michigan has “reached no conclusion” about whether the killing was justified, the ACLU points out “a seemingly ever-growing list of people of African descent…who have been killed by the police.”

That list included a mentally ill Saginaw man who was surrounded by eight police officers in 2012 and shot. The officers shot him a total of 46 times. The 49-year-old homeless man was armed with a penknife.

AAPD information about the shooting released to the media indicated that Aura Rosser was armed with a “fish knife.”

This was not Rosser’s first interaction with the AAPD over allegedly being armed with a knife. In Sept. 2014, Ann Arbor police were called to the residence Rosser shared with boyfriend Victor Stephens at 2083 Winewood.

The report from that interaction—released in response to a FOIA request—highlights several instances that raise questions, starting with small errors, including incorrect dates, to Rosser’s statement—taken over the phone rather than in person, to the County Prosecutor’s assertion that a warrant could not be issued because of the conflicting stories offered by Stephens and Rosser.

Interviewing a domestic violence suspect over the phone is not  recommended practice, according to a number of police training manuals and officials from police departments in surrounding Oakland and Wayne Counties. A Washtenaw County Sheriff’s Dept. official who asked not to be named said that phone interviews of domestic violence suspects are, perhaps, the result of understaffing in the AAPD.

The results of a 2006 six-city police department study on assessing criminal domestic violence suspects, published in Public Health Reports, concluded that “arresting domestic violence suspects led to a lower risk of repeat domestic violence.” An AAPD spokesman responded by asking, “What do you do with people who go back to situations like this? We arrest the same people over and over.”

An AAPD spokesman said Rosser was not interviewed in person because she’d left Ann Arbor after the Sept. incident. The exact date of her subsequent return is unknown.

At the time of the Sept. incident, Aura Rosser had three outstanding warrants for her arrest, according to documents turned over by the AAPD. One warrant was out of Detroit for traffic violations. Dispatch records show the responding officers were told she also had two outstanding bench warrants for failure to appear in court, one in the city of Westland and the other in the city of Inkster.

Had Rosser not fled the scene of the Sept. incident, an AAPD spokesman said she would have been taken into custody. It is customary, when there is probable cause, for AAPD officers to arrest perpetrators of domestic violence.

Had the AAPD taken Rosser into custody and had her transported to Wayne County, there is no way to know what the legal outcome of the three outstanding warrants would have been. It’s possible Rosser could have been evaluated for mental health services.  Wayne County has an extensive Jail Mental Health program. Unlike Washtenaw County, Wayne County also has a Mental Health Court where “services are provided through various collaborations….case management and psychiatric services,” according to an official in the Wayne County office of Health and Human Services.

In Sept., Victor Stephens told the responding officers that Rosser had “chased him around the yard with a knife.”

Stephens’s call to 911 resulted in the dispatch of five patrol cars and seven Ann Arbor police officers, the majority of the cars and officers on patrol that Sept. evening. In his call, Victor Stephens alleges Aura Rosser was threatening him with “a butcher knife.”

The dispatcher notes that: “Caller said she’s threatening his life. Can hear caller yelling, ‘Get that thing away from me.’”

At 2:49:28 a.m. AAPD officers Petterle and Shafer were dispatched, and arrived at 2:53:05.

At 2:50:22 a.m. AAPD officer Strang was dispatched, and arrived at 2:53:25.

At 2:56:44 a.m. AAPD officer Barton was dispatched, and arrived at 2:56:48.

At 2:57:43 a.m. AAPD officer Gillen was dispatched, and arrived at 2:57:48.

At 3:02:59 a.m. AAPD officers Dunlap and Jerome were dispatched, and arrived at 3:03:01.

At 3:06 a.m., the dispatcher also told all of the responding officers before they left the scene that Aura Rosser had three outstanding warrants issued for her arrest by Wayne County jurisdictions.

While it would be logical to assume a suspect with three outstanding warrants would be subject to arrest regardless of the circumstances, reality is that jail space is limited, particularly in Wayne County. In Washtenaw County, arresting officers are expected to check with the County Jail concerning availability of space, as well.

While the dispatcher told the officers that Aura Rosser “may be headed to S. Maple,” finding someone who doesn’t want to be found at night is challenging, even in Ann Arbor and even when the individual is on foot, according to AAPD officers interviewed.

Rosser was not subsequently arrested for allegedly committing assault with a weapon or because she had multiple outstanding warrants. Instead, sixteen hours later AAPD Officer Knobelsdorf spoke with Aura Rosser by phone.

In his report, Knobelsdorf notes that the Washtenaw County Assistant Prosecutor Arianne Slay had contacted him and asked him to “contact the victim.” He contacted Rosser, the alleged perpetrator.

A spokesman for the AAPD suggested, perhaps, the assistant prosecutor had assumed Rosser was the victim simply because Rosser was a woman.  The spokesman also said it was possible the officer “misspoke” in the report, used “victim” when he should have written “perpetrator.”

According to information from the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, “ninety to ninety-five percent of domestic violence victims are women.”

Later in the report Officer Knobelsdorf, when explaining why the prosecutor declined to issue a warrant, jumbles his words: “I received a denial from APA Slay citing conflicting stories from both parties and being unable to during aggressor Beyond a Reasonable Doubt.”

In the police report, Rosser’s recollection of the altercation was vastly different than Stephens’s.

She concluded her comments by saying, “she did not think the situation was that big of a deal and was surprised to hear from the Ann Arbor police Department.”

Victor Stephens, on the other hand, told the officers that he wanted to take out a restraining order against Rosser. He did not.

Hindsight is 20-20. In the instance of the Sept. incident in which Aura Rosser allegedly threatened Victor Stephens with a knife, it’s tempting to speculate about how the Nov. 9 incident in which she was shot by an AAPD officer responding to another domestic violence call at the Winewood address might have been avoided.

Seven AAPD officers responded to the Sept. domestic violence incident when it was thought Rosser was threatening Victor Stephens with a butcher knife. Yet, in the follow-up investigation, the officer chose to interview Rosser by phone, ostensibly because she could not be located for a face-to-face interview, according to an AAPD official.

She was not subsequently arrested, because police do not actively pursue misdemeanor warrants thanks to the sheer number of warrants versus the availability of beds in county jails.

The case was closed because, according to the County Prosecutor’s office there was a “lack of crime elements.” There were “conflicting statements.” Police could not “determine the order of events, or determine Rosser’s intent.”

Sixty-four days later, on Nov. 9, Aura Rosser allegedly took up a knife, again, and this time stood face-to-face with an Ann Arbor  police officer. Both the ACLU and The Ann Arbor Independent seek public records, including the dispatch and incident reports from the AAPD, in order to inform the public and understand how and why Rosser was shot.