Suspect Hit By Car After Being Tased On The Interstate During Foot Pursuit
Posted on
July 28,2023
Body camera footage from the Larimer County Sheriff's Office deputy who deployed a Taser on a man fleeing from a traffic stop in the middle of Interstate 25 was released Wednesday following the conclusion of the department's internal investigation.
After a five-month Critical Incident Response Team investigation, 8th Judicial District Attorney Gordon McLaughlin announced in a decision letter last week that Deputy Lorenzo Lujan was within the bounds of the law in shocking 28-year-old Brent Thompson with a Taser as Thompson fled from a traffic stop across a dark portion of the northbound lanes of I-25 near the Mountain Vista exit in northeast Fort Collins the evening of Feb. 18. Thompson was immobile on the interstate when an oncoming car fatally struck him.
Feyen said the department's internal investigation has determined that Lujan's actions — including the use of a Taser — "were within our policies."
In the video statement, Feyen notes that investigators found a firearm and drug paraphernalia in Thompson's car after he was killed, and the coroner's report found he had "fentanyl, methamphetamine and other illegal narcotics in his system at the time of his death."
Thompson's family says the sheriff's office is unjustly shifting the blame for Thompson's death from their deputy onto Thompson.
"The family of Brent Thompson is appalled by the Larimer County Sheriff's failure to discipline or terminate the deputy responsible for the murder of Brent," the family said in a statement through their attorneys at Rathod Mohamedbhai LLC. "The Sheriff is more concerned with smearing the name of Brent based on information the deputy did not possess at the time of the murder rather than holding his deputies accountable. Blaming Brent for his death is callous and dishonest."
"The tasering of an individual in the middle of an interstate highway at night is criminal and reprehensible conduct and has no place in law enforcement," the family said in the statement.
The family does intend to file a civil lawsuit against the deputy involved and the sheriff's office, according to their attorney, Qusair Mohamedbhai. They are also calling on the Colorado Attorney General's Office to review the case.
Lujan told CIRT investigators he did look for cars and after deploying his Taser realized the car traveling northbound toward them was "closer than expected," according to McLaughlin's decision letter. Investigators determined the car was traveling at about 70 mph.
In the video statement, Feyen explained that the sheriff's office trains using safety priorities, which is "standard across the nation that guides law enforcement decision making," prioritizing the safety of people involved in a situation, starting with victims, then bystanders, then first responders, then suspects.
"Unfortunately, Mr. Thompson's choices created a potentially no-win situation," Feyen said. "Simply letting him run away could have resulted in deadly consequences for travelers on the highway, and the deputy was forced to make a choice: Act and try to stop the suspect or stand by passively and just hope no innocent people got hurt."
In McLaughlin's review of the case, he stated that evidence showed Lujan "was acting in a way that would reduce risk” to Thompson and people driving on the interstate, but in hindsight “his belief with respect to other motorists appears to have been incorrect, as the deputy seems to have exacerbated an already dangerous situation by temporarily immobilizing Mr. Thompson in a roadway with oncoming traffic.”
McLaughlin suggested — in hindsight, which he said the deputy did not have — it may have been safer to let Thompson run and not pursue him onto the interstate.
McLaughlin also noted that the sheriff's office department policy on Taser use identifies several factors in which deputies should avoid using a Taser "unless the totality of the circumstances indicates that other available options reasonably appear ineffective or would present a greater danger," including whether an individual is somewhere or doing something that may result in a collateral injury, like if they are operating a vehicle or if they might fall from something and injure themselves that way.
“A commonsense interpretation of those policies would seem to prohibit incapacitating an individual in a high-speed roadway,” McLaughlin said, but neither the department’s policy nor Taser’s official training advice specifically mention roadway safety, likely because there is no record of an incident similar to this one occurring before. McLaughlin said he “encourages and expects” discussions about adding roadway safety in the sheriff's office Taser training moving forward.
In citing Thompson's apparent fentanyl use as a contributing factor in this case, Feyen called for more action against the issue in the community.
"Fentanyl is destroying lives and families in Northern Colorado, and this is just one more example," Feyen said.
![[ACCIDENT AFTERMATH]MINISTER BENGVIR INJURED AS CAR FLIPS IN RAMLA](https://theync.net/media/thumbs/6/6/2/c/b/689168662cbe10820f8.mp4/689168662cbe10820f8.mp4-9.jpg)
.jpg)