(August 21, 2002) -- In an emotion packed but orderly community meeting conducted by LB's NAACP branch, LBPD Chief Jerome Lance described the chain of events that culminated in the January 19, 2002 officer involved shooting death of Ms. Marcella Byrd.
Ms. Byrd, a 57 year old LB resident, was wielding a knife and walking south on Pine Ave. toward 4th St. after earlier committing a theft at a local market when she was intercepted by police officers.
Police say she was unresponsive to their commands. At 4th St. police attempted to use less than lethal bean bag rounds before Ms. Byrd allegedly raised the knife and officers fired, fatally wounding her.
Only after the encounter did police learn she was schizophrenic.
Chief Lance revealed at the meeting that the L.A. County District Attorneys office has concluded the officers' use of lethal force was a justified act of self-defense and defense of others. We post below excerpts of the D.A.'s report (separately obtained by us) as well as an LBPD synopsis of the Chief's statements.
The LB NAACP presented its independently prepared report containing written recommendations by its Task Force appointed to examine the police response. We post the LB NAACP Task Force report, below.
The August 18 meeting at the Cal Rec Center in the 1500 block of MLK Ave. was attended by LB's highest ranking officialdom (including the Mayor (in blue, in first row), several Councilmembers and City Manager), LB community activists from across the political spectrum...and members of Ms. Byrd's family.
Chief Lance's presentation was preceded by remarks from 6th district Councilwoman Laura Richardson-Batts, 1st district Councilwoman Bonnie Lowenthal and LB Mayor Beverly O'Neill. Also attending (but not speaking) were 4th district Councilman Dennis Carroll, 7th district Councilwoman Tonia Reyes-Uranga, City Manager Henry Taboada and an array of LBPD brass.
[LBReport.com caveat:: Some words in our lengthy quoted excerpts may be inexact with extemporaneous speech and ambient sound sometimes difficult to discern.]
Councilwoman Richardson-Batts noted that now that the Police Department's report is ready on what took place, Chief Lance is releasing it first to the community, "not to the press, not to other people but he will speak first to the community to say what happened, what have we learned and what will we do better."
Mayor O'Neill said, "This is a special city. It's a special city because we have meetings like this where people really want to work things out...It shows a maturity that many cities do not have in that the more we understand, the more we learn, the more we talk about our differences and our problems, the better our city is going to be, even stronger."
The Mayor added, "I do have confidence in our police department. I have confidence in our police chief. I think that he is accessible. He is trying very hard to make sure that this community knows how important they are...The City of Long Beach is the most diverse community in the nation. This diversity was discussed and presented in newspapers, USA Today, and that's something that we're very proud of. It's something that we have learned to live together in a way that no other city in the United States has been able to accomplish, and that's a source of pride to us. But that doesn't mean that we have answered all the questions..."
1st district Councilwoman Bonnie Lowenthal said, "I'm glad we're all in the same place...I would like to believe that we now have an opportunity to look at how the police handle people with mental illness..."
Chief Lance was introduced and noted his remarks would necessarily be circumscribed because litigation is now pending concerning the event. He delivered a police narrative with emotional intensity, describing the chain of events as they unfolded to his officers. Brief excerpts follow:
[To the right is the evidence photo of the knife.]