Manuel Ellis' Death Will Be Investigated By WSP After All: Inslee

TACOMA, WA — After weeks of confusion and uncertainty, Gov. Jay Inslee has announced the Washington State Patrol will be investigating the death of Manuel Ellis after all. At issue was whether the agency could be impartial in the probe after it was discovered that a trooper was at the scene before Ellis' death.

How we got here

The decision has been long in the making. Ellis, a black Tacoma man, was killed while being restrained and cuffed by four Tacoma Police Department back on March 3. In recordings of the incident, Ellis can be heard telling officers he cannot breathe, before ultimately dying.

Ellis' death drew a strong reaction from the community, many of whom saw it as yet another example of biased policing, and the video shows an incident strikingly similar to the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, which served as the catalyst for a series of nationwide protests against police brutality.

After Ellis' death, the Pierce County Sheriff's Department was called to investigate the Tacoma police officer's handling of the situation. The investigation was routine, it is standard protocol to have a separate law enforcement agency investigate police killings in Washington state. The department's investigation continued relatively quietly for months, until early June when the Pierce County Medical Examiner's Office determined that Ellis' had been killed because of the way the officers restrained him, and ruled his death a homicide.

The homicide ruling sparked another wave of scrutiny. Tacoma Mayor Victoria Woodards gave an impassioned conference calling for the firing and prosecution of the four officers involved, and shortly afterwards the city of Tacoma unanimously voted for another independent review into Ellis' death, without the involvement of Pierce County deputies.

At the time, Pierce County spokesman Ed Troyer told the Tacoma News Tribune they welcomed the review and that they had "nothing to hide." But Troyer was proven wrong not long after.

Just days after Tacoma asked Gov. Jay Inslee to approve an independent review, it was discovered that the Pierce County Sheriff's Department had not released one crucial detail: that they had had a deputy on scene when Ellis was killed, meaning their investigation could not be objective or truly independent. After the discovery, Inslee called for the Pierce County Sheriff's Department to cease their investigation.

Meanwhile, Inslee had planned for the Washington State Patrol to perform the independent review into Ellis death, but found that a State Patrol trooper had also been on scene shortly before Ellis was killed, throwing their objectivity into question as well, and leaving the future of the investigation uncertain.

The investigation goes on

Now, a week after that discovery was first made public, Inslee has announced that Washington State Patrol will make the final determination on Ellis death after all. Inslee announced at a news conference Wednesday that the trooper in question had been interviewed, and officials believe he was not at the scene long enough to compromise their investigation.

As a result, WSP will be allowed to review the case after all. However, the trooper who was on scene will not be involved in the investigation in any way, according to Inslee.

Inslee also noted Wednesday that the Pierce County Sheriff's Department had failed to uphold the police reforms legally mandated by Washington Initiative 940, a police reform initiative passed by voters in 2018. According to the governor, deputies had not appointed community members to be a part of the review process and had failed to set up a liaison with Ellis' immediate family, both of which are required by law.

It is still unknown if the Pierce County Sheriff's Department will face any repercussions for their failure to disclose that a deputy was on scene or for their failures to meet the I-940 regulations, but Washington State Patrol will be taking the sheriff's department's records for the next steps of their investigation. A full team of investigators is expected to be appointed soon and will begin their work by the end of next week. When they are done, their work will be sent to Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson for review and any potential prosecution.

In the meantime, the four Tacoma Police officers on scene at the time of Ellis' death, 34-year-old Christopher Burbank, 37-year-old Matthew Collins, 28-year-old Masyih Ford, and 31-year-old Timothy Rankine, have all been placed on leave pending the investigation.