SALT LAKE CITY — Salt Lake police “showed great restraint” and “deserve merit” in their response to protesters storming the Chamber of Commerce Building in July, though there were “areas for improvement,” according to a Salt Lake City Police Department incident review report released Thursday.
The incident report, completed months after the summer protests and following internal and Salt Lake County District Attorney reviews, lists several recommendations for Salt Lake police to improve their tactics for a more efficient response, but mainly applauds police for in the way they handled the incident.
“The officers in the lobby deserve merit for maintaining their composure during a dynamic and increasingly volatile situation, where some of the officers were physically attacked by the demonstrators,” the report states. “They showed great restraint in removing the demonstrators from a dangerous situation, with little direction, in the chaos that was present.”
That’s despite protesters blaming police for the escalation of violence at the office building, accusing officers of shoving, punching and choking demonstrators.
Fourteen people are facing criminal charges after the protest, when more than 100 protesters from multiple groups entered the office building to show opposition to the Utah Inland Port, a massive global trade hub planned in northwest Salt Lake City to maximize Utah’s place in the global import and export economy with a network of truck, train and air connections.
In the aftermath, Gov. Gary Herbert condemned the protest, calling it “borderline terrorism.”
Demonstrators charged with riot have called for the charges to be dropped, saying they’re fighting for their community. A coalition made up of “a majority of the defendants” issued a statement Thursday in response to the report.
The statement, issued in a list format, said: “1. These charges are political repression. 2. The inland port threatens our community. 3. The activists are our community. 4. (Salt Lake County District Attorney) Sim Gill: Drop the charges.”
The incident report cites the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office decision not to pursue a criminal charge against a sergeant for use of force.
As officers were trying to clear the lobby and stop demonstrators from entering the building, the sergeant reported he “punched” a protester who was holding open a door to the building’s lobby after the sergeant told multiple protesters let go of the door, but they kept holding on, according to the report.
“While pushing, shoving, and arrests were being made, there were no signs of excessive or inappropriate use of force,” the report states. “Officers interacted within policy and training to remove the trespassers.”
The report states an internal affairs review tried to follow up on complaints of police behavior, but complainants did not respond to investigators’ requests for interviews. The Civilian Review Board also reviewed the internal affairs complaints, but dismissed the matter after a complainant did not respond to repeated attempts to set up an interview. Without the complainant’s cooperation, “there was no way” for the Civilian Review Board to “determine if a policy violation had occurred,” according to the report.
The report also listed several documented “assaults” against police officers, including multiple officers reporting being spit on, a protester kicking an officer in his groin, another officer being pulled into the crowd and “kicked and punched in the face” by protesters, and a sergeant being “knocked to the ground, hit and kicked by multiple demonstrators.”
The report also lists damage to the Chamber of Commerce Building totaling about $9,000, including $7,000 for “cleaning” after urine and human feces were reported in the office building, and $2,000 to replace a glass lobby door.
The “areas for improvement” for Salt Lake police in the report was made up of mostly technical critiques in the police response.
Those included recommendations for more training on how to handle protester tactics such as the “sleeping dragon” (a device that is made up of PVC pipes protesters used to handcuff each other together on the sixth floor of the building).
The report also detailed a “lack of formal announcement” and no use of an amplified device, such as a megaphone, to make multiple announcements to disperse the protest before police escalated their tactics.
Additionally, the report noted the sergeant in command of the “mobile field force” — the line of officers assembled to disperse the crowd in the lobby — was at times “in line with officers applying force” but should have been “behind the line giving direction to the officers and making sure that proper force was being used.”
The report also stated there was some “confusion” from officers because it appeared three incident commanders responded to the protest.
Salt Lake police public relations director Christina Judd said Thursday the police department “learned a lot” from the protest and will be implementing all of the report’s recommendations.
“Given the dynamic situation ... the restraint used by the officers was admirable,” Judd said. “We have room for improvement, but overall it was a lot of moving parts that were handled quickly in a pretty professional way.”