A federal judge has cleared Brookfield Police Sgt. Cody Dean of any federal or state civil violations in the shooting death of Fred H. Wild on March 21, 2023.
According to the stipulation of facts in the lawsuit, Wild, who was wanted on a number of warrants, holed up in a cabin in the 1400 block of Route 7 when police from several departments responded. Wild became aware police were approaching and climbed out of a window of the cabin into a pickup he had stolen from elsewhere in Brookfield. The truck had a plow on the front of it.
Wild started the truck and accelerated “so fast that the tires were spinning and spewing gravel and dirt,” according to the report released by Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins. Two officers were in front of the truck; officers opened fire and Wild was struck five times, killing him, Watkins said.
Watkins cleared the officers involved of any criminal wrongdoing in May 2024
The estate of Wild filed a civil suit in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court against Dean, Trumbull County Deputy Sheriff Dennis Garito, Vienna police officers Shane Smith and Jarett Pishotti, and Ohio Highway Patrol Sgt. Jason Bonar, all officers who fired their guns at Wild, alleging the use of deadly force was not warranted. Because there was a claim that the officers violated Wild’s federal civil rights, the case was moved to federal court.
In her opinion filed July 24, U.S. District Court Judge Benita Pearson, Youngstown, said that while the estate claimed that officers fired on Wild before he started the truck, this argument is “blatantly contradicted” by an expert’s report and body camera footage.
The evidence also showed that Bonar was in front of the truck as it moved forward but that it “swerved away from Sgt. Bonar at the last second,” the judge said. However, there is no evidence that Dean, Garito or Pishotti, who were alongside the truck, “saw or realized” that Wild had swerved before they opened fire, Pearson said.
“Based on the record, a reasonable officer in the same position as Deputy Garito, Officer Pishotti, or Sgt. Dean would have probable cause to believe that Wild posed an immediate threat to the officers in front of the truck as he attempted to flee,” she said.
The firing of guns by these three officers “was reasonable based on the totality of the circumstances,” she said.
The judge also cleared Bonar. While he saw the truck swerve, he feared for the safety of officers he thought were behind him, Pearson said.
However, the judge allowed the case against Smith to proceed to trial, determining that the evidence was not conclusive as to whether he acted properly. As he was stationed behind the truck, he could see that there were no other officers in Wild’s “direct path” behind Bonar, and that the officers further up the drive were not in “imminent danger,” Pearson said.
