nothin 3rd Arrest Prompts Prisoner-Release Debate | New Haven Independent

3rd Arrest Prompts Prisoner-Release Debate

A 37-year-old man was out on probation when he had a third armed confrontation with New Haven police.

That led New Haven’s police chief to question why he was out on the street in the first place.

New Haven Police Chief Karl Jacobson raised that question at a crime-update press conference held Wednesday afternoon at police headquarters at 1 Union Ave.

He and Assistant Police Chiefs Bertram Ettienne and David Zannelli cited the story of the 37-year-old armed man’s arrest Sunday as an example of the hard work officers have been doing to get illegal guns off the street.

The police reported making 208 firearm-related arrests so far this year, removing 234 illegal guns, 45 of them ghost” guns. That compares to 191, 183, and 11, respectively at this point in 2021.

They also told the story about the incident to raise concerns about truly violent repeat offenders being released from prison.

The latest incident occurred in Fair Haven Sunday at 12:30 a.m. The chiefs described the official version of the incident, and the department subsequently released body camera video showing it. (You can watch it at the top of this story.)

Paul Bass Photo

Asst. Chief Ettienne at Wednesday's crime-update press conference.

A team of officers was on traffic enforcement duty. They noticed the operator of a blue Honda driving erratically. They pulled the car over on Clay Street.

A woman was behind the wheel, a man in the passenger seat.

They checked her ID. He gave his name but said he didn’t have ID on him. He told officers they had just stopped by a smoke shop on Grand Avenue.

The interaction was at first cordial. But, according to police, an officer noticed a weapon in plain sight.

Officers walked off to a cruiser, then returned and asked the man to exit the vehicle.

The man emerged with his hands up. The officers tried to arrest the man.

Then he tried to break free” and fought them, according to Ettienne. Relax, relax,” an officer instructed the man.

The video shows a scuffle ensuing.

At one point the man calls out, Shoot me in the fucking head! I’m not fighting! Just kill me!”

The officers were able to detain and arrest the man. They also recovered a .45-caliber Glock as well as four vials of crack, Ettienne said. 

One officer suffered a minor injury in the scuffle. The arrestee was sent to the hospital for observation, not because of any physical injuries, but because he was in a mental state where we wanted to get him checked out,” Jacobson said. The arrestee was subsequently released from the hospital and charged with seven motor vehicle and firearms and assault offenses, five of them felonies, including assault on an officer.

Jacobson praised the officers involved in the incident — Sgt. Chris Cameron and Officers Brandon Way, Joseph Galvin, Paul Vakos, and Derek Huelsman — for extreme professionalism. They used a minimal amount of force even though they knew he had a gun.”

Chief Jacobson and Assistant Chief Zannelli Wednesday.

It turns out the police have encountered the man at least twice before.

The first time, in 2004, they stopped him on suspicion of having committed an armed robbery. He fought with officers then and had a .357 Luger handgun on him at the time, according to Jacobson.

The second time was in 2014. In that incident, the man had shot at a group of people on Norton Street, according to police. When officers arrived to arrest him, he began firing at them,” Ettienne said. The officers arrested him. He pleaded guilty to felony attempt to assault a public safety officer. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison — suspended after three years, with three years probation.

So he was out on probation when Sunday’s encounter occurred.

That reflects a problem, Chief Jacobson argued Wednesday.

The arrestee has had three encounters with ofifcers where he could have been killed, officers could have been killed, and he was let out early,” the chief stated.

There’s a very [small] amount of people in this community that commit violent acts. So when we do catch them for violent acts, we need them to do time, have a higher bond, to protect the community.”

Contacted after the press conference, criminal defense attorney Alex Taubes said he draws a different lesson from the story.

If the facts as alleged by police are true, he said, they would condemn the prison system, not the practice of early release.

If he came out of prison after six years in prison, and he hasn’t been corrected, isn’t that an issue with the Department of Correction? They failed to do any correction for six years … so we should have given him 10 years?” Taubes asked.

He also questioned the role, or lack thereof, of the probation department: What are they doing to supervise people to make sure they’re doing what they should be doing?”

The arrestee remains behind bars on the latest charges, on a $750,000 bond. Chief Jacobson praised the state’s attorney’s office for obtaining the high bond.

You can watch the NHPD's full crime-update press conference above.

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