Calgary Police Serious Policy Violations in Fatal Traffic Stop: ASIRT

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Officers failed to properly bag the suspect’s vehicle, leading to the fatal shooting of the 30-year-old woman on Dec. 25, 2018, the investigation concluded

Stacey Perry was fatally shot by police while trying to flee a traffic stop on December 25, 2018. Facebook photo

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Serious violations of Calgary police policy occurred during a high-risk traffic stop that resulted in the fatal shooting of a 30-year-old woman on Christmas Day 2018, an investigation has concluded.

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The driver — later identified by family as Stacey Perry — was shot three times at close range as she tried to flee from police, who had boxed into her car after repeated attempts to stop her.

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However, an Alberta Serious Incident Response Team (ASIRT) investigation released Friday found the officer who shot Perry, fearing for the safety of a female officer trapped between vehicles, committed no wrongdoing.

“The officer concerned was responding to the imminent risk of serious injury or death to his colleague,” the ASIRT report said.

“There were serious breaches of CPS policy which led to this appalling situation. However, these violations are not the fault of the employee concerned, who followed the instructions of his superiors and was not trained in the technique used, and they do not lead to criminal liability for him.

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Several CPS vehicles surrounded Perry’s car around 2:30 a.m. in response to 911 calls about three hours after she was first seen driving erratically on Blackfoot Trail SE

CPS policy states that only officers trained in low-speed techniques are authorized to perform the maneuver. Of those directly involved in the December 25 encounter, only one, a sergeant, was properly trained.

The ASIRT investigation found that an acting staff sergeant authorized officers to surround and stop the vehicle, even though patrol officers were not offered vehicle intervention training at the time.

“Although it initially appeared that the box maneuver was successful and the woman’s vehicle was stopped, the success quickly disappeared,” the report states.

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One sergeant positioned his vehicle in front of Perry’s while three others moved to either side and behind. The driver’s side police car positioned by the officer who ended up being trapped was not close enough to Perry’s car, the investigation found.

Several police officers got out of their cars and three approached.

One of the three told the driver to turn off the vehicle before smashing the driver’s side window with a baton and trying to pull her out of the vehicle. A second opened the passenger side door while a third stood between the vehicles.

Perry accelerated his vehicle, moving his car into the gap on the driver’s side and forcing the passenger door of that police car to close, pinning the female officer, who was lifted off her feet by the force.

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“The trapped officer was in serious and immediate danger. The woman gave her car gas hard, to the point of blowing rubber from the tires,” the report says.

The officer who tried to pull Perry from her car then fired three shots at close range. All three shots struck Perry in the head, the autopsy showed.

Only 40 seconds passed between the police stopping Perry and the fatal shots.

“The use of high-risk techniques with untrained officers directly resulted in placing the trapped officer in a situation of imminent risk of death or serious bodily injury, and this directly resulted in the reasonable use of deadly force by the officer in question,” the report states.

The female police officer was not injured. ASIRT investigators said she should have stayed in the police car with her foot on the brake.

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“It’s not the subordinate officer’s or the captured officer’s fault that they didn’t have training that they didn’t and couldn’t have. They were following the directions of their superior officers,” the report said.

Perry first came to the attention of officers just before midnight on Dec. 24 when she was seen driving very slowly and erratically on Blackfoot Trail SE. Suspecting that it might be impaired, officers attempted to pull the vehicle over, but it sped off. Officers decided not to pursue the vehicle.

A second traffic stop minutes later was also unsuccessful as the driver fled.

911 callers reported a vehicle being driven recklessly on Falconridge Boulevard NE. Officers found the vehicle minutes later when the driver ran a red light and was on the wrong side of the road before the McKnight Boulevard box entrance near Stoney Trail.

Perry had no criminal record or involvement with the police prior to December 2018.

A toxicology report showed she had cocaine and prescription benzodiazepine drugs in her system.

ASIRT said CPS must determine next steps to address policy violations.