Gresham Police Officer Cleared After Shooting - After He Jumped In Front Of Car - Earning The Hate

A Multnomah County grand jury has declined to indict a Gresham police officer who fatally shot a 49-year-old man within six seconds of arriving at the scene of a neighborhood argument in Southeast Portland last year.

Officer James Doyle told investigators that he feared the car driven by Israel Mark Tyler Berry would run him over when he shot at it on May 31, 2020, according to his lawyer. Berry died at the scene.

Doyle fired seven shots, striking Berry once in the left side of his torso. The front driver’s side window of Berry’s car was shattered from the officer’s gunshots, the short video clip shows.

The grand jury determined the shooting was “lawful under the circumstances. We respect that decision, and thank the jury for its careful and thorough deliberation,”

Schmidt had taken the unusual step of hiring a criminal defense lawyer as a special prosecutor to help two prosecutors in his office present the case to the grand jury. The review took more than a year as Schmidt first brought in the state Department of Justice to help and then in spring paid private attorney Samuel Kauffman $300 an hour to work with his office.

“Body-worn footage and other evidence showed that Officer Doyle shot at Mr. Berry as he drove his vehicle toward Officer Doyle, and Mr. Berry was hit and killed by one of those rounds,” the district attorney’s statement said.

After the grand jury’s decision, Gresham Police released a 14-minute video statement about the shooting, including edited 911 audio, body camera footage, a neighbor’s video surveillance footage and the chief’s narration of the encounter.

The first call to 911 that night came in about 8 p.m. from Berry himself. He complained that a resident in the 12400 block of Southeast Kelly Street wouldn’t return his cellphone. The call taker advised Berry that police likely couldn’t respond for a long time, noting they were busy with protest coverage. So Berry remained outside the home for hours.

The resident who apparently had the cellphone then called 911 about 9:30 p.m., complaining that Berry was being aggressive, threatening and throwing garbage on the property. The resident also shared with the dispatcher that Berry had mental health issues. Another 911 call came in a short time later from a woman, saying Berry “came speeding down” the street and “almost hit my mother-in-law.”

As he stepped out, he “immediately perceived” Berry driving west toward a woman in the street, Grandjean said.

Doyle, who made it to the front of his patrol car, later raised his gun, briefly lowered it and then raised it again as Berry continued to drive west and appeared to accelerate in a black Chrysler on Kelly Street in his direction, the chief said.

Doyle fired his first shot “as the car’s front bumper was within feet of him,” Grandjean said.

The body camera footage included in the video statement appears to show the officer on the side of Berry’s car when he fired shots.

Grandjean said the body camera footage has limitations and is “unable to capture all angles or provide accurate perspective” at times, with a slight delay between the video and audio.

“Oh, oh, you hit me. You hit me,” Berry is heard saying on audio captured from the body camera

The shooting occurred within six seconds of Doyle arriving at the scene and stepping from his SUV, according to Grandjean and the body camera footage. The chief said Doyle “perceived an extreme risk” when he fired at Berry

“We wish the outcome was different,”
This screenshot from the Gresham police body camera footage shows the location where the car Israel Berry, 49, was driving came to rest and the shattered driver's side window from the officer's gunshots

Gresham police will now do an internal review of the shooting, he said. It will examine what if any policies, procedures and training might need to be changed to “improve the outcome of potential use of force encounters,” he said
The shooting had raised some concerns among investigators because the body camera video also showed Doyle continuing to fire on Berry’s car after it had passed by Doyle

The sources said investigators early on were looking at whether Doyle standing in a position where he reasonably could have been run over and whether he make an effort to get out of the way. They also wondered why there was a bullet entry wound under Berry’s arm, which would suggest Doyle may not have been in front of Berry’s car at the time the shot was fired.

Berry had been seen sitting in a black car parked outside the house of the people he was feuding with -- at one point getting out of the car, removing three garbage bags filled with cans from the trunk and tossing them onto the front lawn.

He then got into an argument with the residents of the house once they came out. Surveillance video from a home across the street shows Berry shoving one man to the ground. It shows Berry returning to the black sedan, backing up and racing down the street, before driving back past the house again.