NORTHAMPTON — State public safety officials have suspended four police academy instructors and revoked another’s training credentials after a Granby officer was blinded in one eye while training at the Western Massachusetts Regional Police Academy in Springfield last year.
In addition, the defense tactics training exercises involving padded suits in which Granby Officer Shawn Rooney was injured in November 2015 have been suspended at all academies statewide “until a detailed curriculum involving safety protocols and role playing script has been developed,” according to the Municipal Police Training Committee.
The committee is an agency of the state Executive Office of Public Safety and Security and manages academies in Springfield, Boylston, Plymouth, Randolph and Reading.
“The Municipal Police Training Committee takes its responsibility to provide a safe training environment fo recruits very seriously, and as a result, we feel tremendous empathy towards the recruit officer who was injured in this case,” Dan Zinkovich, the committee’s executive director wrote to the Gazette on Thursday.
“While training for police work will always involve dynamic training that replicates real-world applications and will require physical contact to be effective, we strive to make such training as safe as possible and are constantly refining our methods and practices to reduce training injuries.”
The injury Rooney suffered ended his career as a police officer.
The committee did not name the suspended instructors, but one has had his instructor certification revoked and contract terminated with the agency. Four others who were either in supervisory roles or who were functioning as safety officers during the training exercise are suspended until they have completed updated safety training, according to the agency.
Rooney, 41, was injured during a defensive tactics training exercise on Nov. 30, 2015, in which he had to react to an unruly patron in a bar, according to a heavily redacted, 200-plus page State Police investigative report released to the Gazette on Thursday.
During the exercise, Rooney was injured by his own baton after training instructor Robert Wise, of the West Springfield Police Department, gained possession of it while Rooney was on top of Wise trying to subdue him, according to the report. The report relies on interviews with more than two dozen recruit officers, instructors and instructors in training who witnessed the incident.
Rooney had been wearing a protective helmet with a face cage, but no eye protection, which the manufacturer of the equipment recommends, according to the report by State Police Detective Capt. Robert M. Irwin, who investigated the case with State Police Capt. Paul D’Amore. The investigating officers also found that there appeared to be no written lesson plans for what is know as the “Redman” drill at academies and that training instructors relied on “institutional knowledge” in carrying out the scenario-based exercises.
The report states that witnesses gave “numerous statements” indicating that Rooney’s “downward movement coincided with Officer Wise bringing the baton up causing the baton to meet and enter Rooney’s cage causing the injury.” It continues, “… there are more statements … that coincide with Officer Wise thrusting or striking the baton at the head/cage area of Rooney causing injury.”
Other witnesses said they did not see the injury occur, according to the report. Wise was off duty Thursday, according to the West Springfield Police Department, and could not immediately be reached for comment.
Rooney’s lawyer, Judd L. Peskin of Springfield, said he was still reviewing the State Police report Thursday afternoon.
“There’s negligence all over the place,” Peskin said. “I’m going to try to prove this was a civil assault and battery.”
Peskin said he believes there will be many statements that will support Rooney’s position, “that he was intentionally struck in the eye with his own baton by the instructor.”
Peskin said doctors tried to save Rooney’s eye, albeit unsuccessfully, and that he has to get a prosthetic eye in its place after multiple surgeries.
“This is a big deal,” Peskin said of Rooney’s injury. “He lost an eye.”
Dan Crowley can be reached at dcrowley@gazettenet.com.