KBI Takes Up Goodyear Worker Death

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Updated: 4:43 PM Apr 9, 2008 KBI Takes Up Goodyear Worker Death The Kansas Bureau of Investigation began investigating the incident on Monday and will send its findings to the District Attorney's office Posted: 7:28 AM Apr 9, 2008

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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) _ The Kansas Bureau of Investigation is reviewing the death of a man who was tasered three times by a local sheriff's deputy and died of causes the cornor says were not taser-related.

Shawnee County Sheriff Richard Barta told The Topeka Capital-Journal that he asked the KBI to become involved and it began investigating Monday. Barta says its findings will go to the district attorney's office.

Shawnee County's coroner has released his report on the March 30 death of Walter E. Haake Jr.

The coroner says Haake died after being held face down by deputies while they were handcuffing him.

The coroner says compression of his chest, combined with his diabetes and cardiac problems, led to his death.

Deputies were responding to a call that Haake was having medical problems at work.
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Posted by: jerry Location: effingham, ks on Apr 10, 2008 at 08:10 PM

An intentional act that results in an unintended death is voluntary manslaughter. Police officers are trained to do what the "reasonable person" would do and a reasonable person would not use a stun gun and force on a person they felt was disoriented and ill, who was not posing a threat to anyone. Additionally when EMS forced medical care on a person who refused, they were violating his liberty. Reasonable people may have called a family member and waited for them to arrive, but would not have manhandled someone who had done nothing wrong. Oh, and a clean record or not, these officers clearly do not have the judgement to be police officers.
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Posted by: Anonymous on Apr 10, 2008 at 07:02 PM

Has anyone mentioned that the poor guy was a large man. Perhaps the EMTs should've known that he shouldn't have been placed on his stomach. Speaking of EMTs, doesn't Goodyear have their own on staff? Why isn't anyone blamimg Goodyear for calling the horrible sheriff's officers, or for calling the EMTs, or for sending him home early... I guess if you've got to blame someone, there are plenty of choices. It's just unfortunate that they all didn't just pull up chairs and watch the guy die. It sounds as though you all know them, and say they are lazy. Perhaps the reason for the so called low housing market in Topeka is that fact that it's a hateful city.
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Posted by: Anonymous on Apr 10, 2008 at 04:54 PM

JC, your outlook is completely wrong here. no one is even remotely trying to claim he posed a threat to THEIR safety. the man posed a threat to his OWN saftey. the man was DYING. the ONLY conclusion that can be drawn from your comments is that YOU feel it was appropriate for them to just allow him to sit there in his car, and die. Suicide more or less is what you are condoning here. No one involved in this situation, EMS, Goodyear, Security, or Cops wanted to see this man die, they wanted to save him, and they did what they could to do so. I personally feel that they should have cuffed him in the front and not behind the back, but that's not the point of argument here. My father suffers from similar symptoms as this man, and I realize that it's a very realistic possibility that my family or emergency services could potentially be put in a position to use force on him when he's stricken like that, simply to save his life. The man I LOVE, I might have to forcefully save.
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