{"id":1316464,"date":"2019-11-05T18:35:44","date_gmt":"2019-11-06T01:35:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/?p=990531"},"modified":"2019-11-06T07:16:32","modified_gmt":"2019-11-06T14:16:32","slug":"no-charges-for-officers-in-rifle-shooting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/no-charges-for-officers-in-rifle-shooting\/","title":{"rendered":"No charges for officers in Rifle shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Law enforcement officers secure the scene of the officer involved shooting Aug. 5 on the Highway 13 bridge at Rifle. <\/strong>
Kyle Mills\/Post Independent<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

The officers who shot and killed an armed Rifle man in August<\/a> will not face criminal charges, 9th<\/sup> District Attorney Jeff Cheney announced Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Following a three-month investigation, the DA \u201cconcluded that no officer committed a criminal violation\u201d when shooting Allan George, then 54, in the back on the Rifle bridge as he attempted to flee arrest while armed on Aug. 5.<\/p>\n

George never pointed his handgun at Cpl. Dewey Ryan or Officer Shelby McNeal, the two officers involved, but Ryan still didn\u2019t commit a crime in shooting him, the DA determined. Less-lethal force was not an option, according to the officers.<\/p>\n

\u201cArguably \u2026 Corporal Ryan could have fired his firearm at
\nMr. George as soon as he removed the handgun from concealment and openly
\npresented it,\u201d according to the report.<\/p>\n

The two officers exhausted all possible measures in trying
\nto get George to submit to arrest, according to the report. In total, Ryan and
\nMcNeal told George to put his gun down 46 times, according to a transcript of
\nthe audio recording device one of the officers was wearing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere over three dozen orders to drop the weapon go
\nunheeded, prevailing law does not require a police officer to wait until an
\narmed and dangerous felon has drawn a bead on the officer or others before
\nusing deadly force,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n

According to the report, there is evidence that George was considering
\nsuicide leading up to the incident.<\/p>\n

George was wanted on charges of possessing child
\npornography, and the investigation had been going on for several weeks with his
\nknowledge, according to the report.<\/p>\n

George had pleaded guilty to sexual exploitation of a child in Lake County in 2009, and in April 2019, an FBI task force investigation located George on a private Kik Messenger group that shared child pornography.<\/p>\n

Officers interviewed George, while he was working a
\nconstruction site in Vail, and he told them he \u201cknew it was wrong, but explored
\nseveral groups on Kik\u201d looking for child pornography.<\/p>\n

On July 30, George\u2019s wife requested a welfare check while
\nshe was out of state, and reported that George had made suicidal statements.
\nShe also told Rifle Police that George told her he was not \u201cgoing back to jail
\nwithout a fight.\u201d<\/p>\n

A judge in Eagle County issued a warrant for George\u2019s arrest
\non the morning of Aug. 5. Police visited George\u2019s home, where his wife informed
\nthem George carried a firearm with him.<\/p>\n

Ryan and McNeal parked their patrol vehicles on the intersection of Interstate 70 and Colorado Highway 13, at around 6:30 Aug. 5, and spotted George in his work truck around 7:11 p.m.<\/p>\n

They pulled him over on the bridge, and George got out
\nwithout being told to do so and displayed the handgun.<\/p>\n

What followed was several minutes of confrontation. Officers
\nkept their weapons on George and gave numerous commands for him to drop his
\nweapon.<\/p>\n

At one point, McNeal asked George, \u201cSo, what can we do to make you put the gun down?\u201d<\/p>\n

George ignored all commands, the report said. The officers
\nbelieved George was going to jump off the bridge. McNeal alerted dispatch to \u201cget
\nriver rescue team ready.\u201d<\/p>\n

George did not jump, but ran toward the city of Rifle, and
\nwas shot in the back twice by Ryan, according to the report.<\/p>\n

Part of the incident was captured on video <\/a>and provided to law enforcement and the Post Independent.<\/p>\n

According to the officers, using a less-lethal TASER was not an option. When George produced the gun, he pointed it almost immediately at himself. \u201cUsing a TASER could have caused him to squeeze the trigger and shoot himself or cause him to fall into the swift river and drown,\u201d according to the report.<\/p>\n

tphippen@postindependent.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Law enforcement officers secure the scene of the officer involved shooting Aug. 5 on the Highway 13 bridge at Rifle. Kyle Mills\/Post Independent The officers who shot and killed an armed Rifle man in August will not face criminal charges, 9th District Attorney Jeff Cheney announced Tuesday. Following a three-month investigation, the DA \u201cconcluded that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1316464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-06 14:33:50","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1316464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1316464"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1316464\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1316485,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1316464\/revisions\/1316485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1316464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1316464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1316464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}