Defense expert breaks down video in police shooting of unarmed bus passenger

A former New Berlin police officer who helped write the handbook used to train officers in Wisconsin has begun trying to convince a jury that a Brown Deer officer was justified in shooting an unruly, unarmed bus passenger in the back, and why her Taser wasn't a real option. 

After he and another expert in police psychology addressed jurors Wednesday morning, the judge reluctantly informed the jury before their lunch break that the trial, expected to end Wednesday, will instead likley run into next week. It began Feb. 12.

Devon Kraemer, 28, is on trial for aggravated battery with intent to cause great bodily harm over the March 14, 2016, encounter with Manuel Burnley Jr. She and another officer were trying to handcuff the 370-pound Burnley when she fired a single shot between his shoulder blades.

Burnley, 28, was hospitalized for 12 days and lost part of a lung. The bullet remains in his body. He testified he was not resisting but expected to be Tased after the officers took him down and couldn't get him cuffed because of his size.

Robert Willis, 68, explained the many variables officers are trained to consider in assessing the threat posed by any subject. He used many axioms he honed over years of instructing officers: Threat assessment is constant. Hands kill. There's always a weapon, because the officer has one.

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By late Tuesday, he had begun breaking down bus video the jury has already watched dozens of times into single frames.

Video, he said, can be misleading. "It's an illusion," he said.

In 2015, Willis' video analysis led to the acquittal of a former Milwaukee police detective who was recorded beating a prisoner handcuffed to a wall in an interrogation room.  The same lawyer in that case, Michael Steinle, is defending Kraemer.

Willis also contended it was unreasonable for Kraemer to use a Taser on Burnley. Using slides from the manufacturer, he detailed how they work. He said by the time Kraemer was on the ground struggling with Burnley she probably couldn't reach her Taser, kept in the "cross draw" position on her belt.

He also explained that at point-blank range, the Taser's two probes couldn't separate far enough to achieve temporary paralysis. Just touching the weapon to Burnley in stun mode, he said, would only cause pain in that spot, and some subjects don't comply in response to pain, they react violently. 

On the first day of the trial, Assistant District Attorney James Griffin presented his own expert, a Harvard-trained lawyer who has also taught use-of-force extensively to law enforcement officers. He told jurors Kraemer's claimed fears for the officers' safety were not objectively reasonable and fell far short standards for use of force.

Before Willis could complete his testimony, the defense called another expert, in from California, out of order. 

As a certified police psychologist, Philip Trompetter told jurors he's talked to hundreds of officers shortly after they'd been involved in on-duty shootings. He said they often report not hearing their own shots, or not seeing anything around them but the subject and the deadly threat, or experience post-incident amnesia.

Kraemer told investigators she couldn't hear the fellow officer helping her arrest Burnley, that her own shot seemed very muted, that she felt alone and was having tunnel vision.

On cross-examination, Trompetter agreed it was unusual for an officer to use the term tunnel vision, rather than just describe a situation. He also agreed that in his experiences, those other officers had faced clear deadly threats, like suspects with a gun.