Announcement Detail

By Lisa Backus STAFF WRITER

April 2, 2024

Connecticut’s Inspector General Robert Devlin Jr. is recommending state leaders consider legislation requiring citizens to report if they have “specific information” that police officers could be in imminent danger of serious injury, according to his annual report released Monday.

The suggestion could have to ties to the fatal shootings of two Bristol police officers in October 2022 that Devlin is still investigating.

The law could be crafted much in the same way therapists and other mental health professionals are required to report if a patient threatens to harm someone, Devlin said.

“The OIG believes that this is a question worth examining,” the report said.

The annual report focuses on Devlin’s activities as the state’s inspector general in 2023 while investigating use of deadly police force and in-custody death incidents.

In 2023, Devlin completed investigations into four police in-custody deaths, five reports of deadly use of force and several state Department of Correction deaths, including four suicides and four suspected drug overdoses while people were incarcerated.

In every case, Devlin determined the use of deadly police force was justified or that police force was not a factor in an in-custody death. The use of deadly force means officers used a manner of force that could potentially kill a suspect. Not every case of deadly police force involved the death of a person, but there were six incidents in 2023 when officers fatally shot suspects or people in crisis, including two that happened on the same day in October.

There are several pending deadly use of police force investigations that have not been released, including the review of the actions of Bristol Officer Alec Iurato who shot and killed Bristol resident Nicholas Brutcher after he fatally shot Bristol Lt. Dustin DeMonte and Sgt. Alex Hamzy in his driveway in October 2022.

Devlin determined in the days after the fatal shootings that Iurato was justified in killing Brutcher with a single gunshot to the head as he was still toting the gun he used to kill the two other officers.

But Devlin is still expected to release a more comprehensive report on the fatal shootings of the officers who were responding to what may have been a fake domestic violence call to draw police to his home. Nathan Brutcher, the man’s younger brother, was also shot during the incident. However, authorities have not said who shot him or whether he will face charges.

In the annual report, Devlin also called for police to monitor for signs of opioid withdrawal after a suspect died in custody in 2022.

Devlin said that while the death of Joseph Torrice Jr, as he was being held by Manchester police was likely “atypical,” officers should have paid closer attention when he told them he had been prescribed Suboxone, a drug that helps people deal with opioid addiction.

“It is foreseeable that local police department lockups will hold arrestees experiencing opioid withdrawal,” Devlin said in the report. “It would be prudent for police agencies to capture information about an arrestee’s use of prescribed opioid substitution medications (such as methadone, suboxone, etc.) and, where reasonable, make efforts to allow the arrestee to continue with such therapy while held in police custody.”

When Manchester police took Torrice into custody on July 8, 2022, he told them he had used drugs about an hour before and had a prescription for Suboxone, Devlin said in the report.

Torrice was placed in a cell in Manchester and held over the weekend after he couldn’t bond out from local charges and an arrest warrant out of New York, the report said. He was found unresponsive in his cell two days later and brought to Hartford Hospital were he was pronounced dead on July 18.

Torrice’s death was determine to have been caused by a lack of oxygen to the brain after he suffered cardiac arrest while he was in withdrawal from the drugs he had used, according to Devlin, who concluded that a police use of force did not cause the man’s fatal injury.

Devlin’s report also included a recommendation that police use the technology that would automatically turn on body-worn camera if the officer failed to engage the camera or shuts it off during an incident.

In addition, Devlin recommended a change in state law that would allow guns to be confiscated from people who voluntarily sought to have their affairs managed by a conservator. Under current law, only those who have been involuntarily placed under a conservator can have their firearms removed, Devlin said.

He suggested the law change after investigating the deadly use of police force against Andrew O’Lone who was under a conservator when he repeatedly fired an assault rifle at a Norwich officer in 2021. Devlin’s report said the officer was justified in shooting at O’Lone who fled the scene. No one was injured in the shooting, Devlin said.

But the inspector general concluded that probate officials should reexamine the current law on firearms restrictions for those who are voluntary under a conservator.

“Because O’Lone gained access to an assault weapon and nearly assassinated a police officer, the Connecticut Probate Courts should consider reexamining whether the firearms restrictions should apply to a person sufficiently incapable of caring for him or herself that the person is subject to a voluntary conservatorship,” Devlin said.