The Colorado Springs Police Department used its facebook page to disagree with the way local ABC affiliate KRDO portrayed the department’s SWAT team in a recent story.
Last Thursday, KRDO reporter James Jarman reported Catherine Wilson, a Colorado Springs grandmother, was served by the CSPD SWAT team with a felony warrant originating from Orange County, FL. The warrant turned out to be a mistake.
Jarman’s story focused on who might be to blame for the 56-year-old woman being taken into custody on a mistaken warrant. In the video, Jarman uses file footage of SWAT team members dressed in full tactical gear. See the video after the jump.
The day after the report aired, the Colorado Springs Police Department posted a detailed account of why it thought the station was wrong in making it look like the SWAT team went in fully armed and armored to apprehend, in their own words, a “sweet older woman.”
The station’s use of our SWAT Team footage, dressed in full body armor with submachine guns drawn, was misleading to your viewers and disingenuous and unfair to our department.
The “uniform” the members wore was their black “soft uniform” as mandated by policy – not the one shown in your footage.
Officers do NOT have discretion when it comes to an arrest warrant signed by a Judge.{How nice this would have been to include in the story}
While the reporter clearly mentioned {at the end of the story} how Ms. Wilson praised the actions of our TEU officers – the damage was already done with the portrayal of an armed SWAT Team with guns drawn preparing to arrest a sweet older woman.
Three hours later, KRDO posted the story to its facebook page with this explanation:
In case you missed this. To be clear, as James Jarman mentions in the story, Colorado Springs SWAT did nothing wrong and should be held in high regard.
KRDO also ran a clarification to the story apologizing for using the file footage. Click here to watch the video.
James Jarman then added two comments to the Colorado Springs Police posting. (see screenshots below) Jarman’s comments seem to take the argument to another level. In them he accuses CSPD public information officer Barbara Miller of being unprofessional, playing favorites with TV stations and basically covering up the mistake of Orange County, FL, where he said she once worked.
Here are the comments from Jarman captured by the Colorado Springs Independent:
Jarman said the two parties will meet Thursday to discuss the issue. He told TVSpy, “I’m hoping we can put this all behind us and everyone can focus on the real issue we raised in our story.”
Click here to view the original story by Jarman.
[Colorado Springs Independent]