A Denver police officer will serve a 14-day suspension after she failed to realize a suspect she was arresting was armed with a gun, allowing the handcuffed man to later shoot another officer in the neck from the backseat of a police vehicle two years ago, according to disciplinary records released Wednesday.
Officer Alicia Martinez will serve the suspension across two weeks in June and July, Chief Compliance Officer Mary Dulacki wrote in a May 1 disciplinary letter.
Martinez missed the gun when she searched suspect Daniel Cheeseman, 35, as she and Officer Jordan Archuleta arrested him in connection with a stolen car on Nov. 11, 2022.
During the arrest, Martinez searched Cheeseman’s left side and Archuleta searched his right side. The two officers took a backpack from Cheeseman and searched that, discovering fentanyl and a handgun inside the backpack.
Martinez searched Cheeseman again after the officers removed his backpack. She checked the front of his waistband and then asked Cheeseman to lean forward, but he refused and said he couldn’t do so, according to the disciplinary letter. Martinez moved on, reading the man his rights.
She did not find a second gun that Cheeseman had holstered in his pants, clipped below the base of his spine, internal affairs investigators later found.
The officers handcuffed Cheeseman, put him in the back of a patrol vehicle and took him to the Denver Downtown Detention Center. There, the officers sat in their vehicle in the jail’s sallyport for more than an hour filling out paperwork.
Cheeseman spent most of that time sitting in the back silently with his eyes closed, the officers said. After about 75 minutes, the two officers got ready to take Cheeseman out of the patrol car.
Archuleta opened the rear driver’s side door. He noticed Cheeseman was leaning back and sitting on his hands, which were handcuffed behind his back. Archuleta thought it was strange, because it is an uncomfortable way to sit, he said, according to the letter.
As Cheeseman moved to get up, Archuleta “got a weird feeling” and ordered the handcuffed man to sit back down, the officer told internal affairs investigators. Archuleta could not see Cheeseman’s right hand. He leaned into the patrol car to feel around for the man’s hand. As he did so, Cheeseman “pulled back really fast” and shot him in the neck, the officer said.
Cheeseman fired four times, police said. Cpl. Thomas Schmidt, who was sitting in an SUV nearby, heard the shots, got out of his vehicle, and fired nine rounds into the patrol car, striking Cheeseman multiple times.
Cheeseman and Archuleta both survived. Cheeseman was charged with attempted murder of a police officer; that case is pending.
Martinez could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
She took hands-on training on search and seizure after the shooting, and now “educates other officers on her team on the importance of thorough searches,” according to the disciplinary letter.
“I have lived with the images of my partner being shot and telling me to tell his wife and kids that he loves them,” she said, according to the letter. “It has affected me in many different ways at work and with my family. I don’t want other officers to have to go through the same experiences, and if I can help others avoid the same situation, I will do so.”
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