The police shooting of Thomas Siderio could renew debate over use-of-force laws

In Thomas Siderio’s final steps — taken Tuesday night as he ran away from plainclothes police officers, before one fatally shot the 12-year-old boy in the back — there were echoes of other Philadelphia police shootings, and a looming battle over the future of a critical state law.

Police officials have said four officers were in an unmarked car in South Philadelphia as part of a gun investigation, and spotted Thomas near 18th and Barbara Streets shortly before 7:30 p.m., along with a 17-year-old boy, whom the officers wanted to question.

The officers said they turned on a red-and-blue emergency light, and then someone fired a bullet through their rear passenger window; one was struck in the face with shards of broken glass. Two officers got out of the car and opened fire, but only one bullet hit Thomas, a seventh-grade student at George W. Sharswood Elementary School.

Police have alleged that Thomas was holding a stolen 9mm semiautomatic handgun that was loaded and equipped with a laser.

“The fact alone that a person was shot in the back certainly looks bad,” said Anthony Erace, the executive director of the civilian-run Police Advisory Commission, which is receiving updates from the Police Department on the investigation into the boy’s killing. “But the totality of the circumstances has to be considered before any judgments can be made.”

The city was gripped by a similar case nearly five years ago, when Officer Ryan Pownall shot a 30-year-old man, David Jones, twice in the back after the officer stopped Jones for riding a dirt bike in North Philadelphia. The two men tussled over a gun that Pownall said he found in Jones’ waistband, but surveillance footage showed that Jones had dropped the gun, and was more than 10 feet away, when Pownall fired the fatal shots.

Pownall — who had previously shot another man in the back, leaving him paralyzed — was fired by then-Police Commissioner Richard Ross. A grand jury determined in 2018 that the ex-officer should be charged with murder; the charges were later reduced to third-degree murder. (The city paid Jones’ family a $1 million settlement.)

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled, in the 1986 case Tennessee v. Garner, that it is “constitutionally unreasonable” for police officers to use deadly force to stop a suspect who has committed a felony from escaping.

But a wrinkle can be found in Pennsylvania, where the law states that officers are justified in using deadly force if a suspect “has committed or attempted a forcible felony, or is attempting to escape and possesses a deadly weapon. …”

The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office has argued the state Supreme Court should declare that portion of the state law unconstitutional, a maneuver that attorneys for Pownall derided as an attempt by prosecutors to boost their chances of success when the former officer eventually stands trial.

Long before Pownall made headlines, the Police Department was forced to grapple with concerns about police shootings. In 2015, a U.S. Department of Justice review found that the department had “serious deficiencies” in its use-of-force policies and training, and needed to communicate more effectively with the Police Advisory Commission.

That same year, the department implemented a new use-of-force directive that noted a police officer wouldn’t be justified in using deadly force solely if a suspect resisted arrest or attempted to escape. Other factors are supposed to be taken into consideration, such as whether a suspect was armed.

But another directive on firearm use, implemented last year, forbids officers from shooting at a fleeing suspect “who presents no immediate threat of death or serious bodily injury,” and further instructs officers to not fire their weapons if it would unnecessarily endanger innocent people.

Thomas was shot on a narrow residential street, not far from a playground.