“Keep my hydrangeas alive.” Margaret almost smiled.
Body-camera footage supported Camille’s description in nearly every material detail. Danner entered the yard, asked who she was, and learned within seconds that she claimed ownership.
Pierce suggested verification early. Danner delayed it.
Camille placed down the hose when ordered. Danner later picked it up.
That last fact became important because his initial report stated that he took control of “an object the subject continued holding in a potentially threatening manner.” The video showed the hose resting on the ground for eleven seconds before Danner touched it.
Margaret replayed that section several times. Then she compared it with the written report.
The two versions could not both be true. Danner was interviewed the following day.
“Why did you say she continued holding the hose?” Margaret asked. Danner said he wrote the report from memory after a stressful incident.
“Was the hose in her hand when you picked it up?” “No.”
“Was she moving toward it?” “No.”
“Had she threatened to use it?” “No.”
“Had she sprayed you?” “No.” Margaret looked at him.
“Then why did you pick it up?” Danner answered, “For officer safety.”
“What specific safety problem existed after she put it down?” Danner became irritated.
“She was noncompliant.” Margaret did not move.
“That isn’t an answer to my question.”
Danner stared at the table. “She kept challenging everything.”
Margaret wrote the sentence down. “Is questioning you a safety threat?”
“That depends.” “On what?”
“Context.” Margaret waited.
“What context existed here?” Danner had none he could articulate.
Then came the question about the water. “Why did you activate the nozzle?”
Danner said he was trying to move Camille away from the residence. Margaret asked whether spraying water at a stationary person was an approved control tactic.
“No.” “Did you believe she was armed?”
“No.” “Attempting assault?”
“No.” “Attempting escape?”
“No.” Danner’s frustration became visible.
“She wouldn’t listen.”
That sentence ended up near the center of the final report.
The review also examined Judith Palmer’s original call. Hearing it was harder for Camille than she expected.
Judith told dispatch she believed a woman had “gotten into the expensive stone house across the street.” The dispatcher asked whether the woman had broken a window, forced a door, climbed a fence, or carried anything away.
Judith answered no to every question. She said the woman entered through the side gate.
The dispatcher asked whether the gate had been forced. Judith said she thought the woman entered a code.
Then came the important question. “Could she be the new homeowner?”
Judith hesitated. “I don’t think so.”
“Why not?” Another pause followed.
“She just doesn’t look like somebody who bought that house.”