Paramedic who injected Elijah McClain with ketamine before his death avoids arrest

(BRIGHTON, Colo.) – A former paramedic who injected Elijah McClain with ketamine avoided prison time and was sentenced to probation Friday following his murder conviction in the death of the black man, who helped fuel protests against racial injustice in 2020.

Jeremy Cooper faces up to three years in prison. He administered a dose of the sedative ketamine to McClain, 23, who had been forcibly restrained after the police stopped him as he walked home to a Denver suburb in 2019.

The sentence ends a series of trials that lasted seven months and resulted in the conviction of a police officer and two paramedics. Criminal charges against paramedics and emergency medical technicians involved in police custody cases are rare.

Experts say the convictions would be unprecedented before 2020, when The murder of George Floyd triggered a nationwide reckoning over racist policing and deaths in police custody.

McClain’s mother, Sheneen McClain, says the two acquitted officers — as well as other firefighters and police officers who were there — were complicit in her son’s murder and escaped justice.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. The previous AP story follows below.

DENVER (AP) — Nearly five years after Elijah McClain died following a police stop in which he was pinned around the neck and injected with the powerful sedative ketamine, three of five Denver Area Officers and Paramedics prosecuted for the death of the black man were convicted.

Experts say the convictions would be unprecedented before 2020, when The murder of George Floyd triggered a nationwide reckoning over racist policing and deaths in police custody. At a sentencing hearing Friday, former Aurora Fire Rescue paramedic Jeremy Cooper faces up to three years in prison after being convicted in December of homicide due to criminal negligence in McClain’s death in 2019.

But McClain’s mother, Sheneen McClain, said justice has not yet been served. She said the two acquitted Aurora police officers, as well as other firefighters and police officers at the scene, were complicit in the murder of her 23-year-old son and that they escaped justice.

“I’m waiting for heaven to convey everyone’s judgment. Because I know that heaven will not miss the mark,” she told the Associated Press.

Sheneen McClain plans to speak at Friday’s hearing.

Criminal charges are rarely brought against paramedics and paramedics, according to experts.

At least 94 people died after being given sedatives and restrained by police from 2012 to 2021, according to findings from the AP in collaboration with FRONTLINE (PBS) and Howard Centers for Investigative Journalism.

McClain’s name became a rallying cry in protests against racial injustice in policing that swept the US in 2020.

“Without taking into account criminal justice and how people of color suffer at much higher rates from the use of force and police violence, it is very unlikely that anything would have come of this, that there would have been any charges, much less convictions,” he said. David Harris, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh and an expert on racial profiling.

Harris added that the acquittals of the two officers after weeks-long trials were not surprising, since juries are often reluctant to second-guess the actions of police and other first responders.

“It’s still very difficult to convict,” he said.

The judge who will preside over the hearing on Friday sentenced former paramedic Peter Cichuniec in March to five years in prison for criminally negligent homicide and second-degree assault, the most serious of the charges facing any of the respondents. It was the shortest sentence allowed by law.

Previously, Judge Mark Warner sentenced Officer Randy Roedema to 14 months in prison for criminally negligent homicide and misdemeanor assault.

Prosecutors initially declined to pursue charges related to McClain’s death when an autopsy did not determine how he died. Democratic Gov. Jared Polis ordered the reopening of the investigation following 2020 protests against police brutality.

The second autopsy said McClain died because he was injected with ketamine after being forcibly restrained.

To Sheneen McClain, it doesn’t make sense that Officer Nathan Woodyard, who detained her son and held him around his neck, was acquitted, while Officer Roedema received a lighter sentence than paramedic Cichuniec. She thinks the paramedics’ role was to cover up what the police did to her son.

“I raised him alone and will continue to support my son regardless of anyone listening to me,” she said.

Since the Floyd murders, McClain and others have put emphasis on deaths in police custody, many departments, paramedic units, and those who train them have re-examined how they treat suspects. However, it could take years to collect enough evidence to show whether these efforts are working, said Candace McCoy, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.

Cooper injected McClain with ketamine after police detained him as he walked home. Officers later referenced a suspicious person report. McClain was not armed or accused of breaking any laws.

Medical experts said that when he received the sedative, McClain was already weakened from the forced restraint that left him temporarily unconscious.

He went into cardiac arrest on the way to the hospital and died three days later.

Cooper’s attorneys did not immediately respond to phone messages and emails seeking comment on the sentencing.

Since McClain’s death, the Colorado health department has told paramedics not to give ketamine to people suspected of having excited delirium, who was described in a since-retracted emergency medical report as manifesting symptoms including increased strength. A group of doctors called it an unscientific definition rooted in racism.

The protests against McClain and Floyd also sparked a wave of state legislation to restrict the use of neck restraints known as carotid restraints, which cut off circulation, and chokeholds, which cut off breathing. At least 27 states, including Colorado, have exceeded some limits on these practices. Only two had bans before Floyd was killed.

For MiDian Holmes, a racial justice advocate who participated in the trials against first responders, change is not happening fast enough.

“It’s the message that Elijah’s life was important, but not important enough,” Holmes said.