Ball State to alter police policy

Ball State University is changing its university police officer training program and boosting efforts to respond to student alcohol abuse, said BSU President Blaine Brownell during a news conference Thursday.\nThe announcement came one month after the death of BSU senior Michael McKinney in a police action shooting by a rookie BSU officer Nov. 8.\nBSU Executive Director of University Communications Heather Shupp said the policy changes and initiatives will go into effect immediately.\n"The university has been engaged in a process of continual improvement in its police department," Shupp said. "Certainly the tragedy that occurred has focused attention very specifically on training issues, and in response to that tragedy, the university has had many conversations on how to improve training, and many of these new changes are a direct result of those conversations." \nThe policy changes stipulate no officer will patrol or respond to calls alone until completing Indiana Law Enforcement Academy training and if the officer completes field training before going through the academy, the rookie officer will patrol and respond to calls only when an experienced officer is also present.\nIUPD Lt. Jerry Minger said the IUPD will use the Nov. 8 BSU shooting incident as a basis of evaluation for the IUPD.\n"The BSU incident, as well as every shooting incident in the United States is considered and evaluated so we can keep our personnel as proficient as possible in all aspects of law enforcement," Minger said. "We constantly evaluate all of the training of our officers and cadets. IUPD is unlike other university police departments in that we have a police academy within IUPD and the majority of officers and administrators are certified police instructors."\nMinger said he has responded to numerous inquiries since the BSU shooting.\n"The majority of the calls are from people that want to draw comparisons to police in general or to other universities and their training," Minger said. "The assumption seems to be that if another department does things differently, it must be right or wrong and not just a different approach. There may, in fact, be a number of things that create different procedures which aren't right or wrong."\nBSU Officer Robert Duplain, 24, had just been hired in April and was scheduled to attend the police academy in January when he responded to a call at about 3:30 a.m. alone and shot McKinney four times.\nThe new policy will also require expanded field training experience for university police officers, including more training with department-approved defensive equipment, like chemical spray and batons.\nOn Nov. 27, the Delaware County prosecutor's office, which handled the investigation into McKinney's death, announced it would forward the case to a grand jury. That panel of six citizens will meet privately to hear testimony from authorities and witnesses, which it hopes to convene before Christmas. \nThe grand jury will decide whether Duplain's actions were justified when he apparently mistook McKinney, 21, for a burglar outside an off-campus residence. Duplain remains on administrative leave until the grand jury completes its investigation, Shupp said. \nInvestigators said Duplain fired after McKinney lunged at him. McKinney's family and friends said it would have been out of character for him to lunge at an officer. Reports said intoxication could have been a factor in McKinney's behavior. He had been drinking at a bar earlier in the evening, and the county coroner reported that his blood-alcohol level was 0.343.\nIn Marion County, municipal code requires any law enforcement agency that investigates a police-action fatality to submit it to a grand jury for review. In other counties, it's up to prosecutors to decide whether to involve a grand jury.\n-- Contact staff writer Andrea Minarcek at aminarce@indiana.edu.