City didn’t stop man’s ‘campaign of terror’ that ended in deadly shooting, CA suit says
Officials in California did nothing to stop a man’s “relentless campaign of terror” against a family before he shot and killed their patriarch, according to a federal lawsuit.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on April 3, says police officers with the City of Oakland and probation officers with the County of Alameda could have done more to prevent the killing of Miles Armstead. The “beloved” husband and father was killed by his next-door neighbor, Jamal Thomas, a “violent” man who was on probation at the time of the killing, the lawsuit says.
Armstead and his family made repeated calls to police to report harassment by Thomas and got a restraining order against him, but police officers consistently dismissed their concerns, the lawsuit says. Despite the fact that Thomas was on probation and violated the terms of his release, county officials did not revoke his probation and allowed him to go “completely uncontacted” for weeks leading up to Armstead’s killing on May 1, 2020, the lawsuit says.
The Oakland city attorney’s office declined to comment on the pending litigation. A spokesperson for Alameda County did not respond to a request for comment from McClatchy News.
Thomas is charged with murder and multiple other counts in connection with Armstead’s killing, according to Alameda County court records. No attorney for him is listed. He has pleaded not guilty to the murder charge, according to court records.
‘Campaign of terror’
In 2019, about two years after Armstead, a father of five, moved into an Oakland neighborhood with his wife, he and his family began to be harassed by Thomas, who was squatting at a neighboring property, the lawsuit says.
Between December 2019 and February 2020, Armstead called 911 at least 23 times to report harassment by Thomas, the lawsuit says. Thomas broke in; threw stones and bricks through the family’s windows, at one point injuring Armstead’s pregnant wife; and threatened to burn their house down, the lawsuit says. Armstead had a restraining order against Thomas at the time, according to the lawsuit.
Despite the ongoing harassment, police officers did not appear to take the threats to Armstead’s family seriously, according to the lawsuit.
“Each time Oakland Police were called, their response times became longer, and in conformance with their practice - their efforts lessened,” the lawsuit says. “On at least one occasion, the Armsteads did not receive a response to their call for service until two days later.”
Officers also often did not arrest or question Thomas about the crimes the Armsteads accused him of, which “emboldened (Thomas) further,” the lawsuit says.
During one call for service on Feb. 26, 2020, an officer responded to Armstead’s home where he was holding a baseball bat to protect his family and Thomas was threatening to burn Armstead’s house down, the lawsuit says. The officer told Armstead and Thomas that they were “acting like 12-year-old girls,” the lawsuit says. The officer then suggested that Thomas “go back down the street,” according to the lawsuit.
In March 2020, Thomas was arrested and released under the supervision of the Alameda County Probation Department, the lawsuit says. His probation officer was required to make contact with him every week to ensure he was complying with the terms of his release and the restraining order the Armsteads had against him, according to the lawsuit.
Instead, a probation officer met with Thomas on March 11, 2020, “directly in front of ... Armstead’s house in violation of the restraining order,” the lawsuit says. Despite the violation, Thomas’s probation was not revoked. Probation officers then did not have contact with Thomas for nearly eight weeks, despite requirements to be in touch with him on a weekly basis, according to the lawsuit.
In the meantime, Armstead had become “so desperate from the lack of intervention from law enforcement” that he and his family decided to sell their home and move from the neighborhood, the lawsuit says. On May 1, 2020, while he was cleaning the front yard of the home after it was sold, Thomas fatally shot him, the lawsuit says.
“The probation department and the police department, they doused this flame with gasoline, and it just continued to grow and grow until it was completely out of control, and this inferno consumed Miles’s family,” Adante Pointer, an attorney with Pointer & Buelna who is representing the family, told McClatchy News.
‘Ripple effects’
Pointer said Armstead’s death has had “ripple effects” in the community beyond his family.
“He was a coach, he mentored people, he was a bank executive,” he said. “He touched a lot of lives.”
His family has also been “suffering,” he said.
“His most recent child never got a chance to meet their father,” Pointer said. “His older kids, they miss their father tremendously. His wife is left to raise a family without the patriarch.”
Pointer said city and county officials had a duty to supervise Thomas, and they failed.
“Any family, any person that is legitimately calling the police 20 plus times to their home because they’re being menaced and harassed and injured by anyone, should be taken seriously,” he said. “The taxpayers have a right to expect that our public employees are performing their job constitutionally and faithfully.”
The lawsuit accuses Oakland and Alameda County of negligence and wrongful death and seeks an unspecified amount of damages, including medical costs, funeral and burial expenses, and pain, suffering and emotional distress.
“Miles and his family were searching for and had invested in the American dream,” Pointer said, “and no one’s American dream should turn into a nightmare because of the ineffectiveness and the callous disregard of our government.”
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