WEST JORDAN, Utah — A Salt Lake City police K-9 handler is on trial over whether the officer was reasonable when he ordered his dog to bite a man kneeling in his backyard, with opening arguments beginning Tuesday.
Nickolas Pearce arrived at the scene of a domestic disturbance as a police officer.
“He left as an assailant,” Salt Lake County District Deputy District Attorney Andrew Deesing told the jury.
“The facts of this case, the bite is clear as the sky is blue,” Deesing said. “So, what you’re going to have to decide is whether this bite was reasonable.”
“But I want you to pay close attention to the people who are telling you the sky is not blue,” Deesing added.
Pearce is charged with aggravated assault, a felony punishable by up to 15 years in prison. The count stems from ordering his police dog, Tuco, to bite Jeffery Ryans – whose first name is Jeffrey in some public records – in 2020.
“On April 24th, 2020, this is the violent, dangerous and scary scene singlehandedly caused by Jeffery Ryans,” defense attorney Nathan Evershed told the jury.
Evershed argued that Pearce and two other officers were responding to a report of Ryans abusing a woman in a home where a court had ordered Ryans not to be and where there were also afraid children. Ryans also didn’t immediately respond to commands to get on the ground and there were indications he was trying to flee from his own backyard.
“The level of force used here, we will argue, was reasonable,” Evershed added.
The defense also told the jury about the 42-year-old Pearce. His father was also a Salt Lake City police officer and K-9 handler, Evershed said. After serving in various posts with Salt Lake City police, Pearce joined the K-9 unit in 2010, achieved the required certifications and helped train other dog handlers. Evershed said Pearce selected Tuco when he was still an 11-month-old puppy.
Evershed told the jury that Ryans lied to investigators. Deesing quickly rose from his chair and asked Third District Court Judge Wiliam Kendall for a meeting at the bench. The discussion couldn’t be heard from the gallery, but when it was over, Evershed didn’t elaborate and continued with his opening statement.
He was speaking to what appeared to be an all-white jury of five men and five women. Two of the jurors are alternates.
Pearce is white and Ryans is Black – a dynamic noted in headlines around the country after the video of the two men’s encounter was made public.
Ryans began his testimony after the opening statements. He told the jury he had finished his job as a conductor at Union Pacific and was getting ready to go to a second job making masks to protect people during the pandemic.
He said he did not know a protective order was preventing him from being at the house, saying he had never been served the order. He also didn’t know one of the children in the home had called 911 to report the argument he and his then-wife had that night.
Ryans was in the backyard when people holding flashlights arrived calling his name. Ryans didn’t know at first that they were police officers.
“I was in shock trying to figure out what was going on, who were these people,” Ryans said.
“There were so many commands come here, do this do that,” Ryans said. “So, I just kind of froze.”
Deesing told the jury that Tuco bit Ryans left leg for 46 seconds. Police and EMTs took him to a hospital where, Ryans testified, he had a six- or seven-hour surgery. More surgeries and physical therapy followed.
Ryans denied a defense contention that he was preparing to flee, saying he could not have scaled a head-high cinder block wall with a drop off on the other side.
Pearce has remained employed at the Salt Lake City Police Department. Under state law, a felony conviction would end his law enforcement career. Even if he’s acquitted, there’s a chance the city will fire him.
According to a document the city gave FOX 13 under a public records request, Salt Lake City has not yet completed its internal affairs investigation into Pearce because of the pending trial, a delay that perplexed one former detective FOX 13 interviewed last year.
Salt Lake City’s Civilian Review Board in 2020 ruled Tuco’s bite of Ryans was excessive force. Brown is not bound by that decision and the pending criminal case against Pearce was a reason cited by city attorneys in arguing Brown shouldn’t testify at the Pearce trial.
If Pearce is found not guilty, Brown will have the final say in whether Pearce remains employed with the city.
It’s unclear whether Brown will consider a separate episode for which Pearce was also charged with assault. In that case, Pearce lifted Tuco to bite a suspect in a car.
That criminal charge was dismissed when the victim refused to testify.
Meanwhile, Ryans has a federal civil lawsuit pending against Salt Lake City.