The Columbus cop who fatally shot Donovan Lewis while the unarmed, 20-year-old Black man was in bed last month was previously fired from the force after being criminally charged in connection with a side gig at a bank.
The firing did not involve the use of force, and the officer, Ricky Anderson, was later reinstated by an arbitrator. But learning about the history renewed the anger and hurt felt by Lewis’ sister, she told The Daily Beast.
“If we did these kinds of things in any regular job, you wouldn’t have your job anymore,” Tatiana Crowder, 28, told The Daily Beast.
ADVERTISEMENT
She was furious about the fact that, like most officers who use lethal force, Anderson continues to get paid.
“Like, that should be a deterrent to maybe not shoot people because you’re not getting a paid vacation at your house,” she told The Daily Beast.
The revelation about the 30-year-veteran’s law-enforcement history came by way of his personal file, which was obtained by The Daily Beast on Wednesday. Anderson, who joined the force in December 1991, has been placed on leave after fatally shooting Lewis early in the morning of Aug. 30.
The 137-page file states that in May 2004, Anderson was terminated “for cause” after a hearing with the Department of Public Safety. While details of the incident are not mentioned in the report, a police spokesperson told The Daily Beast that the incident “was not related to use of force” and that Anderson was reinstated after he and the Fraternal Order of Police challenged his termination.
“We can’t comment on a personnel file that we have not seen,” Mark Collins, one of Anderson’s lawyers, told The Daily Beast on Wednesday. “Those are labor-related issues. Regardless of what is in his personnel file, nothing in there has anything to do with the split-second decision he was forced to make.”
According to the Columbus Dispatch, Anderson was indicted in 2003 after allegedly accepting payment for guarding a bank—even though he did not provide the service. The paper reported that he admitted to the theft and got his record expunged, and was reinstated in November 2004 by a federal arbitrator who said the city should have given the officer a suspension.
Anderson’s Internal Affairs Bureau history also shows 10 complaints filed against him during his career. The history, first reported by Dispatch, includes a complaint about a 2019 incident—though no details were immediately available.
Rex Elliott, an attorney representing the Lewis family, told The Daily Beast that Anderson’s personnel file only raises more questions—including how the officer was still allowed to carry a firearm even though he had been previously implicated in a crime. He also slammed police for how they communicated—and failed to communicate—with the Lewis family after the shooting, saying that they “exhibited complete disregard for the family.”
“It’s stunning that they did not have more compassion for the family,” Elliot added.
Eighteen years after being fired, Anderson was captured on body-camera footage shooting Lewis while he was in bed. Police said the incident began around 2:30 a.m. on Aug. 30, when officers attempted to serve Lewis with a felony warrant at a second-floor apartment on Sullivant Avenue.
Court records show a misdemeanor arrest warrant for Lewis on charges of domestic violence, improperly handling a firearm, and assault. An August criminal complaint filed in Franklin County Municipal Court says that Lewis’ girlfriend told police the two had an argument at Westgate Park, where he shoved her.
Body-camera footage initially released the day of the shooting showed that after knocking for about eight minutes and apprehending two other men in the apartment, several officers went into a back bedroom where Lewis was sleeping—and that he was shot about a second after the door was opened. Lewis had one hand raised as Officer Anderson, who had a K-9, fired a single gunshot.
Two officers can then be seen handcuffing a wounded Lewis and carrying him out of the apartment before eventually rendering aid. Lewis was pronounced dead at a local hospital shortly afterward. A search warrant and evidence receipt of the incident show that no firearms were found in Lewis’ apartment—and that a vape pen was collected from his bed.
The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation has also opened an investigation into Lewis’ death.
Crowder called Lewis “forever 18,” a man who towered over her at 6’ 2 but was “forever a little kid,” who she stressed was a kind man who loved dancing, TikTok, and sports.
And while she said Lewis had briefly struggled with homelessness, he was a hard worker who often worked odd jobs for his sister to make money.
Included in the personnel file released on Wednesday was audio of a 911 call from Lewis’ mother, Rebecca Duran, shortly after the fatal shooting.
“I need to try and figure out if the police called my son’s girlfriend—that he may have been shot by the police. I don’t know if he’s dead or not,” Duran says on the call.
She also asks the dispatcher—at times barely getting words out between sobs—for information about whether there had been a police-involved shooting on the Westside of Columbus. She also is heard asking what hospital he might be at.
“Please because what hospital would they normally take someone? Like he might be dead and I need to know.”
“We’ll have someone call you as soon as we can OK?” promised the dispatcher.
Crowder’s 911 call was also included in the documents obtained by The Daily Beast—but Crowder said that Columbus PD never called her back. (A police spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment about her claim.)
“We actually didn’t even know that he had passed away,” she said. “We found out from the news. They didn’t even tell us.”
After this story was published, a police spokesperson told The Daily Beast that “the Bureau of Criminal Investigation made the official next of kin notification at around 11 that morning.”
“The Columbus Division of Police did not release his name to the media until late that afternoon in a press release. We as a practice do not release names until we know the next of kin notifications have been made,” the spokesperson aded.
Crowder recalled that two years to the date before her brother died, she had marched in a Black Lives Matter Protest bearing a sign that said “it could be my brother.”
“It’s just like nothing changed at all.”
