December 17, 2025 • 48 mins
In this episode of the Bear Grease podcast, Oklahoma game warden Jared Cramer recounts the harrowing events surrounding a lethal use-of-force incident that erupted from what began as a routine fishing-license check. In his conversation with host Clay Newcomb, Cramer walks through the extraordinary circumstances in which a simple body of water became the unlikely “means” for attempted murder.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
The last episode of bear Grease was on the drowning
of Oklahoma Wildlife Officer Melvin Bucky Garrison in nineteen seventy one.
The story that we're going to tell today goes separated
by forty four years, is eerily connected. It's the story
about the use of lethal force and the legal precedence
(00:25):
of water as a means of potential murder. I really
doubt that you're going to want to miss this one.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
And he actually started shaking me under the water like
he was trying to drown me, like you would see
somebody on TV shaking somebody under the water. And he's
doing that, and I'm laying there and in my mind,
I'm it's slow. I mean, everything went real slow. And
(00:54):
I was sitting there thinking, Okay, I know where I'm at,
I know what I got to do.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
My name is Clay Knukem, and this is the Bear
Grease podcast, where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search
for insight and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the
story of Americans who live their lives close to the land.
Presented by FHF Gear, American made purpose built hunting and
(01:31):
fishing gear as designed to be as rugged as the
place as we explore, I'd like to introduce you to
Oklahoma Wildlife Officer Jared Kramer. I'd say Jared is in
his forties. He has a very serious demeanor. He's kind
(01:54):
of fit and wiry, and I could immediately tell he
takes his job extremely serious. I want to jump right
in and learn about his history and law enforcement. Meet
Officer Jared Kramer.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Okay, Yeah, So actually started in conservation right out of college.
Two thousand and five. I went to work for the
Missouri Department of Conservation, and it's actually just an hourly
temporary job doing some stream surveying, backpack shocking streams and
doing a little study there in northern Missouri. And that
(02:31):
turned into me staying and getting on as an hourly
temporary employee with the wildlife guys. Worked all winter with them,
and then I got a full time job with them
on a conservation area as a wildlife technician. And all
the while I'm trying to get on as an Oklahoma
game warden, and I got that in two thousand and seven,
(02:58):
and this Adair County was my first assignment and I've
been here ever since.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
M Why do you want to get into wild life law.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
You know, I don't really have a memory of the why.
It just seems like that was always it. I don't
I don't recall like deciding one day that's what I
want to do. But you know, since I was probably
in junior high, I knew that, you know, that's something
I probably wanted to do. My brother is actually a
(03:31):
game warden in Oklahoma, and he hired on five years
before I did, And that's that basically solidified that that's
what I wanted to do. Not only because I looked
up to my brother and you know, wanted to work
with him and enjoyed, you know that, but I got
(03:53):
an inside scoop on the job, you know, and so
I really got to learn all ins and outs of
actually being an Oklahoma game warden because he was doing it.
And so then it's like, yeah, that's what I want
to do.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Officer Kramer was involved in a life changing altercation in
twenty fifteen. He knows what I'm here to talk to
him about. He's often been asked to share the story
with other wildlife officers and trainings and with new cadets.
His story shows a very extreme situation and one that
you wouldn't think a wildlife officer would find himself in.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
So it's twenty fifteen in April's Sunday morning, and I'm
going I'm going to go to work for a little
bit mid morning, and my plan was was to go
make a circle, probably check some fishing licenses. I actually
had a place on a wildlife management area where some
(04:57):
people have been illegally driving four wheelers or pick ups
off road, and I was going to go check on that.
And I was hoping to be home early in the afternoon,
going to have a short Sunday as what I had planned.
So this spot that I'm going to go check on
the wildlife management area's not far from my house, so
I hadn't been gone long. And I'm over there and
(05:19):
I hear my partner on the county radio to the dispatcher.
He's calling in a couple of individuals that are to
run their status of their driver's licenses and to check
them if they have any outstanding warrants. And so I
hear this, and he I believe, he tells the dispatcher
(05:42):
where he's at, and it was a place called Sanders
Flat and I'm just right down the road from there. Well,
within a minute they come back and say they've got
two of these individuals have outstanding warrants out of Arkansas,
and one of them's fell any warrant. So I know
this guy's going to go to jail. So I start
(06:05):
heading that way, and I raised.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Is a guy.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Forgive me for interrupted, this is a guy that he
has got here checking.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Out saw back up. So there was a little pond,
little farm pond that it's on private property, but it's
commonly being used by the public for fishing. Pretty small pond,
and so he just went there to check see if
anybody's there fishing that morning, and these people are there,
so he's checked their fishing licenses, now having Oklahoma fishing licenses.
(06:33):
So this contact progresses into him checking them for the warrants.
So the county comes back and tells him, yes, this
this one individual's got the felony warrant. So I immediately know, okay,
I'm going to his location, back him up, helping whatever.
So I radio to him and tell him, hey, I'm
(06:55):
just down the road. I'll be there in a minute.
So I'll pull up there. He's parked kind of up
on this hill above the pawn The ponds one hundred
and fifty yards away or so from where he's parked,
and he's got this woman at his truck, and I
already know that she has warrants as well, and he's
(07:18):
there with her. So I pull up and I immediately
am looking down at this pond these other two guys,
knowing one of those guys has this warrant and he's
with this girl. So I'm just my thought process is
I got to go down here to this guy and
(07:39):
take care of this, whether that's hook him up right
now or whatever. I'm gonna get over there. So I
confirm with that it's, you know, this one particular guy,
whatever he was wearing. But I already knew that because
when I pulled up, even from one hundred and fifty yards,
I could see the look on his face in his
body language that he was the guy. He knew when
(08:02):
he's seen me pull up, everything about him changed, and
I knew that's that's the guys.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
So what did what did you see? What did he do?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
I just just could see it. I don't know, I
couldn't describe it, but it was it was written all
over him in his body language that I could tell
he was the guy that was going to have this warrant.
Most likely it was probably him looking at me directly
and watched me pull up there, and I, you know,
so I pull off and have to drive around down
(08:35):
the county road and come back around the other side
to get to where these these guys are parked on
the other side of this pond. I was looking across
the pond from him. They've got a truck parked down
there by the pond. And I get out. This other
guy is a middle aged man. I recognized him from
(08:58):
another contact, and this to be a little side story
that can go into this. So this guy, I took
him to jail a year or two prior. He had
an outstanding warrant. And I'm taking this gentleman to jail
or we're making the drive and he's telling me that
(09:21):
this is a big mistake, which I've heard, you know,
it's always well, I paid it, but you know they
lost the whatever. You know. Well, he's telling me that
he's a victim of identity theft and that somebody stole
his identity and that person got arrested using his identity
(09:44):
and then they bailed out of jail. Didn't never come
back after they posted bond never showed back up to court.
So now he's on the hook because it was his identity.
Of course, I'm you know what I'm thinking, Okay, Well,
he keeps telling me about it, and I start to
believe in you know, I'm thinking, you know, this sounds legitimate.
(10:07):
He's pretty adamant about it. And I told him, I said, well,
I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll look into it,
so take him to jail, book him in which I
explained to him. He knew, like he it's not like
I can't take you to jail now, but we'll look
into it. So sure enough, the following week, because that
was the weekend, I followed up and I ended up
(10:30):
finding these, you know, the photos from the booking of
this guy. It's not him, and so he's telling.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Me the truth.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
And so I wrote up a deal and gave it
to the district attorneys and you know, told him what
i'd found, what i'd discovered, and got this guy off
and got his charges dropped and all that deal because
he truly was a victim of identity theft. Anyway, So
now I'm on I'm at the pond, and there he
is and he's kind of excited to see me, you know,
(11:01):
he you know.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
He knows you've done yeah, he or he.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Knows that this deal all worked out and and he
got off those charges because of that deal, and he
knew that I had took care of it, yeah, or
figured it out and got it took care of So anyway,
he shows me his fishing license because Cody hadn't checked
him yet. I guess maybe he was at a different
(11:24):
part of the pond or something whatever. So he shows
me his fishing license. And this other guy's standing at
the pickup truck and he's standing there at the bed
with his hands his arms rested up on the bedrail,
and I have he's cross, you know, looking across the
bed of the pickup front from me. So I have
to look walk around to the back of him, and
(11:46):
I do. And I decided that I'm just going to
handcuff this guy, you know, and get him into custody.
And so I told him and said, hey, you know,
whatever I said. I don't remember if I told him
you've got warrants for your rest or whatever, but I
instructed him to put his hands behind his back and
(12:07):
go through that motion. And as he's doing that, I'm
reaching for my handcuffs at the same time, and he
puts his hands behind his back, and then he bolts
and he runs and he takes off to the right.
The pawn's right behind us, twenty yards or so, the
edge of it, and so he bolts to the right
(12:30):
and just takes off sprinting, and I presume and you know,
probably in twenty yards, I've tackled Dean, and so now
the fight's on where he's not complying. You know, I've
tackled him, but he's not going to lay there and
let me cuffing. You know, he's scrambling, trying to get up.
(12:50):
And he's quite a bit bigger than me. He's probably
got forty pounds on me, and you know, taller, a
little bit taller than me too. He's pretty stout guy.
And so it's all I can handle, not handling him.
Can't keep him on the ground. He gets up, well,
instead of disengaging and trying to run again, now he's
(13:12):
attacking me, and so he's trying to wrestle me to
the ground. And so now I've went into defense and
trying to keep my feet and so this this wrestling
match of him trying to drag me to the grounds
going on, and I'm merely just trying to stay on
my feet at this point. And you know, in my mind,
(13:33):
I'm thinking, Okay, I got to keep my feet, but
I got to get back control of this guy because
right now he's just I'm just defending and I've got
to get back on offense and get him under control.
And this is going on, and I mean it's it's
mere seconds, but it really felt like it's minutes of
fighting going on. And you know, he's got me by
(13:56):
the collar, trying to drag me down, trying to sling
me to the ground, whatever he can do. But I'm
maintaining throwing punching. Now he hasn't thrown any punches. He's
just grappling you, just trying to get me, trying to
drag me physically, drag me down, is what he's trying
to do. And I'm maintaining my feet and keeping that
from happening. But I'm thinking in my head, where's this
(14:18):
other guy at? And I'd start thinking, I gotta check
this other guy because I may be fixing to get
smoked in the back of the head or something. And
I managed to get to a point to where I
could get a look, and I see the guy standing
where he was standing when I left him, and he's
(14:39):
just standing there looking, you know, not doing anything, which
at the time for me, I thought, that's fine, that's great,
just stand there. You know, he's not not trying to
help me, but he's not doing anything to try to
hurt me either. This wrestling continues, and eventually this guy
(15:02):
just lunges and just in a perfect form, tackle shoulder
in my in my gut and wraps me up and
we just launch into the pond and I'm on my
back and so he's you know, I'm under the water
now and on my back and he's on top of me,
(15:24):
and he he's you know, in full mount, you know,
he's I assume, of course I can't see, but I
assume his knees are laid over me right of like
where my gun belt would be in my gun in
(15:45):
my side arm, because I can't get to it. I'm trying,
you know, and I can't. Well, he's got me. Of course.
My first instinct was to get up, but I can't
get up because he's on me. But he also grabs
a hold of me like by the collar or the
shirt my chest, and he pushes me down and he
actually started shaking me under the water like he was
(16:06):
trying to, you know, drown me, like you would see
somebody on TV shaking somebody under the water. And he's
doing that and I'm laying there and in my mind,
I'm it's slow. I mean, everything went real slow. And
I was sitting there thinking, Okay, I know where I'm at,
(16:27):
and I know what I know what I got to do,
and I don't have any recollection of how but my
next my next thought is, or my next memory is
(16:51):
he's off of me, and I'm standing up, and I'm
telling myself, get up and get your gun, Get up
and get your gun. Get up and get your gun.
And so I come up out of the water and
I'm getting my gun and he had bolted, well, I
say bolted. He was off to my left, and uh
(17:15):
I had I think I had hollered at him. But
he's coming at me like he was over here on
my left as what I was, what I remember, And
he's coming at me, and I believe I had hollered stop,
you know, but he's coming through the water. We're still
in he's still in the water. I'm still in the water,
(17:37):
but the water is like knee deep, and he's coming
at me, and it's like somebody trying to run or
hurry through the water. He's really side to side and
working at trying to get to me quick. And I have,
you know, drawn my gun, and I've got the gun
cleared the holster about the time he's right at me,
and I shoot him twice, and in my mind I
(18:02):
had well, I'll just say I shot him twice. And
he he turns to his right and kind of puts
his his hands up and says, I give up as
he falls into the water, face down, And so I
(18:27):
command him, put your hands behind your back, you know,
and he does. He hears me, and he complies, puts
his hands behind his back. I holster my gun and
I cuff him, and I roll him over on his
back and I drag him out of the water onto
the bank, and that, you know, from there, I was
(18:47):
trying to administer a first aid. I had stood up,
actually back up, I had stood up, and I look
up and my partner, he's driving the truck. I see
him pull up. He is just now pulled up to
the scene. This whole time, he has no idea that
this is going on, because about the time that I
(19:10):
got over there, he got that gal loaded up in
the truck and they started driving over there, and all
that took place. And I think they had the time
frame from radio traffic that it was like a minute
had took place from him getting in his truck and
driving over there and discovering what had just took place.
(19:31):
And so I stand up from this pond and see him,
and he gets out, and I holler at him to
throw me as first aid kit because we all have
a you know, a kit in our truck, and he does.
And anyway, I try to give this guy some some
(19:53):
aid to his gunshot wounds. I try to find them,
but I can't find them. Took a shirt put pulled
his shirt up and was trying to find these these wounds.
I knew I should I shot him twice, but I
can't find these gunshot wounds. And and I remember thinking,
what in the heck, because in my mind I knew
(20:13):
exactly where they were at when I pressed the trigger,
they weren't there. And anyway, he he didn't make it, unfortunately,
and we we radioed for help and you know, Cody
(20:34):
was able to secure the other guy that was there,
and we ended up having to you know, give directions
to the county where we were at and how how
to get there, you know, and they they showed up
and and took over the scene and all that. So
you know, from there, you've got, uh, this one guy
(20:55):
that sat there and watched the whole thing, and and
I remember thinking, you know, that guy, he's going to
have to tell this story. And I remember wondering what
story was he going to tell?
Speaker 1 (21:08):
You know, And but this is the guy that you've helped,
but this is also his obviously a buddy, a friend
of his or whatever.
Speaker 4 (21:17):
You know.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Fast forward to me having to sit down with investigators
and and or the investigator for the Ocloma State Guirreau
of Investigation and and tell my story.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
You know, can I can? I ask you?
Speaker 1 (21:46):
I don't want to disrupt your flow, but what's what's
going through your mind when you know this guy is
not going to live?
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Are you?
Speaker 1 (21:55):
I mean like kind of just thinking what you know
you're now up against in terms of.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah, so this this time, you know, this was twenty fifteen,
there was a lot going on with law enforcement there
was riots, and and you know, there had been some
incidents that were you know, in the news that from
people that were unarmed that got shot by law enforcement officers,
(22:22):
and that those sort of things were going on, and
that actually crossed my mind, you know, not during the event,
but right after it happened. I'm now thinking, you know,
here we are with all this stuff going on, and
law enforcement's getting you know, hammered in the media and
getting portrayed to be the bad guys constantly, and here
(22:45):
this guy is. He ain't armed, you know, And I
thought about that while I was standing there. And this
guy's not made it, you know, he's passed away.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Less than a year earlier, on August ninth, twenty fourteen,
eighteen year old unarmed Michael Brown was killed by police
in Ferguson, Missouri, which created a national uproar in riots
in the streets. When officers in twenty fifteen, this very
year that all this took place with Officer Kramer, these
(23:17):
officers in Ferguson were found justified in the use of
deadly force. They were essentially acquitted. It's hard to forget
the tension in the air since that time, as law
enforcement has been under intense scrutiny and has had to
continue to do their job upholding the law. These were
(23:38):
incredibly intense times and Officer Kramer has found himself right
in the middle of it. What a nightmare. And secondly,
you remember the woman that his partner had arrested that
was connected with this crew. Well, his partner and this
woman were completely out of view of the fight. They
(23:58):
never saw a thing. But later in court she claimed
that she had witnessed the fight and told a completely
different story than Officer Kramer and this other guy that
was standing right there beside him.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
My lawyer and I show up to give a you know,
the formal statement to the investigators. They've already interviewed these
other witnesses and whatever, and they're waiting to do mine.
And we sat down and do it. And so I
tell that story just like I told it to you,
(24:34):
and probably close to word for word. And after it
was done, the investigator asked me if I wanted to
see what the eyewitnesses story was. What he said, okay,
So they handed me the statement and I read it,
(24:55):
and it was almost word for word or what I said,
and the only the only thing that was there might
have been a couple of little things different because there
always will be, but it was, I mean, it was
the exact story. The main difference for me, and it
was a piece of the puzzle that I've never been
able to get back myself was he stated that I
(25:16):
kicked this guy off of me, and that the guy
landed on his butt in the water and then got up.
But I have no recollection if that's what really happened
or not. I just know that the guy's off of me,
you know, and I got to get up.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Well. Wouldn't that make sense though, I mean, because because
it's it's like you're under water and then all of
a sudden he's off of you. If he was trying
to leave you, feels like he would have kept going.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, but he didn't. He re engaged again for the
second time, you know, and decided he wanted to, I guess,
play this one one more time. But in my mind
I had to, you know, I had to make that
decision of I'm not going to fight this guy in
the water again. You know, that's not happening when I'm
not going back down there.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
I'm not going back down there. I think that phrase
paints a clear picture of the direness of the situation
for Officer Kramer. Sometimes you just wonder what in the
world someone is thinking. Who's fighting a law enforcement officer
who has the legal right to protect themselves with deadly force.
Do people know this? Are they just rolling the dice?
(26:29):
Are they crazy? Are they high? Do they care if
they live or die? It's hard to know, but it
happens every single day. This logic makes it easy to think, well,
this criminal got what he deserved and what he asked for.
But I can't help think of what a sad state
of life, what dire straits a person would have to
(26:52):
be in to act this way. I cannot understand it
or reconcile it. Fighting a law enforcement officer is like
fist fighting a black mamba. You're probably going to get struck.
But what's gonna now happen for Officer Kramer.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Yeah, and another kid bit there about the that witness.
He did say at some point he told the truth
because he believed I was a good guy, because I
had helped him out and made that right for him,
and he wasn't gonna lie.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Wow, Yeah, that's man, that's when when you told that
part of the story. I was like God was looking
out for you mean, he really was, because that could
have gone completely the other direction, you know, I mean,
just to have a witness there that you had just
randomly done a good thing for.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
I mean, what are the chances of that?
Speaker 4 (27:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Yeah, because who knows how it would have turned out
if that guy wasn't present that day and now it's
you know, you got my story and and get this
other so called witness and her story. It would have
been a completely different deal. I mean it would have.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Yeah, if that guy had corroborated the same false story
the woman told, this story could have turned out completely different.
But what happens now the thing is just starting for
Officer Kramer. Actually this was just the start of years
of lack of resolution.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Wow. But that's that's the short, not really the short,
but that's the gist of what happened there on the
on the scene. And you know, from there there was
of course the criminal side of it, which you know,
every officer that is involved in such is going to
be there's going to be a criminal investigation. And of
(28:55):
course that that was determined to justify, you know, I
was justified in my actions, So there was no criminal
ramifications or whatever coming there. But that following year, I
think it was about right out a year after the incident,
the family of the suspect they filed the federal lawsuit.
(29:18):
So that was basically accusing me of violating Fourth Amendment right,
you know, unlawful search and seizure, taking this guy's life.
And that played out for years, several years really yeah,
just a lot of it was I think just the
slow process of the federal court system. But the short
(29:39):
version of that was it was it was deemed by
the judge, federal judge that it would go to a
trial and that I was being represented by the okahom
Attorney General's office, and they filed an appeal with the
tenth Circuit District Court out of Denver, and they decided
(30:00):
otherwise that it would be dismissed. So that was the
end of that.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
But when all that was going on was that I
was that stressful.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
Oh yeah, that's that's the worst part, you know, I mean,
I say it was the worst part. It was because
of the duration how long that took.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
You know, can you walk me through your training in
a situation like that, Like, I know, any level of
law enforcement training these days I mean there is a
prescribed action basically for any category of situation like you're
I know, there's there's probably there's gray areas that they're
(30:41):
they're just naturally it's going to be. But like there's
certain just laws that if this happens, I do this,
and I mean that's just part of your job.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
Yeah, So the you know, we're being trained and have
to abide by what we call the use of force
continuum laws governing the use of deadly force, which you
know basically say that you know, if somebody is trying
to do me physical harm, trying to kill me, or
(31:15):
serious bodily injury, that elevates to the justification of the
use of deadly force to prevent that from happening. You know,
it doesn't have to be on me, It can be
on any citizen that they're you know that I am
justified to use that level of force to prevent somebody
from harming you in that manner, taking your life, or
(31:37):
doing serious bodily injury. So that's the first and foremost
is you know, was the person capable of inflicting that injury,
did they have the intent to do it, and did
they have the opportunity to complete it, and all three
(31:58):
of those things have to be present in order for
it to be justified for me to make that decision
to use that deadly force. You know, they could have
the intent and the means to do it, but it
may not have the opportunity to actually do it, and
so it doesn't it won't work. I would be unjustified,
(32:19):
you know. And in this case, you know, the guy
his means was his physical ability to hold me under
the water and you know, subdue me and make that attempt.
And it's clear to me that he had that ability there.
He obviously showed the intent and the opportunity was there
(32:43):
and he seized it. So he met all that criteria,
which is in my mind just my training. Not thinking
about that. I'm not checking those boxes. They're just that's
just trained in me. But I will say that at
the those split seconds of time where I'm seeing what's
(33:04):
happening and I'm I've got my gun drawn, there was
a thought process of is is this good? You know,
I'm asking my I'm running that down. Is this good? Right?
And that was the only question I asked myself, and I.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Had to make that decision.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
I guess the water is what if you're uncoverable with
this question, we don't have to put this on there.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
You probably wouldn't have shot him if it hadn't been
for the.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
Water, though, right, that was his means.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
I mean, because like if you were just wrestling on
the ground with a guy that was just trying to
get you down.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yeah, he never would have. He would have had to
have done something something.
Speaker 1 (33:45):
Being reached for your gun or if he had had
a weapon.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
Right, that's totally different. The water is what the means were.
That's the means of him having the ability to take
my life. Was the water that was his weapon. Yeah,
so that's that's exactly right. If it wasn't for that,
it'd have been just to fight on the ground, you know,
and I'd have been trying to do it.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
You wouldn't have been justified, right and deadly force.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
Just if he would have had to have done something else.
You know, he'd had to have been picking up a
rock and trying to beat me in the head with it,
or you know, a stick or something. He would have
had to have some other kind of weapon to to
reach that threshold.
Speaker 3 (34:25):
Yeah, yeah, that makes total sense.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
But we're still standing in the water. You know, and
he's re engaging to attack me again while we're still
in the water, and so that that's what justified that.
Speaker 3 (34:38):
Godly, that's wild man.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
You know, probably never in a thousand lifetimes of a
wildlife officer did something.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Like that happen.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
Is that?
Speaker 3 (34:46):
Would you say? That's probably accurate?
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Yeah, I don't know of another, you know, incident like that. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
Similar to justify the use of lethal force, the perpetrator
has to have three things, the intent, the means, and
the opportunity. And in this case, the most unusual and
(35:16):
unprecedented thing was the means to kill being water. The
water was equivalent to a gun or a knife, or
a rock or a club. And if you've ever almost drowned,
I think you'll understand that. It goes without saying that
any time a human life is taken, it's extremely serious.
And just because someone is a convicted felon on the run,
(35:38):
it doesn't lessen their value as a human and a
fellow partaker of the breath of life. It is wild
that this took place less than seventy miles away from
where Bucky Garrison drowned in nineteen seventy one. Here's Officer
Kramer with a very interesting detail about the psychology of
these types of situations.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
And I will backtrack to say to fill in a
spot that I left open there about his gunshot wounds.
And I don't remember the terminology of what it is,
but the I guess it's pretty common that in that situation,
In those situations, that your brain is not processing in
(36:24):
real time, and so my brain is seeing or telling
me what I think were what I know, and that
this guy was squared up to me, and because I
believed that I knew where I had hit him, but
the reality was was he had turned to his let
(36:48):
to his right when I had shot, but I didn't
see that. My brain didn't process that it was behind.
So I'm pressing the trigger, but my brain is still
behind on where he's located. And I guess that's pretty
common for somebody to get shot in the back, but
that's not what the officer intended because in their mind
(37:11):
they were still facing them, but they had turned, and this.
Speaker 3 (37:14):
Was exactly what happened.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
He's actually turned before those shots went off, and so
he was hit in the side with the ribs and
I'm looking for him on the front of his torso
and can't see him because in my brain I thought
that I know exactly where they're at, but they weren't.
They were around the side because he had turned to
move away, tried to get away from me, you know,
(37:36):
when he realized what was fixing to happen, you know.
And I didn't never knew that until I was told,
you know, this is where he was hit. And that
was a complete shock to me because I would have
bet the farm and I knew exactly where they went.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
The razor edge of time is faster than the human
brain can compute such a precarious thing. To be a
law enforcement officer, Why couldn't this guy have just run
away when Officer Kramer's kicked him off?
Speaker 2 (38:08):
He didn't.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
He came right back. I've got another question, did that
affect your career? I mean, did it make you Did
you think, man, I maybe ought to get out of
this business or or did it.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
You know, I don't, I don't think i've I didn't
really ever think about that about getting out, you know.
But it's definitely changed. I mean, I'll never be the
same person. And uh, it's it's uh, it has created
uh an opportunity for the good where we have some
(38:46):
training now because up to up to that point, we
hadn't had in a incident game warding involved shooting incidents.
Sense I don't remember. I think it was in the
nineties retired officer now, but had gotten in it, had
(39:08):
shot a guy and the rumors of that, how that
played out with the agency and everything, it wasn't good.
It just was kind of like a disaster for the
officer involved. And now, you know, we know as law
(39:30):
enforcement agencies around the country, this is not uncommon to
have these incidents, so they know more about mental health
and how things should play out, what you do and
how you do it. And my agency didn't have any experience.
(39:50):
There wasn't anybody working at our administrative level that was
working at the time when the last one happened, So
there wasn't any new scenario. Yeah, it was completely new.
Speaker 3 (40:01):
Yeah, and.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Thankfully those that were in that those positions, you know,
they handled it correctly. And the fact that they didn't
do anything if they were unsure about what they were doing,
and that's just and I'm saying that in regards to
to towards me, But after this took place, I decided,
(40:32):
you know, hey, our agency needs to be prepared how
do we handle this? And so now we have some
some good training on how do you respond, Like if
you're an officer that's out working and you get the
call that there's been an officer involved shooting, how how
do you respond to that? What do you do? What
(40:53):
do you need to do when you get there, you know,
And and then the other side of the for the agency,
like the supervisors of that officer, the things that they
should be doing to to help that officer you know,
through this, you know, because there there can be a
(41:15):
lot of struggles, you know, mentally the mental health thing
can go south, you know, and it can be a
bad It can turn out to be a really bad deal.
And and that's for me, that was an that was
something I experienced. Was nothing real negative. Nobody did anything
to me that you know, caused some negative impact. But
(41:37):
your brains is it's a weird deal. I mean, it
does some crazy stuff. And I remember immediately after, you know,
the next day and the next next two couple of days,
there's everybody's trying to call me, you know, and people
are wanting to know what happened, and you know, then
a lot of them are just wanting to you know, hey,
(42:00):
I'm glad you're all right, you know, and they got
that out of the way. Well I figured out that
that's that's all we do, is we we get that
out of the way and we.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
Go on about our lives.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
So what happens is it goes from all these all
this attention and people, you know, saying these good things,
and then it's crickets and you don't hear nothing, and
that starts screwing you know, was kind of screwing with me, like,
you know, what's going on? How come nobody's called you know?
You know, is this bad? You know, because there's there's
(42:33):
an investigation going on. Yeah, yeah, you know, am I
being blacklisted or something? And you don't. It's like so
that those kind of things that we're aware of now
that that's going to happen, so we kind of know
how to handle it, how to prevent it from turning
into something that it shouldn't or whatever.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
That's interesting.
Speaker 1 (42:52):
That's probably a similar thing with any kind of traumatic event,
is that you you get a lot of people who
care about you contacting you, and then yeah, it kind of.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
After some period of time, Yeah, it's like nothing.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Yeah, and you you you you know.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
That's interesting. I wouldn't have thought of that.
Speaker 2 (43:11):
Yeah, and your brain, you know, I guess maybe vulnerable
would be a good term you get in you're just
it's like it's very susceptible to manipulation, and you know,
you're you don't you know, you don't know what's what's
right and what's you know, like, is this normal that
(43:31):
they're not calling me? I mean you can't. You're not
processing that, you're not understanding' not grasping. Well, okay, well
this is just everybody has said what they wanted to
say and that's it.
Speaker 1 (43:40):
Now you start thinking the worst. So what can what
could we learn from all this? Like when you tell
the story, I know, to law enforcement officers there's a
(44:01):
lot in terms of just like training and response and stuff.
What do you what value is there too to us
to hear the story?
Speaker 2 (44:12):
You know, it's as a as a game warden. You know,
it's solidifies that you know, we're we're law enforcement officers
out there dealing with the same people that may want
to do us harm, just like any other law enforcement
you know, I think a lot of times.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
We get.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
You know, maybe downplayed on what you know, we're just
a wildlife cop, you know, or not a real cop
you you know whatever, But you know that's yeah, this
deal started out it's a wildlife related thing. But the whole,
the whole reason that happened was because this guy was
a criminal that was wanted, you know, and we're going
to take him to jail. We're going to make him
(44:57):
you know, see the judge. So ah, I guess that
would be one thing that this you know, comes should
come of this situation as people realize, yeah, we're out
there dealing with bad guys.
Speaker 1 (45:13):
You know. I just think about how you see these
videos now of people engaging with law enforcement and like
in a fight or something, and it's just like, you
gotta be crazy. I mean, people should know when you
feel like everybody should know. And obviously people aren't in
their rational mind when they like put their hands on
(45:33):
an officer. But it's like the rule of law that
we have in this country because we all can walk
around the streets and feel safe in most places this
country is because we have law enforcement that has the
right to protect the public but also themselves. And you
lay your hands on a law enforcement officer, you might
(45:55):
be in big trouble. I mean that that blows my
mind when I see, you know, of people that start
thinking straight.
Speaker 2 (46:02):
Well, like in this incident, this guy, he come out,
you know, in testimony from the witnesses that they had
just got done doing math. Well you know, and I
think that was part of why he was wanted, you know,
probably with some drug. I don't remember exactly, but I
believe it was something to do with that. But he
(46:24):
had already told this other this other guy, that he
wasn't going back. He already had that conversation before I
got over there. He made his mind up. It was
about not going back to jail. You know, he's going
to do whatever he needed to do to not go back.
Speaker 3 (46:40):
So he'd already made.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
That decision, yea, And that explains why he was, you know,
re engaging. He realized that I wasn't going to let
him go, wasn't going to let him just run off,
you know, So he knew I believe he knew that
he needed to take care of me.
Speaker 1 (46:57):
In order to go away, to get away, I guess,
you know, the ill saying you'd be surprised at what
people do if they're really desperate. It is eye opening
to go behind the scenes with law enforcement officers, especially
(47:19):
in the most stressful, difficult times of their career. I
can't thank Officer Kramer enough, first of all for his
service and protecting our communities and our wildlife resources, but
secondly his willingness to tell this story anytime human life
has taken It's an incredibly serious situation, and I think
(47:40):
that we can all learn a lot from this. I
cannot thank you enough for listening to Bear Grease Brent's
This Country Life and Lakes Backwoods University. I hope that
everyone has a married Christmas and a wonderful New Year.
And while you're opening up those Christmas presents on December
(48:02):
twenty fifth, remember keep the wild places wild, because that's
where the bears live.
The last episode of bear Grease was on the drowning
of Oklahoma Wildlife Officer Melvin Bucky Garrison in nineteen seventy one.
The story that we're going to tell today goes separated
by forty four years, is eerily connected. It's the story
about the use of lethal force and the legal precedence
(00:25):
of water as a means of potential murder. I really
doubt that you're going to want to miss this one.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
And he actually started shaking me under the water like
he was trying to drown me, like you would see
somebody on TV shaking somebody under the water. And he's
doing that, and I'm laying there and in my mind,
I'm it's slow. I mean, everything went real slow. And
(00:54):
I was sitting there thinking, Okay, I know where I'm at,
I know what I got to do.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
My name is Clay Knukem, and this is the Bear
Grease podcast, where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search
for insight and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the
story of Americans who live their lives close to the land.
Presented by FHF Gear, American made purpose built hunting and
(01:31):
fishing gear as designed to be as rugged as the
place as we explore, I'd like to introduce you to
Oklahoma Wildlife Officer Jared Kramer. I'd say Jared is in
his forties. He has a very serious demeanor. He's kind
(01:54):
of fit and wiry, and I could immediately tell he
takes his job extremely serious. I want to jump right
in and learn about his history and law enforcement. Meet
Officer Jared Kramer.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Okay, Yeah, So actually started in conservation right out of college.
Two thousand and five. I went to work for the
Missouri Department of Conservation, and it's actually just an hourly
temporary job doing some stream surveying, backpack shocking streams and
doing a little study there in northern Missouri. And that
(02:31):
turned into me staying and getting on as an hourly
temporary employee with the wildlife guys. Worked all winter with them,
and then I got a full time job with them
on a conservation area as a wildlife technician. And all
the while I'm trying to get on as an Oklahoma
game warden, and I got that in two thousand and seven,
(02:58):
and this Adair County was my first assignment and I've
been here ever since.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
M Why do you want to get into wild life law.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
You know, I don't really have a memory of the why.
It just seems like that was always it. I don't
I don't recall like deciding one day that's what I
want to do. But you know, since I was probably
in junior high, I knew that, you know, that's something
I probably wanted to do. My brother is actually a
(03:31):
game warden in Oklahoma, and he hired on five years
before I did, And that's that basically solidified that that's
what I wanted to do. Not only because I looked
up to my brother and you know, wanted to work
with him and enjoyed, you know that, but I got
(03:53):
an inside scoop on the job, you know, and so
I really got to learn all ins and outs of
actually being an Oklahoma game warden because he was doing it.
And so then it's like, yeah, that's what I want
to do.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Officer Kramer was involved in a life changing altercation in
twenty fifteen. He knows what I'm here to talk to
him about. He's often been asked to share the story
with other wildlife officers and trainings and with new cadets.
His story shows a very extreme situation and one that
you wouldn't think a wildlife officer would find himself in.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
So it's twenty fifteen in April's Sunday morning, and I'm
going I'm going to go to work for a little
bit mid morning, and my plan was was to go
make a circle, probably check some fishing licenses. I actually
had a place on a wildlife management area where some
(04:57):
people have been illegally driving four wheelers or pick ups
off road, and I was going to go check on that.
And I was hoping to be home early in the afternoon,
going to have a short Sunday as what I had planned.
So this spot that I'm going to go check on
the wildlife management area's not far from my house, so
I hadn't been gone long. And I'm over there and
(05:19):
I hear my partner on the county radio to the dispatcher.
He's calling in a couple of individuals that are to
run their status of their driver's licenses and to check
them if they have any outstanding warrants. And so I
hear this, and he I believe, he tells the dispatcher
(05:42):
where he's at, and it was a place called Sanders
Flat and I'm just right down the road from there. Well,
within a minute they come back and say they've got
two of these individuals have outstanding warrants out of Arkansas,
and one of them's fell any warrant. So I know
this guy's going to go to jail. So I start
(06:05):
heading that way, and I raised.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Is a guy.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Forgive me for interrupted, this is a guy that he
has got here checking.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Out saw back up. So there was a little pond,
little farm pond that it's on private property, but it's
commonly being used by the public for fishing. Pretty small pond,
and so he just went there to check see if
anybody's there fishing that morning, and these people are there,
so he's checked their fishing licenses, now having Oklahoma fishing licenses.
(06:33):
So this contact progresses into him checking them for the warrants.
So the county comes back and tells him, yes, this
this one individual's got the felony warrant. So I immediately know, okay,
I'm going to his location, back him up, helping whatever.
So I radio to him and tell him, hey, I'm
(06:55):
just down the road. I'll be there in a minute.
So I'll pull up there. He's parked kind of up
on this hill above the pawn The ponds one hundred
and fifty yards away or so from where he's parked,
and he's got this woman at his truck, and I
already know that she has warrants as well, and he's
(07:18):
there with her. So I pull up and I immediately
am looking down at this pond these other two guys,
knowing one of those guys has this warrant and he's
with this girl. So I'm just my thought process is
I got to go down here to this guy and
(07:39):
take care of this, whether that's hook him up right
now or whatever. I'm gonna get over there. So I
confirm with that it's, you know, this one particular guy,
whatever he was wearing. But I already knew that because
when I pulled up, even from one hundred and fifty yards,
I could see the look on his face in his
body language that he was the guy. He knew when
(08:02):
he's seen me pull up, everything about him changed, and
I knew that's that's the guys.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
So what did what did you see? What did he do?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
I just just could see it. I don't know, I
couldn't describe it, but it was it was written all
over him in his body language that I could tell
he was the guy that was going to have this warrant.
Most likely it was probably him looking at me directly
and watched me pull up there, and I, you know,
so I pull off and have to drive around down
(08:35):
the county road and come back around the other side
to get to where these these guys are parked on
the other side of this pond. I was looking across
the pond from him. They've got a truck parked down
there by the pond. And I get out. This other
guy is a middle aged man. I recognized him from
(08:58):
another contact, and this to be a little side story
that can go into this. So this guy, I took
him to jail a year or two prior. He had
an outstanding warrant. And I'm taking this gentleman to jail
or we're making the drive and he's telling me that
(09:21):
this is a big mistake, which I've heard, you know,
it's always well, I paid it, but you know they
lost the whatever. You know. Well, he's telling me that
he's a victim of identity theft and that somebody stole
his identity and that person got arrested using his identity
(09:44):
and then they bailed out of jail. Didn't never come
back after they posted bond never showed back up to court.
So now he's on the hook because it was his identity.
Of course, I'm you know what I'm thinking, Okay, Well,
he keeps telling me about it, and I start to
believe in you know, I'm thinking, you know, this sounds legitimate.
(10:07):
He's pretty adamant about it. And I told him, I said, well,
I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll look into it,
so take him to jail, book him in which I
explained to him. He knew, like he it's not like
I can't take you to jail now, but we'll look
into it. So sure enough, the following week, because that
was the weekend, I followed up and I ended up
(10:30):
finding these, you know, the photos from the booking of
this guy. It's not him, and so he's telling.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Me the truth.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
And so I wrote up a deal and gave it
to the district attorneys and you know, told him what
i'd found, what i'd discovered, and got this guy off
and got his charges dropped and all that deal because
he truly was a victim of identity theft. Anyway, So
now I'm on I'm at the pond, and there he
is and he's kind of excited to see me, you know,
(11:01):
he you know.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
He knows you've done yeah, he or he.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Knows that this deal all worked out and and he
got off those charges because of that deal, and he
knew that I had took care of it, yeah, or
figured it out and got it took care of So anyway,
he shows me his fishing license because Cody hadn't checked
him yet. I guess maybe he was at a different
(11:24):
part of the pond or something whatever. So he shows
me his fishing license. And this other guy's standing at
the pickup truck and he's standing there at the bed
with his hands his arms rested up on the bedrail,
and I have he's cross, you know, looking across the
bed of the pickup front from me. So I have
to look walk around to the back of him, and
(11:46):
I do. And I decided that I'm just going to
handcuff this guy, you know, and get him into custody.
And so I told him and said, hey, you know,
whatever I said. I don't remember if I told him
you've got warrants for your rest or whatever, but I
instructed him to put his hands behind his back and
(12:07):
go through that motion. And as he's doing that, I'm
reaching for my handcuffs at the same time, and he
puts his hands behind his back, and then he bolts
and he runs and he takes off to the right.
The pawn's right behind us, twenty yards or so, the
edge of it, and so he bolts to the right
(12:30):
and just takes off sprinting, and I presume and you know,
probably in twenty yards, I've tackled Dean, and so now
the fight's on where he's not complying. You know, I've
tackled him, but he's not going to lay there and
let me cuffing. You know, he's scrambling, trying to get up.
(12:50):
And he's quite a bit bigger than me. He's probably
got forty pounds on me, and you know, taller, a
little bit taller than me too. He's pretty stout guy.
And so it's all I can handle, not handling him.
Can't keep him on the ground. He gets up, well,
instead of disengaging and trying to run again, now he's
(13:12):
attacking me, and so he's trying to wrestle me to
the ground. And so now I've went into defense and
trying to keep my feet and so this this wrestling
match of him trying to drag me to the grounds
going on, and I'm merely just trying to stay on
my feet at this point. And you know, in my mind,
(13:33):
I'm thinking, Okay, I got to keep my feet, but
I got to get back control of this guy because
right now he's just I'm just defending and I've got
to get back on offense and get him under control.
And this is going on, and I mean it's it's
mere seconds, but it really felt like it's minutes of
fighting going on. And you know, he's got me by
(13:56):
the collar, trying to drag me down, trying to sling
me to the ground, whatever he can do. But I'm
maintaining throwing punching. Now he hasn't thrown any punches. He's
just grappling you, just trying to get me, trying to
drag me physically, drag me down, is what he's trying
to do. And I'm maintaining my feet and keeping that
from happening. But I'm thinking in my head, where's this
(14:18):
other guy at? And I'd start thinking, I gotta check
this other guy because I may be fixing to get
smoked in the back of the head or something. And
I managed to get to a point to where I
could get a look, and I see the guy standing
where he was standing when I left him, and he's
(14:39):
just standing there looking, you know, not doing anything, which
at the time for me, I thought, that's fine, that's great,
just stand there. You know, he's not not trying to
help me, but he's not doing anything to try to
hurt me either. This wrestling continues, and eventually this guy
(15:02):
just lunges and just in a perfect form, tackle shoulder
in my in my gut and wraps me up and
we just launch into the pond and I'm on my
back and so he's you know, I'm under the water
now and on my back and he's on top of me,
(15:24):
and he he's you know, in full mount, you know,
he's I assume, of course I can't see, but I
assume his knees are laid over me right of like
where my gun belt would be in my gun in
(15:45):
my side arm, because I can't get to it. I'm trying,
you know, and I can't. Well, he's got me. Of course.
My first instinct was to get up, but I can't
get up because he's on me. But he also grabs
a hold of me like by the collar or the
shirt my chest, and he pushes me down and he
actually started shaking me under the water like he was
(16:06):
trying to, you know, drown me, like you would see
somebody on TV shaking somebody under the water. And he's
doing that and I'm laying there and in my mind,
I'm it's slow. I mean, everything went real slow. And
I was sitting there thinking, Okay, I know where I'm at,
(16:27):
and I know what I know what I got to do,
and I don't have any recollection of how but my
next my next thought is, or my next memory is
(16:51):
he's off of me, and I'm standing up, and I'm
telling myself, get up and get your gun, Get up
and get your gun. Get up and get your gun.
And so I come up out of the water and
I'm getting my gun and he had bolted, well, I
say bolted. He was off to my left, and uh
(17:15):
I had I think I had hollered at him. But
he's coming at me like he was over here on
my left as what I was, what I remember, And
he's coming at me, and I believe I had hollered stop,
you know, but he's coming through the water. We're still
in he's still in the water. I'm still in the water,
(17:37):
but the water is like knee deep, and he's coming
at me, and it's like somebody trying to run or
hurry through the water. He's really side to side and
working at trying to get to me quick. And I have,
you know, drawn my gun, and I've got the gun
cleared the holster about the time he's right at me,
and I shoot him twice, and in my mind I
(18:02):
had well, I'll just say I shot him twice. And
he he turns to his right and kind of puts
his his hands up and says, I give up as
he falls into the water, face down, And so I
(18:27):
command him, put your hands behind your back, you know,
and he does. He hears me, and he complies, puts
his hands behind his back. I holster my gun and
I cuff him, and I roll him over on his
back and I drag him out of the water onto
the bank, and that, you know, from there, I was
(18:47):
trying to administer a first aid. I had stood up,
actually back up, I had stood up, and I look
up and my partner, he's driving the truck. I see
him pull up. He is just now pulled up to
the scene. This whole time, he has no idea that
this is going on, because about the time that I
(19:10):
got over there, he got that gal loaded up in
the truck and they started driving over there, and all
that took place. And I think they had the time
frame from radio traffic that it was like a minute
had took place from him getting in his truck and
driving over there and discovering what had just took place.
(19:31):
And so I stand up from this pond and see him,
and he gets out, and I holler at him to
throw me as first aid kit because we all have
a you know, a kit in our truck, and he does.
And anyway, I try to give this guy some some
(19:53):
aid to his gunshot wounds. I try to find them,
but I can't find them. Took a shirt put pulled
his shirt up and was trying to find these these wounds.
I knew I should I shot him twice, but I
can't find these gunshot wounds. And and I remember thinking,
what in the heck, because in my mind I knew
(20:13):
exactly where they were at when I pressed the trigger,
they weren't there. And anyway, he he didn't make it, unfortunately,
and we we radioed for help and you know, Cody
(20:34):
was able to secure the other guy that was there,
and we ended up having to you know, give directions
to the county where we were at and how how
to get there, you know, and they they showed up
and and took over the scene and all that. So
you know, from there, you've got, uh, this one guy
(20:55):
that sat there and watched the whole thing, and and
I remember thinking, you know, that guy, he's going to
have to tell this story. And I remember wondering what
story was he going to tell?
Speaker 1 (21:08):
You know, And but this is the guy that you've helped,
but this is also his obviously a buddy, a friend
of his or whatever.
Speaker 4 (21:17):
You know.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Fast forward to me having to sit down with investigators
and and or the investigator for the Ocloma State Guirreau
of Investigation and and tell my story.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
You know, can I can? I ask you?
Speaker 1 (21:46):
I don't want to disrupt your flow, but what's what's
going through your mind when you know this guy is
not going to live?
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Are you?
Speaker 1 (21:55):
I mean like kind of just thinking what you know
you're now up against in terms of.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah, so this this time, you know, this was twenty fifteen,
there was a lot going on with law enforcement there
was riots, and and you know, there had been some
incidents that were you know, in the news that from
people that were unarmed that got shot by law enforcement officers,
(22:22):
and that those sort of things were going on, and
that actually crossed my mind, you know, not during the event,
but right after it happened. I'm now thinking, you know,
here we are with all this stuff going on, and
law enforcement's getting you know, hammered in the media and
getting portrayed to be the bad guys constantly, and here
(22:45):
this guy is. He ain't armed, you know, And I
thought about that while I was standing there. And this
guy's not made it, you know, he's passed away.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Less than a year earlier, on August ninth, twenty fourteen,
eighteen year old unarmed Michael Brown was killed by police
in Ferguson, Missouri, which created a national uproar in riots
in the streets. When officers in twenty fifteen, this very
year that all this took place with Officer Kramer, these
(23:17):
officers in Ferguson were found justified in the use of
deadly force. They were essentially acquitted. It's hard to forget
the tension in the air since that time, as law
enforcement has been under intense scrutiny and has had to
continue to do their job upholding the law. These were
(23:38):
incredibly intense times and Officer Kramer has found himself right
in the middle of it. What a nightmare. And secondly,
you remember the woman that his partner had arrested that
was connected with this crew. Well, his partner and this
woman were completely out of view of the fight. They
(23:58):
never saw a thing. But later in court she claimed
that she had witnessed the fight and told a completely
different story than Officer Kramer and this other guy that
was standing right there beside him.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
My lawyer and I show up to give a you know,
the formal statement to the investigators. They've already interviewed these
other witnesses and whatever, and they're waiting to do mine.
And we sat down and do it. And so I
tell that story just like I told it to you,
(24:34):
and probably close to word for word. And after it
was done, the investigator asked me if I wanted to
see what the eyewitnesses story was. What he said, okay,
So they handed me the statement and I read it,
(24:55):
and it was almost word for word or what I said,
and the only the only thing that was there might
have been a couple of little things different because there
always will be, but it was, I mean, it was
the exact story. The main difference for me, and it
was a piece of the puzzle that I've never been
able to get back myself was he stated that I
(25:16):
kicked this guy off of me, and that the guy
landed on his butt in the water and then got up.
But I have no recollection if that's what really happened
or not. I just know that the guy's off of me,
you know, and I got to get up.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Well. Wouldn't that make sense though, I mean, because because
it's it's like you're under water and then all of
a sudden he's off of you. If he was trying
to leave you, feels like he would have kept going.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, but he didn't. He re engaged again for the
second time, you know, and decided he wanted to, I guess,
play this one one more time. But in my mind
I had to, you know, I had to make that
decision of I'm not going to fight this guy in
the water again. You know, that's not happening when I'm
not going back down there.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
I'm not going back down there. I think that phrase
paints a clear picture of the direness of the situation
for Officer Kramer. Sometimes you just wonder what in the
world someone is thinking. Who's fighting a law enforcement officer
who has the legal right to protect themselves with deadly force.
Do people know this? Are they just rolling the dice?
(26:29):
Are they crazy? Are they high? Do they care if
they live or die? It's hard to know, but it
happens every single day. This logic makes it easy to think, well,
this criminal got what he deserved and what he asked for.
But I can't help think of what a sad state
of life, what dire straits a person would have to
(26:52):
be in to act this way. I cannot understand it
or reconcile it. Fighting a law enforcement officer is like
fist fighting a black mamba. You're probably going to get struck.
But what's gonna now happen for Officer Kramer.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Yeah, and another kid bit there about the that witness.
He did say at some point he told the truth
because he believed I was a good guy, because I
had helped him out and made that right for him,
and he wasn't gonna lie.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Wow, Yeah, that's man, that's when when you told that
part of the story. I was like God was looking
out for you mean, he really was, because that could
have gone completely the other direction, you know, I mean,
just to have a witness there that you had just
randomly done a good thing for.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
I mean, what are the chances of that?
Speaker 4 (27:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Yeah, because who knows how it would have turned out
if that guy wasn't present that day and now it's
you know, you got my story and and get this
other so called witness and her story. It would have
been a completely different deal. I mean it would have.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Yeah, if that guy had corroborated the same false story
the woman told, this story could have turned out completely different.
But what happens now the thing is just starting for
Officer Kramer. Actually this was just the start of years
of lack of resolution.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Wow. But that's that's the short, not really the short,
but that's the gist of what happened there on the
on the scene. And you know, from there there was
of course the criminal side of it, which you know,
every officer that is involved in such is going to
be there's going to be a criminal investigation. And of
(28:55):
course that that was determined to justify, you know, I
was justified in my actions, So there was no criminal
ramifications or whatever coming there. But that following year, I
think it was about right out a year after the incident,
the family of the suspect they filed the federal lawsuit.
(29:18):
So that was basically accusing me of violating Fourth Amendment right,
you know, unlawful search and seizure, taking this guy's life.
And that played out for years, several years really yeah,
just a lot of it was I think just the
slow process of the federal court system. But the short
(29:39):
version of that was it was it was deemed by
the judge, federal judge that it would go to a
trial and that I was being represented by the okahom
Attorney General's office, and they filed an appeal with the
tenth Circuit District Court out of Denver, and they decided
(30:00):
otherwise that it would be dismissed. So that was the
end of that.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
But when all that was going on was that I
was that stressful.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
Oh yeah, that's that's the worst part, you know, I mean,
I say it was the worst part. It was because
of the duration how long that took.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
You know, can you walk me through your training in
a situation like that, Like, I know, any level of
law enforcement training these days I mean there is a
prescribed action basically for any category of situation like you're
I know, there's there's probably there's gray areas that they're
(30:41):
they're just naturally it's going to be. But like there's
certain just laws that if this happens, I do this,
and I mean that's just part of your job.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
Yeah, So the you know, we're being trained and have
to abide by what we call the use of force
continuum laws governing the use of deadly force, which you
know basically say that you know, if somebody is trying
to do me physical harm, trying to kill me, or
(31:15):
serious bodily injury, that elevates to the justification of the
use of deadly force to prevent that from happening. You know,
it doesn't have to be on me, It can be
on any citizen that they're you know that I am
justified to use that level of force to prevent somebody
from harming you in that manner, taking your life, or
(31:37):
doing serious bodily injury. So that's the first and foremost
is you know, was the person capable of inflicting that injury,
did they have the intent to do it, and did
they have the opportunity to complete it, and all three
(31:58):
of those things have to be present in order for
it to be justified for me to make that decision
to use that deadly force. You know, they could have
the intent and the means to do it, but it
may not have the opportunity to actually do it, and
so it doesn't it won't work. I would be unjustified,
(32:19):
you know. And in this case, you know, the guy
his means was his physical ability to hold me under
the water and you know, subdue me and make that attempt.
And it's clear to me that he had that ability there.
He obviously showed the intent and the opportunity was there
(32:43):
and he seized it. So he met all that criteria,
which is in my mind just my training. Not thinking
about that. I'm not checking those boxes. They're just that's
just trained in me. But I will say that at
the those split seconds of time where I'm seeing what's
(33:04):
happening and I'm I've got my gun drawn, there was
a thought process of is is this good? You know,
I'm asking my I'm running that down. Is this good? Right?
And that was the only question I asked myself, and I.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Had to make that decision.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
I guess the water is what if you're uncoverable with
this question, we don't have to put this on there.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
You probably wouldn't have shot him if it hadn't been
for the.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
Water, though, right, that was his means.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
I mean, because like if you were just wrestling on
the ground with a guy that was just trying to
get you down.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yeah, he never would have. He would have had to
have done something something.
Speaker 1 (33:45):
Being reached for your gun or if he had had
a weapon.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
Right, that's totally different. The water is what the means were.
That's the means of him having the ability to take
my life. Was the water that was his weapon. Yeah,
so that's that's exactly right. If it wasn't for that,
it'd have been just to fight on the ground, you know,
and I'd have been trying to do it.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
You wouldn't have been justified, right and deadly force.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
Just if he would have had to have done something else.
You know, he'd had to have been picking up a
rock and trying to beat me in the head with it,
or you know, a stick or something. He would have
had to have some other kind of weapon to to
reach that threshold.
Speaker 3 (34:25):
Yeah, yeah, that makes total sense.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
But we're still standing in the water. You know, and
he's re engaging to attack me again while we're still
in the water, and so that that's what justified that.
Speaker 3 (34:38):
Godly, that's wild man.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
You know, probably never in a thousand lifetimes of a
wildlife officer did something.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Like that happen.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
Is that?
Speaker 3 (34:46):
Would you say? That's probably accurate?
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Yeah, I don't know of another, you know, incident like that. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
Similar to justify the use of lethal force, the perpetrator
has to have three things, the intent, the means, and
the opportunity. And in this case, the most unusual and
(35:16):
unprecedented thing was the means to kill being water. The
water was equivalent to a gun or a knife, or
a rock or a club. And if you've ever almost drowned,
I think you'll understand that. It goes without saying that
any time a human life is taken, it's extremely serious.
And just because someone is a convicted felon on the run,
(35:38):
it doesn't lessen their value as a human and a
fellow partaker of the breath of life. It is wild
that this took place less than seventy miles away from
where Bucky Garrison drowned in nineteen seventy one. Here's Officer
Kramer with a very interesting detail about the psychology of
these types of situations.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
And I will backtrack to say to fill in a
spot that I left open there about his gunshot wounds.
And I don't remember the terminology of what it is,
but the I guess it's pretty common that in that situation,
In those situations, that your brain is not processing in
(36:24):
real time, and so my brain is seeing or telling
me what I think were what I know, and that
this guy was squared up to me, and because I
believed that I knew where I had hit him, but
the reality was was he had turned to his let
(36:48):
to his right when I had shot, but I didn't
see that. My brain didn't process that it was behind.
So I'm pressing the trigger, but my brain is still
behind on where he's located. And I guess that's pretty
common for somebody to get shot in the back, but
that's not what the officer intended because in their mind
(37:11):
they were still facing them, but they had turned, and this.
Speaker 3 (37:14):
Was exactly what happened.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
He's actually turned before those shots went off, and so
he was hit in the side with the ribs and
I'm looking for him on the front of his torso
and can't see him because in my brain I thought
that I know exactly where they're at, but they weren't.
They were around the side because he had turned to
move away, tried to get away from me, you know,
(37:36):
when he realized what was fixing to happen, you know.
And I didn't never knew that until I was told,
you know, this is where he was hit. And that
was a complete shock to me because I would have
bet the farm and I knew exactly where they went.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
The razor edge of time is faster than the human
brain can compute such a precarious thing. To be a
law enforcement officer, Why couldn't this guy have just run
away when Officer Kramer's kicked him off?
Speaker 2 (38:08):
He didn't.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
He came right back. I've got another question, did that
affect your career? I mean, did it make you Did
you think, man, I maybe ought to get out of
this business or or did it.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
You know, I don't, I don't think i've I didn't
really ever think about that about getting out, you know.
But it's definitely changed. I mean, I'll never be the
same person. And uh, it's it's uh, it has created
uh an opportunity for the good where we have some
(38:46):
training now because up to up to that point, we
hadn't had in a incident game warding involved shooting incidents.
Sense I don't remember. I think it was in the
nineties retired officer now, but had gotten in it, had
(39:08):
shot a guy and the rumors of that, how that
played out with the agency and everything, it wasn't good.
It just was kind of like a disaster for the
officer involved. And now, you know, we know as law
(39:30):
enforcement agencies around the country, this is not uncommon to
have these incidents, so they know more about mental health
and how things should play out, what you do and
how you do it. And my agency didn't have any experience.
(39:50):
There wasn't anybody working at our administrative level that was
working at the time when the last one happened, So
there wasn't any new scenario. Yeah, it was completely new.
Speaker 3 (40:01):
Yeah, and.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Thankfully those that were in that those positions, you know,
they handled it correctly. And the fact that they didn't
do anything if they were unsure about what they were doing,
and that's just and I'm saying that in regards to
to towards me, But after this took place, I decided,
(40:32):
you know, hey, our agency needs to be prepared how
do we handle this? And so now we have some
some good training on how do you respond, Like if
you're an officer that's out working and you get the
call that there's been an officer involved shooting, how how
do you respond to that? What do you do? What
(40:53):
do you need to do when you get there, you know,
And and then the other side of the for the agency,
like the supervisors of that officer, the things that they
should be doing to to help that officer you know,
through this, you know, because there there can be a
(41:15):
lot of struggles, you know, mentally the mental health thing
can go south, you know, and it can be a
bad It can turn out to be a really bad deal.
And and that's for me, that was an that was
something I experienced. Was nothing real negative. Nobody did anything
to me that you know, caused some negative impact. But
(41:37):
your brains is it's a weird deal. I mean, it
does some crazy stuff. And I remember immediately after, you know,
the next day and the next next two couple of days,
there's everybody's trying to call me, you know, and people
are wanting to know what happened, and you know, then
a lot of them are just wanting to you know, hey,
(42:00):
I'm glad you're all right, you know, and they got
that out of the way. Well I figured out that
that's that's all we do, is we we get that
out of the way and we.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
Go on about our lives.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
So what happens is it goes from all these all
this attention and people, you know, saying these good things,
and then it's crickets and you don't hear nothing, and
that starts screwing you know, was kind of screwing with me, like,
you know, what's going on? How come nobody's called you know?
You know, is this bad? You know, because there's there's
(42:33):
an investigation going on. Yeah, yeah, you know, am I
being blacklisted or something? And you don't. It's like so
that those kind of things that we're aware of now
that that's going to happen, so we kind of know
how to handle it, how to prevent it from turning
into something that it shouldn't or whatever.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
That's interesting.
Speaker 1 (42:52):
That's probably a similar thing with any kind of traumatic event,
is that you you get a lot of people who
care about you contacting you, and then yeah, it kind of.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
After some period of time, Yeah, it's like nothing.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Yeah, and you you you you know.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
That's interesting. I wouldn't have thought of that.
Speaker 2 (43:11):
Yeah, and your brain, you know, I guess maybe vulnerable
would be a good term you get in you're just
it's like it's very susceptible to manipulation, and you know,
you're you don't you know, you don't know what's what's
right and what's you know, like, is this normal that
(43:31):
they're not calling me? I mean you can't. You're not
processing that, you're not understanding' not grasping. Well, okay, well
this is just everybody has said what they wanted to
say and that's it.
Speaker 1 (43:40):
Now you start thinking the worst. So what can what
could we learn from all this? Like when you tell
the story, I know, to law enforcement officers there's a
(44:01):
lot in terms of just like training and response and stuff.
What do you what value is there too to us
to hear the story?
Speaker 2 (44:12):
You know, it's as a as a game warden. You know,
it's solidifies that you know, we're we're law enforcement officers
out there dealing with the same people that may want
to do us harm, just like any other law enforcement
you know, I think a lot of times.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
We get.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
You know, maybe downplayed on what you know, we're just
a wildlife cop, you know, or not a real cop
you you know whatever, But you know that's yeah, this
deal started out it's a wildlife related thing. But the whole,
the whole reason that happened was because this guy was
a criminal that was wanted, you know, and we're going
to take him to jail. We're going to make him
(44:57):
you know, see the judge. So ah, I guess that
would be one thing that this you know, comes should
come of this situation as people realize, yeah, we're out
there dealing with bad guys.
Speaker 1 (45:13):
You know. I just think about how you see these
videos now of people engaging with law enforcement and like
in a fight or something, and it's just like, you
gotta be crazy. I mean, people should know when you
feel like everybody should know. And obviously people aren't in
their rational mind when they like put their hands on
(45:33):
an officer. But it's like the rule of law that
we have in this country because we all can walk
around the streets and feel safe in most places this
country is because we have law enforcement that has the
right to protect the public but also themselves. And you
lay your hands on a law enforcement officer, you might
(45:55):
be in big trouble. I mean that that blows my
mind when I see, you know, of people that start
thinking straight.
Speaker 2 (46:02):
Well, like in this incident, this guy, he come out,
you know, in testimony from the witnesses that they had
just got done doing math. Well you know, and I
think that was part of why he was wanted, you know,
probably with some drug. I don't remember exactly, but I
believe it was something to do with that. But he
(46:24):
had already told this other this other guy, that he
wasn't going back. He already had that conversation before I
got over there. He made his mind up. It was
about not going back to jail. You know, he's going
to do whatever he needed to do to not go back.
Speaker 3 (46:40):
So he'd already made.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
That decision, yea, And that explains why he was, you know,
re engaging. He realized that I wasn't going to let
him go, wasn't going to let him just run off,
you know, So he knew I believe he knew that
he needed to take care of me.
Speaker 1 (46:57):
In order to go away, to get away, I guess,
you know, the ill saying you'd be surprised at what
people do if they're really desperate. It is eye opening
to go behind the scenes with law enforcement officers, especially
(47:19):
in the most stressful, difficult times of their career. I
can't thank Officer Kramer enough, first of all for his
service and protecting our communities and our wildlife resources, but
secondly his willingness to tell this story anytime human life
has taken It's an incredibly serious situation, and I think
(47:40):
that we can all learn a lot from this. I
cannot thank you enough for listening to Bear Grease Brent's
This Country Life and Lakes Backwoods University. I hope that
everyone has a married Christmas and a wonderful New Year.
And while you're opening up those Christmas presents on December
(48:02):
twenty fifth, remember keep the wild places wild, because that's
where the bears live.
Host
Clay Newcomb
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