05 May Developments in the Zach Gifford Shooting Case
The Sheriff of Kiowa County has resigned. Evidence has also been discovered of repeated prior unconstitutional uses of deadly force by the Kiowa County Sheriff’s Department, including former Deputy Stump who shot towards the back of a man, 9 times, in a moving pickup. Former Deputy Stump also rammed his vehicle from a standstill into another moving car on a highway. Both of these situations involved suspects who were not threatening anyone at the time.
These occurred just a few months before the shooting of Zach Gifford who was unarmed, suspected only of a minor drug possession, and not threatening anyone when he was shot in the back 3 times and killed for disobeying an order to stop running away.
Sheriff Casey Sheridan, who has now submitted his resignation, did not discipline Stump at all for these blatant violations of Supreme Court law prohibiting shooting non-threatening suspects in the back or using his vehicle as a deadly weapon to prevent escape. Rather, he was terminated for shooting a traffic sign with his duty weapon reportedly while inebriated. This was months after the killing of Zach Gifford.
The other shooter, former Undersheriff Tracy Weisenhorn, was terminated on March 8, 2021 by Sheriff Sheridan.
The Sheriff of Kiowa County has resigned. Evidence has also been discovered of repeated prior unconstitutional uses of deadly force by the Kiowa County Sheriff’s Department, including former Deputy Stump who shot towards the back of a man, 9 times, in a moving pickup. Former Deputy Stump also rammed his vehicle from a standstill into another moving car on a highway. Both of these situations involved suspects who were not threatening anyone at the time.
These occurred just a few months before the shooting of Zach Gifford who was unarmed, suspected only of a minor drug possession, and not threatening anyone when he was shot in the back 3 times and killed for disobeying an order to stop running away.
Sheriff Casey Sheridan, who has now submitted his resignation, did not discipline Stump at all for these blatant violations of Supreme Court law prohibiting shooting non-threatening suspects in the back or using his vehicle as a deadly weapon to prevent escape. Rather, he was terminated for shooting a traffic sign with his duty weapon reportedly while inebriated. This was months after the killing of Zach Gifford.
The other shooter, former Undersheriff Tracy Weisenhorn, was terminated on March 8, 2021 by Sheriff Sheridan.
You can read about the latest coverage of this very troubling misconduct by the Kiowa County Sheriff’s Department prior to Zach’s death in the Colorado Sun, Denver Post and COLAB.