PASADENA, Calif. (CN) - Deputies do not have immunity for detaining a dying woman after her police officer husband shot her in the face, the 9th Circuit ruled.
San Diego County Sherriff's Deputy Lowell Bruce shot his wife, Kristin Maxwell-Bruce, at her parents' home in December 2006. When deputies and medical personnel responded, they found Maxwell-Bruce alert and responsive, suffering from a gunshot wound to the jaw.
As deputies detained Bruce, Alpine Fire District paramedics concluded that they needed to get Maxwell-Bruce to a trauma center quickly.
They ordered an air ambulance, equipped with advance trauma equipment, which would arrive in 25 minutes at a landing zone 10 miles from the home. The Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians Tribal Fire Department sent a vehicular ambulance arrived to bring Maxwell-Bruce there. At that time, the woman's vital signs were still within normal limits.
Sgt. Michael Knobbe took charge of the scene, though he was outranked by Capt. Gregory Reynolds and Lt. Anthony Salazar, both of whom arrived at the same time he had.
While Reynolds and Salazar stayed at the end of the driveway, Knobbe ordered the house evacuated and sealed and the Maxwells separated. The victim's mother, Kay Maxwell, was allowed to stay in an RV on the driveway with the grandfather and the children.
Deputies permitted the victim's father to pace around in the front yard. Officers would not let the Maxwells be together or follow their daughter to the hospital. Both parents told deputies they heard and saw nothing prior to the shooting.
Meanwhile, Maxwell-Bruce's condition deteriorated. As paramedics prepared her for transport - between 10 and 17 minutes after the ambulance arrived - she began expelling blood from her mouth. Medical personnel sat her up, suctioned her and placed her in the ambulance.
Knobbe meanwhile insisted on interviewing the patient in the ambulance. By the time he relented - 22 minutes after the ambulance arrived - the helicopter had arrived at the landing zone, a more than 10-minute drive from the scene.
Maxwell-Bruce died on the way to the helicopter. The San Diego medical examiner later determined she died from blood loss related to a non life-threatening gunshot wound.
Knobbe told the victim's father that his daughter had died about an hour later.
The father demanded to be allowed to tell his wife about their daughter's death, but Deputy Gary Kneeshaw ordered him to stay at the end of the driveway.
Maxwell then told deputies: "You're going to have to shoot me, I'm going to see my wife!"
As he began walking to the RV, deputies blocked his path. Kneeshaw eventually pepper-sprayed the man, hit him in the legs with a baton and handcuffed him. Capt. Reynolds and Lt. Salazar did not intervene.
Though deputies uncuffed Maxwell a half-hour later, they kept the family separated until they finished their investigation five hours later. Deputies then told the victim's mother about her daughter's death.
After the Maxwells filed suit, U.S. District Court Judge John Houston refused to grant summary judgment on the basis of immunity. The 9th Circuit affirmed Thursday
