Man killed by taser looked massive, inquest told

December 1, 2005
Petti Fong, Globe and Mail

VANCOUVER -- Autopsy results show Roman Andreichikov was a slight, smaller-than-average man, but to the four police officers who struggled to subdue him while he was under a cocaine-induced psychosis, he looked massive.

Mr. Andreichikov, a onetime fitness trainer, was so strong and unwilling to comply with police commands that he bucked off a 175-pound (80-kilogram) police officer with his legs while two others held down his upper body.

Three of the officers testifying at a coroner's inquest into Mr. Andreichikov's death said they gauged his height to be at least 5 feet 11 inches (1.8 metres) and his weight at more than 200 pounds.

All the officers were surprised to hear while they were testifying that Mr. Andreichikov was 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighed 168 pounds (76 kilograms).

"He was extremely strong, even face down," Constable Brian McKeddie said at the inquest yesterday. "It took 15 to 20 seconds to get the handcuffs on and we had a lot of difficulty holding him."

When police responded to a 911 call that Mr. Andreichikov was suicidal, the man looked so massive and imposing that within seconds of seeing him sitting on a couch, Vancouver Police Constable Darren Hall said he decided to draw his taser from its holster.

When Constable Hall and his partner, Constable Mark Bouchey, entered the Granville Street apartment on May 1, 2004, Mr. Andreichikov, 25, was upset and on the fifth day of a cocaine binge. A friend had called to say Mr. Andreichikov had attempted to commit suicide twice that day.

In his testimony, Constable Hall said he tried to control Mr. Andreichikov's legs while two other officers, who arrived moments later, attempted to control his upper body. But Constable Hall, who is 5 feet 11 inches and 175 pounds, said Mr. Andreichikov easily lifted the officer off him with his legs and threw him about 60 centimetres.

The five-person jury is hearing evidence in the inquest about the circumstances that led Constable Hall to use his taser. Mr. Andreichikov stopped breathing and died within moments of being hit with two electrical shocks.

Constable Hall said after he was thrown off, he showed Constable Bouchey a better technique to control the man's lower body, but the other police officer still had trouble.

At 6 feet 3 inches and 220 pounds, Constable Bouchey was larger than Mr. Andreichikov.

Constable Hall said that when he and his partner first entered the apartment and saw Mr. Andreichikov, he didn't have time to gauge the man's height and weight adequately. He was more concerned, he told the jury, about the man's agitated state.

"I could see how hard he was flexing his body. He wasn't sitting still. He was shaking and vibrating," Constable Hall said. "With the clenching of the jaw, the fast breathing, the sounds. It was hard to describe. It was so primal."

The officer said based on his experience he believed the man was in a drug-induced psychosis.

Constable Hall said he once saw a 300-pound police officer, one of the biggest guys on the force, lose a physical encounter with a 130-pound teenager in a similar agitated state. It took six police officers to control the skinny youth.

In his testimony, Constable Hall, who had received his taser 10 days before the May 1 incident and was testing it in the field, said he tried to calm Mr. Andreichikov. He said he feared that the man was going to run for the balcony and try to leap off again.

In earlier testimony, Rahim Hadani said he visited Mr. Andreichikov that day and got caught in the middle of a fight he was having with his girlfriend. Mr. Hadani persuaded the girlfriend to leave and tried to calm his friend down. But twice, Mr. Hadani said, he had to plead with his friend to come back inside after he threatened to jump from the balcony.

Mr. Hadani said that as three officers were on top of Mr. Andreichikov and pressing his face on the carpet, his friend said he couldn't breathe. But an officer responded that if he was mumbling, he was breathing.

Constable Hall testified that when an officer alerted him that Mr. Andreichikov had stopped breathing, he tried to clear the man's airways. He said he never heard Mr. Andreichikov complain about not being able to breathe.

Two other officers who testified yesterday said they did not hear any complaints from the victim.

In fact, Constable Hall said the man was incoherent during the encounter. Constable Hall fired two shots of 50,000 volts each at Mr. Andreichikov.

Jurors have not yet heard toxicology results, but his family has said they did not know Mr. Andreichikov was an active drug user.

His girlfriend, Jamie Layno, who had testified at the start of the inquest this week, said Mr. Andreichikov had been using cocaine for five days straight and suffering from paranoia and delusions.

The Vancouver Police have faced criticism from families of victims and some community-rights groups over the use of tasers to subdue individuals.

Just one month after Mr. Andreichikov's death, another man, Robert Bagnell, died after he was hit with a taser.