Modesto settles excessive force lawsuit in police shooting for $1 million
Modesto has paid $1 million to settle an excessive force lawsuit involving a sergeant who in 2017 shot a suspect considered armed and dangerous.
Jason Perkins survived being shot in the jaw, chest and left arm by Sgt. Jerry Ramar on the morning of Nov. 6, 2017, but needed several surgeries, including a bone graft to his jaw, according to court records.
Ramar — now Oakdale’s police chief — fired six times at Perkins as the man was in the driver’s seat of a car. No one else was in the vehicle. Perkins was hit at least three times, according to Mark Merin, one of his attorneys. Ramar thought he saw a gun in Perkins’ hand, according to court records, but Perkins was not armed.
“This was outrageous excessive use of force,” said Sacramento-based Merin. “They are lucky they didn’t kill Mr. Perkins because they would have had to pay a lot more. I’m only disappointed that they did not discharge the officer responsible for this outrage.”
Merin said Perkins clearly was not armed, the officers could have used other means to safely take him into custody, and what Perkins may or may not have done in the past did not justify shooting him. “I don’t care if he ran over his dog that morning,” Merin said.
Suspect in bank parking lot
The City Attorney’s Office did not respond to a request for an interview. But the settlement agreement states the $1 million is not an admission of wrongdoing. The Bee learned about the settlement by filing a Public Records Act request with Modesto. The lawsuit was filed in 2019 in U.S. District Court in Fresno and was dismissed Nov. 30, 2023.
Modesto spent $335,704 in legal and $3,366 in other costs defending itself in the lawsuit, bringing the litigation’s total cost to $1,339,070. The city paid $1 million from its own funds, and its insurance paid the balance.
Ramar left Modesto police in 2019 to work as an Oakdale police lieutenant and was named the department’s chief in 2021.
Ramar and Officer Ryan Olson were attempting to take Perkins into custody on two warrants. One was from a July 2017 incident in which Perkins allegedly led Turlock police on a high-speed pursuit in a stolen car and pointed a handgun at an officer.
Ramar shot Perkins in the parking lot of the Bank of America on Oakdale Road. Perkins was parked in an Infiniti G35 while waiting for his girlfriend to get money from the bank. Olson did not fire his weapon.
Dispatch had alerted Ramar and Olson about Perkins, including that he was considered armed and dangerous, and the officers received updates about his location. The two officers were working traffic and riding motorcycles. They approached Perkins around 9:45 a.m. in single file on foot with their guns drawn. Ramar was in the lead.
Based on Olson’s body camera footage and other documents, Perkins’ attorneys filed this account with the court of the shooting:
Ramar yelled, “Show me your hands! Show me your hands or I’m going to shoot you!” as he approached the Infiniti’s driver side. Perkins looked in Ramar’s direction, put the Infiniti into reverse and leaned forward as if reaching for something. The driver’s tinted window began to roll up and the Infiniti began to reverse.
Sergeant fired three volleys
Ramar shot at Perkins twice less than a second later, with one bullet breaking the window. The Infiniti reversed for several yards before coming to a stop on a landscape island.
Ramar and Olson followed the car and stood at the driver’s door with their guns pointed at Perkins. Ramar yelled, “Let me see your hands! Let me see your hands!” Perkins raised his right hand, which was empty. Ramar shot two more times. Perkins body slumped to the right.
Ramar yelled for Perkins to show his his hands. Perkins turned toward the officer, and Ramar shot two more times, according to Perkin’s attorneys. Ramar continued to demand Perkins show his hands. Perkins said he could not because his left arm had been shot.
The attorneys representing the city said in court records that Perkins ignored the officers’ commands, started his car and quickly reversed, and Ramar shot him after he “repeatedly failed to comply with lawful commands ... .”
A Police Department review of the shooting found Ramar’s use of deadly force was justified and within department policy. The Stanislaus County District Attorney’s Office concluded Ramar’s actions were legal.
But the department review identified several of what it called training issues: Ramar did not turn his body camera on until after the shooting (Olson had his on during the shooting), Ramar did not adequately communicate to Olson his plan to take Perkins into custody and Ramar initiated contact with Perkins without enough resources.
Ramar declined to be interview but issued a statement, which said in part that Modesto police dispatchers had received information that Perkins was armed and dangerous and that Perkins refused to show his hands and drove in reverse rather than surrender.
The statement also said Perkins was sentenced to prison in the incident with Turlock police. “Use of force is a last resort, and an action I don’t take lightly,” Ramar said in his statement.
Perkins pleaded nolo contendere in Stanislaus County Superior Court in March 2019 to the felonies of assault by means of force likely to produce great bodily injury, evading a peace officer and unauthorized use of a vehicle, all coming from the Turlock incident, according to court records. He was sentenced to four years and four months in prison.
