‘Expert’ on use of force by police charged in stabbing

A use-of-force expert hired by the city of Langley to evaluate the action of the former police chief was charged with first-degree assault this week for allegedly stabbing and slashing another man with a knife outside of a marijuana store in October, according to court documents.

Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor said he intends to fire Robert Glen Carpenter, 48, a sergeant in the department, the Tacoma News Tribune reported.

Earlier this year, Langley Mayor Tim Callison hired Carpenter, who billed himself as an expert in police use of force, to review reports related to an incident involving former police chief David Marks. Carpenter concluded that Marks’ actions were proper and within policy in the November of 2017 arrest of a mentally disabled trespassing suspect.

Marks resigned earlier this year after reaching a settlement with the city.

According to the police report from the Oct. 5 incident in Pierce County, Carpenter met two men at a bar and went with them to a pot shop. Carpenter had allegedly told them he was “a man of power” and could get one of them a job as a corrections officer.

At the shop, Carpenter purchased edibles for the men, but one of them complained that he couldn’t get high from them and wanted something to smoke instead. Carpenter allegedly lifted up his shirt and exposed his handgun, an action that the man took as a threat.

The man reportedly got the gun away from Carpenter and got into his friend’s car.

Carpenter followed and was able to get his body partly through an open window on the passenger side. Carpenter demanded the gun back, produced a knife and started slashing and stabbing the man on the hands, the police report states.

The other man recorded part of the assault on his phone, the report indicates.

Carpenter told police who arrived at the scene that he had been robbed, the report states.

The victim received 15 stitches to his hands at the hospital.

Carpenter was suspended from duty in 2007 after he was arrested twice in one day in Chelan County for driving under the influence.

Carpenter was one of two deputies with the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office who fired shots that killed a 36-year-old man in 2003. The man reportedly lunged at them with an automobile jack in 2003.

The shooting was ruled justified.