"In all honesty, my real concern is with the criminal suspect Aaron Arlotta who assaulted and tried to choke out one of my officers."

I reached out to Fortuna Police Chief Casey Day to see if he wanted to respond to the testimony by his officers in the Aaron Arlotta jury trial and remarks by Arlotta's attorney, Ms. Andrea Sullivan.

Chief Day provided a prompt response and detailed statement which I appreciate since I contacted him towards the end of the working day. It is posted in entirety below.

Chief Day's statement:

Law enforcement officers are under no legal or moral obligation to inform a person verbally that they are being handcuffed or detained. The element of surprise is now and has always been a tactical advantage. Law enforcement tactics are designed to be advantageous to the officer and to minimize unnecessary risk to the officer and the person being arrested, especially those with felony warrants. The Fortuna Police Department is not in the practice of providing extra time and opportunity for felons to formulate plans to fight with police and/or try and escape.  Simply put, that would be bad business and increase risk to the officers and the public.

The Orcutt brand OPN (Orcutt Police Nunchaku) is deployed by the Fortuna Police Department and by numerous agencies throughout the State of California as well as nationally. The OPN is used as a control system and the OPN is designed to limit injury to the suspect and to quickly gain control. I think that you should probably read the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals finding which can be found here and under “court tested”

https://orcuttopn.com/about/

“This landmark federal court decision essentially supports the concept of control vs impact using the OPN for arrest control tactics providing a more “humane” arrest procedure”. – Orcutt.

In all honesty, my real concern is with the criminal suspect Aaron Arlotta who assaulted and tried to choke out one of my officers. The criminal justice system has every opportunity to hold Mr. Arlotta accountable to the full extent of the law and personally, I hope that happens.

As for Officer Mullen being declared a “hostile witness” it’s unclear to this point if that is actually factual and I believe that it is untrue. The Defense attorney may have asked for that designation but it is unclear if the court ruled in that manner. My understanding is that Officer Mullen continued to answer all questions in a participatory manner. Additionally, It can be difficult to differentiate at times between anger and frustration especially when you don’t know someone personally. I don’t blame Officer Mullen for being frustrated in this situation and after speaking with him it was apparent that he was - frustrated.

Related posts:

https://johnchiv.blogspot.com/2022/08/fpd-testifies-they-physically-tame.html?m=1

https://johnchiv.blogspot.com/2022/08/jury-selection-started-yesterday-and.html?m=1