SAN JOSE — A federal civil jury has cleared a San Jose police officer of excessive force in the fatal 2019 shooting of a man experiencing a psychiatric crisis and who was walking toward a school on Halloween with what turned out to be a replica gun.
Jurors issued their verdict Friday following a week-long trial overseen by Judge Nathanael Cousins at the federal district courthouse in San Jose. Officer Edward Carboni was found not liable for all four claims filed on behalf of the mother of Francis Calonge, encompassing allegations of excessive force, civil rights violations, wrongful death and battery.
The city of San Jose, which represented Carboni at trial, had argued he acted within his duties in light of his belief that Calonge was armed, ignored police orders to stop and continued to walk toward Independence High School around the time school was letting out. City Attorney Nora Frimann acknowledged that Calonge was likely suffering from a psychiatric episode during the encounter on October 31, 2019.
“This certainly was a tragic incident, and we understand the family experienced a painful loss. There remains a need for more effective and available mental health services in our community to help support individuals and families in crisis,” Frimann said. “The San Jose Police Department and the city appreciate the jury’s confirmation that our officer acted as our community expects when they call police to address a dangerous situation. Francis Calonge’s unfortunate actions … made it reasonable for our officer to believe lethal force was necessary to protect the public and officers, as the jury found.”
The federal lawsuit filed by Calonge’s mother, Rosalina, was initially dismissed by Cousins in 2022 when he decided Carboni was entitled to qualified immunity, a legal protection shielding government officials from litigation over their work actions absent a constitutional violation. That ruling was overturned last year by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which found that the facts of the case warranted a jury’s evaluation of whether Carboni and the city were liable for the plaintiff claims.
James McManis, one of the plaintiff attorneys, and his legal team had argued Carboni and his fellow officers had other ways to intervene and that the public was not facing an imminent threat because Calonge had the gun in his waistband. The family’s lawyers cited conflicting orders and accounts — which were also referenced by the appellate court in approving the case for trial — about whether he was reaching for the weapon.
McManis said the verdict was a troubling endorsement of Calonge being shot in the back from more than 100 feet, without any sign Calonge understood what was happening. A postmortem analysis found that Calonge was under the influence of methamphetamine that compounded his chronic mental illness.
“A guy who clearly had something wrong with him, walking along, with no evidence he ever shot anybody, he just kept going after they told him to stop. Then this cop shoots him in the back, without a warning,” McManis said after the verdict. “To me, the most disheartening aspect of this is that eight jurors in our community thought there was no problem with that.”
McManis also alluded to his dissatisfaction with how the district court handled the case, starting with its initial dismissal that was reversed by the higher court.
“I have a lot of thoughts about the conduct of this trial, but I will save those for later,” he said.
Carboni, who joined SJPD in 2014, has the distinction of being involved in four fatal police shootings in his time with the police department. The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office has cleared him of criminal liability in all four cases. He remains on the SJPD force.
On the afternoon of the shooting, Calonge was seen in front of a gym at Jackson Avenue and McKee Road holding what a 911 caller said was a pistol. Carboni and several other officers responded to the area and tried to contact Calonge.
Authorities contend Calonge was walking erratically through the gym’s parking lot and that officers gave repeated commands to Calonge to stop. He instead briefly looked at them, tucked a gun into his waistband and walked away, authorities said.
Calonge was walking on the west side of North Jackson Avenue toward Independence High School, and Carboni was about 120 feet southeast of Calonge, standing in the center median, when he shot Calonge once with a police-issued rifle. Calonge died at a hospital soon after. Police would later determine his weapon was a Powerline BB gun made to resemble a Beretta handgun.
On his own body-camera footage, Carboni could be heard telling the other officers, “Hey watch out, I’m going to shoot him,” and he did not give Calonge a warning prior to opening fire.
Frimann said the situation was “complicated by concern for students leaving a nearby high school,” and that the matter should conclude given how thoroughly the case has been evaluated by the federal courts.
“This action has been litigated for a long time, and we hope the jury verdict can be accepted,” she said.