On August 24th, 2009, Mark Barmore was a 23 year old Rockford community member. He was a father, a son and enjoyed making music.
To talk about this properly, we must do background on the cops involved. Oda Poole joined the Rockford police department in May of 2004. Poole was part of an 11 officer class. 4 out of the 11 (including Poole) have participated in the murder of a Rockford community member.
Poole in 1998 applied to become a Rockford police department officer. He failed the necessary exams to become a RPD cop. Poole briefly worked part time as a Rockford park district cop before seeking working at a larger department. Poole applied to the Indianapolis police department and the Washington D.C. metropolitan police department.
He was accepted into the D.C. department where he would have three shooting incidents, including the shooting of a dog. In late 2003 Poole for the second time applied to be a Rockford police officer. This time he was accepted.
It is alleged that from 2005 - 2009 Poole pointed his gun at Rockford citizens on at least nine separate occasions. On four of those occasions Poole fired his gun. On January 27th 2007 Poole shot a man in a car accused of car theft. Three months later, in April of 2007 Poole shot and killed 76-year-old Lewis Henderson in what was deemed “suicide by cop.”
Poole’s actions in each of these instances were ruled justified.
Poole’s partner, Stan North, also had a past containing an on duty shooting. North by 2009 had six excessive force complaints lodged against him over the course of his career.
Mark Barmore was asleep on a couch when a woman he was seeing called 911 alleging that Mark had threatened her by telling her something to the effect of “I’ll cut your throat.”
When the police arrived, Barmore woke up and ran out the back door. The Rockford cops weren’t able to catch him so dispatch alerted other RPD officers of a black man by the name of “Skippy”.
In the area were Oda Poole and Stan North in a RPD transport van patrolling the West side of Rockford. After receiving a more detailed description of Mark, they saw him talking to a group of individuals outside House of Grace Church.
Mark was talking to the group about a woman calling the police on him and other troubles he was having. The group advised Mark to participate in a boxing program funded by the House of Grace church.
Poole got out of the van and made his way towards the group. When Mark saw this, he ran into the church. Poole ran after him but the doors into the church were locked. North drove the van to the back of the church to prevent Mark from using a secondary door to escape.
Poole and North were both let in by a church member. They were told that Mark ran down into the basement of the church. In the basement was a daycare with several kids and a teacher inside. Connected to the daycare was a “small boiler room”.
It is alleged that Mark ran down into the daycare and into the boiler room. Shortly after came Poole and North running in the church with their guns out. Sheila Brown, after seeing guns, ran behind the officers as they went down the stairs. She repeatedly told officers that there were children down there.
When the officers entered the room, both with guns in hands, the teacher had the studios gather on the opposite end of the boiler room huddled in a corner. The two officers went over to the children to ask one question.
“Where did that man go?”
Someone pointed towards the closed steel door that led to the boiler room.
There are two accounts of what happened. 5 time shooter Oda Poole alleges there was a physical fight over the gun after they ordered Mark out of the boiler room. Poole alleged that Mark lunged at the gun when the door to the room was opened. Poole shot once and North shot three times all from a range of less than three feet.
The young woman by the door told a very different account than the officers. She said after the two officers forced open the door they ordered Mark to exit the room. Mark Barmore walked out with his hands up near his chest. Then, Poole shot first causing Barmore to begin falling to the ground when North started shooting Mark Barmore in the back.
Of the nearly 20 individuals in the room North and Poole are the only two who said there was a struggle. Every other account stated Mark walked out of the room with his hands up.
After the shooting a Rockford police officer told the young woman standing by the door to go upstairs. The young woman, a minor at the time, went outside where she was detained by RPD officers. She requested to see her parents but was denied and interrogated by officers.
The children that were in the daycare, some as young as 5 years old, were all detained and interrogated by the Rockford police department immediately after the shooting. By this time, their parents had arrived at the church but they were kept from their children as Rockford police officers questioned the kids.
Sheila Brown was taken to the Rockford police station and interrogated by officers. It is alleged that Sheila repeatedly asked for a lawyer but was denied.
Pastor Brown was put in the back of a squad car before being taken into a room in the church where he was interrogated by officers.
Over the course of these interrogations it is alleged that the Rockford police officers in each of the interrogations lied and retold the story of how the shooting happened. In their version is the first mention of a struggle.
Several outside agencies found that leading up to the shooting North and Poole violated several RPD policies. Despite this, the shooting was ruled justified and no charges were pressed against the officers.
The Barmore family sued the City of Rockford after a grand jury found the shooting justified. The lawsuit was settled without a legal admission of guilt - for one million dollars.
The children and the church staff also sued for the distress they dealt with in the aftermath. The City agreed to settle this lawsuit as well.
Stan North retired shortly after the shooting. He cited mental distress as a reason to retire making him capable of receiving disability pension. Oda Poole was briefly fired before union arbitration ruled that he was “wrongfully terminated.” Poole spent four years on administrative leave before Tom McNamara took mayoral office. One of the first things McNamara did was agree to a settlement paying Poole $700,000 to be paid over four years with benefits for a decade. The total worth of the settlement was nearly a million dollars - all on the taxpayers dime.
This was the third shooting, fourth person shot and second person killed by Oda Poole as a Rockford police officer. Poole had been involved in two separate shootings as police officer in Washington D.C.
This was the second police shooting in 2009 and 20th deadly force incident in the 2000’s.