TOPEKA, Kan. – One of the officers involved in the shooting of Dominique White has been a part of two other high-profile killings in Topeka.
Officer Michael Cruse can be seen in the body camera footage of Dominique White’s shooting.
Cruse was fired from the Topeka Police Department in 2002 after pleading guilty to vehicular homicide. Cruse was on his way to a call when he got in a car wreck that killed 61-year-old Leonard Porter.
Cruse was sentenced to one year in jail, but through a legal process Topeka Police ended up rehiring him the next year.
“Every employee has ramifications that they can seek to rectify the situation and that’s what officer Cruse did in that situation,” said Interim Topeka Police Chief Bill Cochran.
Cochran would not confirm that Cruse was one of the officers involved in White shooting. He said that info, along with the body camera footage, can’t be released until after an internal review of the shooting is complete. Cochran said he expects this will be done by the end of next week.
This is not the first time Cruse has been under review for shooting his gun. In 2015, Cruse shot and killed a small dog while responding to a possible break-in. He said the dog was charging and he felt threatened.
Cochran said Cruse did not break department policy in this case. He said there was a review and afterwards officers were given more training on how to respond to animals in the field.