THURSTON COUNTY, Wash. — One of the former Tacoma police officers who was acquitted in the death of Manuel Ellis has been hired by the Thurston County Sheriff's Office (TCSO).
In a Facebook post announcing Christopher Burbank's hiring, TCSO said the hire marks the first lateral patrol deputy since 2021 to apply and pass all phases of its background checks. Thurston County said "for the first time in years," TCSO is expecting to be fully staffed with no vacancies on patrol.
Burbank was charged with second-degree murder and first-degree manslaughter after Ellis died while in police custody.
The state alleged Burbank and Officer Matthew Collins initiated a confrontation with Ellis on the night he died, assaulted and wrongfully imprisoned him, leading to his death. Eyewitness video shows the officers punching Ellis while he lay on the ground and putting his hands up in the air in a surrender position while an officer fired a Taser at him. Ellis was handcuffed and hogtied while Officer Timothy Rankine applied pressure to his back, pressing him into the ground. The Pierce County medical examiner determined those restraint methods caused Ellis to suffer from a lack of oxygen, resulting in heart failure.
The defense countered that Ellis was the aggressor on the night he died, beat the window of Burbank and Collins' police cruiser and continuously fought back against the officers' attempts to restrain him. They denied the officers' actions were even responsible for Ellis' death in the first place, saying a toxic, potentially fatal level of methamphetamine in his system was the true cause.
The officers were found not guilty of all charges at the conclusion of the trial in December 2023. After the city of Tacoma cleared the officers of any wrongdoing following an internal investigation, each officer received $500,000 and resigned from the department "in good standing." All of the men also remained on paid administrative leave for three years following Ellis' death.
Following calls for a federal investigation, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Washington confirmed they were independently investigating Ellis' death for federal law violations.
TCSO said it has seven additional applicants in the process of joining its patrol units and has hired more employees through April of 2024 than it did in all of 2023.