Rotary Club of South Miami Officer of the Quarter – December, 2016 OFFICER ARYO REZAIE

January 24, 2017 – South Miami, Florida

For the 2016-17 Rotary year, Rotary Club of South Miami President Subrata Basu and the club’s Board re-instituted the Police Officer of the Quarter Award to recognize the outstanding work of South Miami’s finest.

The award for the 4^th Quarter, 2016, is being awarded to Officer Aryo Rezaie.

On December 25th, South Miami officers were dispatched to a violent confrontation involving a knife occurring at a residence.

The family’s housekeeper, upon arrival for the day, had been terminated and asked to leave the residence by the woman who employed her. The husband was asleep in the bedroom.

Moments later, the housekeeper entered the residence, woke up the husband and forced him out of the house. She then grabbed a large kitchen knife and held him at knife-point outside of the house. With the wife and son present, she said she was going to kill the husband. He was able to break free and the family ran inside a neighbor’s house for safety and to call 911. The attacker, meanwhile, was banging on the glass door with the knife, attempting to gain entry.

Upon arrival of Officer Rezaie and other officers, the housekeeper approached them, still carrying the knife. With officers giving loud verbal commands to drop the knife, she continued toward them.

Officers are trained to react to a potentially fatal attack to stop the threat against themselves or the public. For attacks with edged weapons, including knives, the “21 foot rule” has historically been accepted as the minimum reasonable distance officers have to defend themselves. Recent training leans toward a “situational response” rather than a fixed distance. Newer principles recommend or encourage officers to use all available resources and options to avoid the use of deadly force.

In this incident, the housekeeper got to within 15 feet of the officers while still disobeying their clear commands to drop the knife. At that moment, Officer Rezaie deployed his Taser, causing the subject to drop the knife and fall to the ground. Officers were then able to take her into custody without injury or further trouble.

For this particular incident, Officer Rezaie’s performance and critical decision making proved the recent trend toward “situational response” is valid. Sound judgment, attention to training, instincts and common sense by Officer Rezaie resulted in the best outcome in this situation.

 source: City of South Miami Police Department