SAN ANTONIO – A former San Antonio Police Department officer fired after investigators said he kneeled on a suspect’s neck during a 2019 disturbance call has been reinstated to the department, KSAT Investigates confirmed on Friday.
Officer Michael Brewer is scheduled to begin return-to-duty training on Tuesday. He also avoided going to arbitration to get his discipline overturned, officials confirmed.
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Brewer was handed an indefinite suspension in 2020, months after he and a second SAPD officer, Andre Vargas, were accused of using excessive force on a suspect during a November 2019 disturbance call at Commercial Avenue and Grosvenor Boulevard.
Although the man “appeared to provide no resistance,” investigators said Brewer caused “unnecessary physical violence” when he placed his left knee on the man’s neck, according to the suspension document.
Vargas also “used unnecessary force when he lifted (the man) off the ground in handcuffs by his arms, causing him unnecessary and unwarranted pain,” according to suspension records.
Vargas also deployed his Taser “when that level of force far exceeded the reasonable force necessary to accomplish the arrest,” the records stated.
The arrested man filed a complaint against the officers in January 2020, according to records.
Vargas, who was also handed an indefinite suspension for the incident, went through arbitration in June and December 2023.
Vargas was reinstated to SAPD last year, after the arbitrator ruled that SAPD Chief William McManus appeared to not have a strong command of all the facts of the case when he testified at the 2023 hearing.
Brewer was tentatively scheduled to have his reinstatement case go before a third-party arbitrator early this year, but those proceedings have now been canceled.
An SAPD spokesman said via email Friday the department anticipates Brewer’s indefinite suspension will be reduced.
The length of the reduced suspension, which Brewer would likely get credit for already serving, has not been determined.
A Bexar County grand jury indicted Brewer in March 2022 for felony unlawful restraint.
Prosecutors, however, dismissed the case in May 2023.
Brewer’s defense attorney, Ben Sifuentes, previously told KSAT that SAPD and the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office demonstrated “gross incompetence” by pursuing the case criminally.
Read more reporting on the KSAT Investigates page.