Strange Justice

2012-01-28T17:50:00.001+10:00

$22m for man kept in solitary confinement for TWO YEARS with no trial after DWI arrest

A man held in solitary confinement for two years and forced to pull his own tooth because he was denied dental care has been awarded $22million for violation of his constitutional rights.

Stephen Slevin, 58, from New Mexico, was given the payout after accusing Dona Ana County jail of essentially forgetting about him after he was arrested for driving while intoxicated, not giving him the healthcare he needed and treating him inhumanely.

The settlement is one of the largest federal civil rights awards in history involving an inmate.

Outside the federal courthouse in Santa Fe today, Mr Slevin said it was never about the money for him but more about sending a message that prisoners should be treated more humanely. He still suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder stemming from what he says was physical and mental mistreatment by corrections officials in Dona Ana County, in the southern part of the state.

He told KOB4.com: 'It was never about the money. We made a statement about what happened to me. 'Prison officials were walking by me every day, watching me deteriorate. Day after day after day, they did nothing, nothing at all, to get me any help.'

The 58-year-old was arrested in August 2005 and charged with driving while intoxicated and receiving a stolen vehicle near Las Cruces. His lawyer said that, due to his history of mental illness, he was placed into solitary confinement.

Civil rights attorney Matthew Coyte revealed it was here that his client started to deteriorate.

He said: 'They threw him in solitary and then ignored him. He disappeared into delirium, and his mental illness was made worse by being isolated from human contact and a lack of medical care.'

While Mr Slevin was in solitary confinement, his toenails grew so long they began to curl around his feet, he developed bedsores, fungus and dental problems and lost a lot of weight, according to the lawsuit.

He was eventually released after 22 months as a pre-trial detainee and the charges against him were dismissed.

It was upon his release that he filed the lawsuit, claiming his rights of due process were violated since he was not given a hearing before being placed in solitary confinement.

The county had recently offered to settle the case for $2million, according to CNN, despite previously denying there was a lack of medical care and that, as government employees, county officials deserved immunity from liability.

Mr Coyte told KOB.com that he hopes Mr Slevin's court victory will send a message throughout the state. He said: 'I have never been with or seen a braver man who stood up to these guys for what they did to him. 'It affects everybody and it's not good for this country. 'It's not good for Mr Slevin for sure and it's not good for this country. It has to stop.'

Original report here

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2012-01-27T19:03:00.000+10:00

Illinois man gets $25M for wrongful conviction

More details of the case here. He was released in 2009

A Cook County jury awarded $25 million Tuesday to a man who sued the city of Chicago after he spent more than half of his life in prison for a murder he didn't commit.

Thaddeus Jimenez was 13 years old when he was convicted in 1993 for the murder of 19-year-old Eric Morro. Jimenez served 16 years of a 45-year sentence in prison before prosecutors asked a judge to vacate his conviction and he received a certificate of innocence in 2009.

Jimenez, who's now 32 years old, is "thrilled" with the verdict, according to attorney Jon Loevy. "Every time he's ever stepped into a courtroom, something bad has happened," Loevy said. "And this time, justice was served."

In a civil suit filed in 2009 against the city of Chicago and several officers, Jimenez accused police of ignoring the evidence against another teen, including a recorded confession, in order to frame him. That teen, who was also 13 at the time, was charged with the murder weeks after Jimenez was released from prison, attorneys say.

Officers coerced Morro's friend and other eyewitnesses to identify him as the gunman. No physical evidence linked him to the crime. Morro was shot and killed on Feb. 3, 1993, as he walked with a friend.

Chicago Law Department spokesman Roderick Drew said the city is "very disappointed" in the decision. "The city will be exploring all available options," Drew said.

Rob Warden, executive director of Northwestern Law School's Center on Wrongful Convictions, said he believes the $25 million award is the largest ever given in a wrongful conviction civil case.

In 2007, the city of Chicago agreed to pay nearly $20 million to settle lawsuits filed by four former death row inmates who claimed they were tortured by Chicago police officers and wrongly convicted.

Original report here

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2012-01-26T19:03:00.000+10:00

TX: Constable, staffers indicted on bribery charges

Dangerous nut bribes his way into a police job

Constable Jack Abercia, a veteran lawman with more than 41 years of service in Harris County's Precinct 1, faces a bevy of criminal charges in a corruption probe that also has snared two of his top staffers.

A federal indictment unsealed Thursday alleges rampant abuses within Abercia's office, accusing the constable of conspiring to sell information from a law enforcement database, accepting a bribe for hiring an unqualified deputy and sending his employees on personal errands on county time.

Federal agents arrested Abercia, 78, Chief Lt. Weldon Kenneth Wiener, 72, and former Office Chief Michael Butler, 56, on Thursday. Abercia, who has colon cancer and plans to resign at the end of month, pleaded not guilty before a federal magistrate in Houston federal court.

"I'm just shocked and sad that a long career would kind of culminate at that kind of point," said Precinct 1 Commissioner El Franco Lee. "The rest of it will take its own course. I feel bad for him, I feel bad for the office, and hopefully we can do the things that need to be done to shore it up and keep the business moving and restore any integrity that was lost."

Attorneys for Abercia, who has been the constable in Precinct 1 since 1991, said they knew little about Thursday's charges. "I look forward to finding out what the government says and thinks he did wrong," said Rusty Hardin, his attorney.

Access to database

The 13-count indictment accuses Abercia and Wiener of soliciting and accepting money from companies interested in running background checks on prospective employees through the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database, which is restricted to law enforcement use.

The indictment alleges 11 specific acts of misuse of NCIC in November, accusing Abercia of accepting about $9,000 total for running checks on about a dozen prospective employees of a power washing company with ties to the government's confidential informant in the case. Though the indictment focuses on the November incidents, prosecutors say the practice had been going on in the constable's office for a longer period of time.

Abercia and Butler are charged with bribery in connection with the hiring of an otherwise unqualified deputy constable in return for an alleged $5,000 bribe in July 2010.

As part of their investigation, FBI agents seized the file of one deputy, Allen Tomas James, according to officials within Abercia's office.

Precinct 1 Assistant Chief J.C. Mosier said James, 30, was rejected by a internal screening board that reviewed his background when he applied for a job in mid-2010. "He hadn't worked for five years," Mosier said. "He had already been turned down by seven police agencies before he got to us."

Mosier recalled that James, besides lacking law enforcement experience, seemed to have a fascination with firearms. "Everyone on the review board said, 'No, we aren't hiring this guy,'" he said. "We took it in to the constable and said, 'We can't have this guy; there's no way we can hire him.' Well, a couple of weeks later, they did."

Allegedly split $5,000

The indictment alleges that Butler took the $5,000 bribe related to the hiring of an unqualified deputy and kept $2,000, giving the remaining $3,000 to Abercia.

A Harris County official confirmed Thursday that James is no longer with the constable's office.

During their initial appearance in federal court, Judge Stephen Smith freed the trio on bond with several requirements, including not having guns in their homes and not talking to each other or witnesses.

If convicted of the conspiracy charge, all three men face up to five years in prison. Abercia and Wiener potentially face an additional five years in prison for each count of exceeding authorized computer access. Abercia and Butler also could receive an additional 10 years in prison if convicted of the bribery charge.

"Individuals that commit law enforcement corruption … took an oath at some point in their careers," said Houston FBI Special Agent in Charge Stephen Morris. "When they make a conscious effort to sell that or violate it, I think that strikes at the heart of our communities."

Replacement in wings

Abercia withdrew his re-election bid in December, citing his illness, then announced this month he would resign Jan. 31. He has denied that his decision to withdraw his candidacy was related to the FBI probe.

Butler, Abercia's former office chief, left the constable's office at the end of December.

Commissioners Court this week named Ken Berry, a retired major who served 35 years with the sheriff's office, to take Abercia's post at the end of the month. Berry has said he does not plan to seek the office permanently.

The Harris County Attorney's Office is investigating all eight county constable offices in a wide-ranging review focusing on charitable organizations run by constables and a program that allows neighborhood groups to hire constables for local security patrols.

Original report here

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2012-01-25T16:13:00.001+10:00

Cop "felt threatened" by chained-up dog

A police officer in Dekalb County near Atlanta responded to a 911 call on Wednesday and shot a pet German Shepherd just moments before finding out he responded to the wrong address.

Now, the owners of the dog are outraged, and there seems little they can do about this very sad incident.

One of the owners told WAGA-TV: ”When I opened the door I started screaming, I said this dog has been shot. I saw nothing but blood… he killed that dog. She added ”It frustrated me because he was so quick to kill the dog.”

The 2-year-old German Shepherd, named “Easy,” was still chained up when the officer shot it. He later stated that he “felt threatened.”

Even more agitating for the owners, though, was that the police officer was investigating the wrong home. He was supposed to be on the scene of a domestic disturbance call across the street.

“Why did you shoot my dog?… I did not call you,” Easy’s owner said she yelled at the police officer.

The officer was not placed on administrative leave and is back on the streets already, though internal affairs was apparently investigating.

Original report here

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2012-01-23T14:02:00.001+10:00

International Day of Solidarity with Leonard Peltier

The Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee calls on supporters worldwide to protest against the injustice suffered by Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier. Gather on February 4, 2012, at every federal court house and U.S. embassy or consulate worldwide to demand the freedom of a man wrongfully convicted and illegal imprisoned for 36 years!

Leonard Peltier is a Native American activist wrongfully accused in 1975 in connection with the shooting deaths of two agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Government documents show that, without any evidence at all, the FBI decided from the beginning of its investigation to 'lock Peltier into the case'.

U.S. prosecutors knowingly presented false statements to a Canadian court to extradite Mr. Peltier to the U.S. The statements were signed by a woman who was forced by FBI agents to say she was an eyewitness. The government has long since admitted that the woman was not present during the shootings.

Meanwhile, in a separate trial in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Mr. Peltier's co-defendants were acquitted by reason of self defense. Had Leonard been tried with his co-defendants, he also would have been acquitted.

Unhappy with the outcome of the Cedar Rapids trial, prosecutors set the stage for Mr. Peltier's conviction. His trial was moved to an area known for its anti-Indian sentiment —Fargo, North Dakota. The trial judge had a reputation for ruling against Indians, and a juror is known to have made racist comments during Mr. Peltier's trial.

FBI documents prove that the U.S. government went so far as to manufacture the so-called murder weapon, the most critical evidence in the prosecution's case. A ballistics test proved,
however, that the gun and shell casings entered into evidence didn't match. The FBI hid this fact from the jury. Mr. Peltier was convicted and sentenced to two consecutive life terms.

According to court records, the United States Attorney who prosecuted the case has twice admitted that no one even knows who fired the fatal shots.

Leonard Peltier is 67 years old and in poor health. An accomplished author and artist, Mr. Peltier is renowned for his humanitarian achievements. In 2009, Leonard was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for the sixth consecutive year.

Although the courts have acknowledged evidence of government misconduct—including forcing witnesses to lie and hiding ballistics evidence reflecting his innocence—Mr. Peltier has
been denied a new trial on a legal technicality. Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, 55 Members of Congress and others—including a judge who sat as a member of the court in two of Mr. Peltier’s appeals—have all called for his immediate release.

The Courts may not be able to act but Barack Obama, as President, can. Please join with us to free an innocent man. On February 4, 2012, tell Obama to grant clemency to Leonard Peltier.

Original report here

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2012-01-23T14:02:00.000+10:00

Britain: Muslim police officer who raped girl, seven, is jailed for 18 years

A policeman was starting an 18-year jail sentence today for sex abuse which a judge described as one of the ‘most despicable’ cases he had ever heard. The 43-year-old officer was sacked from Thames Valley Police after being disciplined for repeatedly threatening witnesses who had lodged complaints against him.

He had also phoned a 14-year-old girl witness in a case he was dealing with and asking her to go on a date him.

Judge Francis Sheriden jailed paedophile policeman Mohammed Younas after hearing how he raped a girl who was just seven years old and continued to abuse her for eight years.

He had also turned up to work drunk after consuming a bottle of vodka and was found wandering the streets randomly stopping traffic whilst on duty.

Despite his dismissal from the force, the judge heard that the sexual abuse of the girl, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, increased. Younas attacked the young girl, the court was told, because his wife refused to have sex with him. He also forced another child to touch his genitals.

‘This was the most despicable offence. It's hard to imagine a worse case,’ Judge Sheridan told the disgraced constable as he stood in the dock at Aylesbury Crown Court.

Younas had denied the 15 counts of rape and sexual assault against him but was found guilty by a jury and on Friday was sentenced to 18 years in prison.

The court had heard Younas came to the UK from Pakistan and was descended from a respectable family with two of his sisters being consultant doctors and another being a headteacher. His father was a retired colonel in the Pakistan Army.

However the judge was told that Younas, from High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, suffered a nervous breakdown due to his unhappy marriage and went off the rails as a police officer. It was during the breakdown that the abuse started and continued until the girl had reached the age of 15 years.

At the height of the abuse Younas would rape her every other day and the court heard he would make her touch him whilst they both played a board game.

Judge Sheridan said: ‘You and your wife were totally incompatible, there was a clash of cultures and views on family life.

‘You were dismissed from the police because you were totally unsuitable to be a police officer. You displayed signs of a man on the verge of a breakdown. ‘You walked around the street drunk, stopping traffic. You threatened witnesses who made complaints against you and you rang a 14-year-old girl to ask her to go out with you.

‘The offending started at around the same time. You showed contempt for your wife and you left your victims psychologically damaged. You robbed them of their childhood. ‘It's the most dreadful, dreadful case I must sentence you for.’

As well as being jailed for 18 years, Younas was handed a Sexual Offences Prevention Order banning him from unsupervised contact or communication with a person under 16.

He was put on the Sex Offenders Register for an indefinite period and given a restraining order banning him from contacting the victims.

Original report here

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2012-01-22T13:50:00.002+10:00

Shocking moment a 66-year-old-dementia sufferer is kicked to the ground and beaten by police officer who tried to delete video from his police car camera

This is the shocking moment a police officer launches a vicious assault on a 66-year-old-dementia sufferer. Officer Derek Middendorf then tried to cover his tracks by deleting the recording from his dashcam. [Video at link]

But it has been recovered by technicians in Florida, in the US, and now the attorney for victim Albert Flowers told Florida Today that his client was prepared to sue the city of Melbourne.

'He should be fired,' attorney Paul Bross said of Officer Derek Middendorf. 'Anyone who’s being pulled over by this officer should be terrified.' 'It’s clear (Officer Middendorf) tried to destroy all the video in this case. He thought he had turned off the camera, and that’s why he acted the way he did.'

The video shows Flowers calmly walking towards the police cruiser before Officer Middendorf suddenly delivers a kick to his groin. Before Flowers is able to get up, the policeman drops to his knees and pounds his fists into Mr Flowers’ face. Mr Flowers spent a month in the hospital after the beating.

Melbourne City Attorney Paul Gougelman promised to review the video to see if the city had any responsibility to pay for Mr Flowers’ health care. 'What I urge everybody to do is stand back and let the dust settle,' Mr Gougelman said. 'There is always more to the story. It’s always important to have a good working relationship in the community.'

Charges against Flowers were dropped by the Brevard County State Attorney’s Office after they learned about his dementia.

Middendorf was initially reprimanded for tampering with the recording device, but the city chose not pursue an administrative review at the time.

'Information regarding the arrest of Albert Flowers was sufficient to indicate that an internal investigation was not warranted,' Melbourne Police Chief Steve Mimbs said in a press advisory before the video was released. 'Officer Derek Middendorf is a valued officer whose record since joining the department in 2005 reflects the fact that he has done a very good job for the city.'

Middendorf indicated in his report that he used force against Flowers after the man did not obey orders to stop moving toward him. The officer said he suspected Mr Flowers may have had a knife. 'I had to react and protect myself in fear he was going to attack me,' the report said. 'Not knowing if he was still armed or not … I struck the defendant in the face to distract him.'

Mr Flowers’ dementia has worsened since returning home from the hospital, according to his granddaughter, Donna Jackson. 'The family’s just upset by the whole thing,'Ms Jackson explained. 'We are glad they dropped the charges. We just want to move forward.'

Original report here

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2012-01-21T15:52:00.001+10:00

From the Right To Resist the 'Duty To Submit'

Anne Dekins was a loud-mouthed party girl – or at least, that's what the arrest warrant suggested. Whatever she may have done in the past, Miss Dekins was quietly minding her own business when Officer Samuel Bray found her on the street and began to haul her away.

Dekins wasn’t inclined to go quietly, and she put up a struggle. Her cries for help attracted the interest of several armed men led by an individual named Tooley, who confronted Bray and demanded to know what he was doing to the frantic woman. The officer produced his official credentials and insisted that he was making a lawful arrest for "disorderly conduct." When witnesses disputed that description, Bray called for backup.

Tooley and his associates ordered Bray to release the woman, and then took action to enforce that lawful order. After Bray’s partner was killed in the ensuing struggle, Tooley and his associates were arrested for murder. The trial court threw out the murder charge, ruling that the warrant was defective. Since the arrest was illegal, the court pointed out, Dekins had a right to resist – and bystanders likewise had a right, if not a positive duty, to assist her. The defendants were eventually found guilty of manslaughter, but quickly pardoned and set free.

By trying to enforce an invalid warrant, Bray "did not act as a constable, but a common oppressor," observed the trial court. Tooley and the other bystanders were properly "provoked" by the act of aggressive violence against Anne Dekins, and their forceful but measured response – first demanding that the abductor release the hostage, then exercising defensive force to free her – was entirely appropriate.

Lawless violence against the helpless "is a sufficient provocation to all people out of compassion" in any circumstance, observed the court, "much more where it is done under a colour of justice, and where the liberty of the subject is invaded…." In fact, an act of that kind carried out by a law enforcement official is nothing less than "a provocation to all the subjects of England."

Every Englishman "ought to be concerned for Magna Charta and the laws," concluded the Queen’s Bench in the 1710 case Queen v. Tooley. "And if any one against the law imprison a man, he is an offender against Magna Charta." .....

Buehler, 34, is a combat veteran of Kosovo and Iraq, West Point graduate, and middle school teacher. He was serving as a designated driver on the morning of New Year’s Day when he saw a woman being abused by police outside a 7-11. The costumed assailants, officers Pat Oborski and Robert Snider, were conducting what they called a DWI arrest of a woman later identified as Norma Pizana.

To Buehler and his friends, the spectacle looked more like a gang assault.

"We hear a loud scream, and we look over, and we see the cop violently yanking the female out of the car onto the ground," Buehler told local ABC affiliate KVUE. "She is screaming. The other cop ran up and they both sort of grabbed her arms. Her hands were behind her back straight out and they lifted her up by her arms. It looked extremely painful."

With the help of a friend, Buehler began to document this act of "street justice" with his cell phone. That prompted Oborski to confront Buehler, who was not interfering in any way.

According to Buehler, Oborski barked, "What the hell are you taking pictures for?"

"My response was, `I am allowed to. Public official in a public place.'"

As he was trained to, Oborski started to lie in an effort to devise a cover charge against Buehler. First he claimed that Buehler was somehow "interfering with the investigation," which was patently untrue. Then the cop assaulted Buhler by pushing the unresisting man – who would have been more than a match for the donut-grazer, had he chosen to fight back – up against a truck.

"Once he had me pinned up against the back of the truck he kept leaning in," Buehler continued. "He kept pushing me."

Eventually Oborski got so close that Buehler actually breathed on him – which gave him a pretext to accuse the witness of "spitting" on him. With some difficulty, and Snider’s help, Oborski wrestled Buehler (who offered only passive resistance) to the ground and handcuffed him. The cops took Beuhler to a BAT van – a patently unreliable mobile alcohol testing unit – in the hope of documenting that the witness was intoxicated, which he wasn't. The cop finally settled on charging him with "harassing a public servant" – a third-degree felony – and "resisting arrest."

As is always the case in incidents of this kind, Buehler wasn’t arrested for an actual crime; he was vindictively punished for "contempt of cop."

"You don’t f*** with cops," Oborski snarled at Buehler. "You don’t get in our f***ing way. You don’t question us, and we’re going to teach you a lesson."

Norma Pizana’s plight was strikingly similar to that of Anne Dekins, with at least one critical difference: Dekins and her rescuers were blessed to live in 18th Century England, a relatively civilized society that recognized and protected a free individual’s indispensable right to resist State-licensed criminal violence.

Original report here

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2012-01-20T16:19:00.001+10:00

Supreme Court: Lawyers abandoned Alabama inmate

Ruling gives man on death row a chance to appeal

An Alabama death-row inmate deserves a new court hearing because his lawyers at a top-flight New York firm abandoned him, the Supreme Court ruled Wednesday in a case one justice called "a veritable perfect storm of misfortune."

The court voted 7-2 to reverse a federal appeals-court ruling that cut off appeals for Cory Maples, who was convicted of killing two men execution-style in 1995. Maples missed a deadline to appeal when court notices to his lawyers at the Sullivan and Cromwell firm were returned unopened and a local clerk took no further action.

Deadlines usually are sacrosanct at the high court, where defendants typically are held responsible for the mistakes of their lawyers. But Maples' case is different because he is facing execution and his lawyers didn't simply err, they abandoned him, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said in her majority opinion.

"Through no fault of his own, Maples, an inmate on death row, was left unrepresented at a critical time," Ginsburg said in an opinion that also criticized Alabama for using inexperienced lawyers and paying them poorly to represent defendants in death-penalty cases.

But Justice Samuel Alito, who often votes against criminal defendants, said in a separate opinion that Maples' circumstances were unique: "What occurred here was not a predictable consequence of the Alabama system, but a veritable perfect storm of misfortune."

Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas dissented. Scalia said the court should have stuck with its usual practice of holding defendants responsible for their lawyers' mistakes.

Wednesday's decision means a court will hear Maples' claims that his inexperienced trial lawyers did such a bad job that their work violated the Constitution's guarantee of representation.

Original report here

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2012-01-19T16:26:00.001+10:00

Smart cyclist refuses to let British cop exceed his powers

They are the bane of motorists' and pedestrians' lives - cyclists who jump red lights - but when one hapless policeman confronted a biker, he was comprehensively out-talked and outsmarted.

A video of the exchange captured on the cyclist's helmet gives a display of police impotence to deal with a minority of cyclists with the rules standing as they currently do.

It is understandable, then, that an officer identified only as PC Stout, appeared to become frustrated and reached out for the head camera in a row over a traffic fine.

After being stopped for allegedly jumping a red light on Edgware Road, Central London, the biker refuses to give his details, telling the policeman that he is not obliged to do so.

PC Stout then threatens the man with arrest citing IDCOPPLAN as a law when in fact it is a police guideline that helps them decide whether or not to make an arrest. However, the biker sticks to his guns, seemingly aware that this is not a law and challenges the officer's knowledge.

The cyclist says 'Before I give you my surname can you tell me what the detail of that law is?' Unable to answer the question directly, PC Stout said: 'You're obliged to give me your details for me to issue you a ticket.'

He does not give the information requested in order for a ticket to be handed to him, and the officer admits that he doesn't know the wording.

After the cyclist asks 'You are telling me you don't need to know what the law is?', the policeman asks if he wants to turn the camera off. The biker said: 'No I don't want to turn it off. It's my right to carry it with me and to film this to make sure for my own protection and for yours.'

He is then asked for his documents but, as he is not driving a car, he does not have any documents to hand over.

PC Stout repeats his threat saying 'I have got no further option but to arrest you.'

The exchange continues until the biker says 'how am I meant to know what I am doing?' but is cut off as PC Stout appears to put his hand over the camera.

Before cycling off he shouts 'Can you not touch me? You touched the camera, you tried to touch the camera, don't you dare do that.'

A Met Police spokesman said: We were first made aware of this video in June 2011 when the incident was published on YouTube and the officer concerned received advice with regards to use of the Road Traffic Act.

'The cyclist concerned was later spoken to about this matter. The officer was right to stop the cyclist and we would like to remind all cyclists of the dangers of not stopping when a red light is shown at traffic lights.'

Original report here

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2012-01-18T21:16:00.001+10:00

Eight British cops resign over illegal searches of dozens of people using police files

Eight police staff have lost their jobs after illegally accessing the confidential records of dozens of people on the Police National Computer. Of the eight, one police officer and one community support officer (PCSO) are facing criminal charges after an investigation by Essex Police found them guilty of gross misconduct. Another PCSO has been cautioned.

All eight are alleged to have accessed the personal records of members of the public and passed on the information to people outside the force.

The force launched an inquiry after a whistle-blower told senior officers about ‘routine abuses’ of the computer system, which contains personal information on millions of people.

Essex Police have confirmed the officer and two PCSOs were arrested in December on suspicion of accessing confidential files in breach of the Data Protection Act. The force refused to comment on what information they were accessing.

A source close to the investigation told The Mail on Sunday that those involved had also routinely attempted to access the private details of celebrities – although this has been denied by the force.

An internal investigation was launched by the force in November to analyse the search history of all 5,500 members of staff from the beginning of October.

Last year, three officers in Essex resigned and several other members of staff were disciplined for similar abuses of the computer system.

Chief Superintendent Dave Folkard, of Essex Police, said: ‘Five staff and three officers have resigned under investigation for breaches of the Data Protection Act. We are committed to maintaining the highest professional standards.’

Original report here

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2012-01-17T13:31:00.001+10:00

British cops plied boy, 17, with cider before he admitted crimes he could not have committed (AND they keep their jobs!)

A teenage boy was given strong cider by police before being questioned over a series of burglaries, a disciplinary hearing was told. Sean Wall, 17, was taken to a police station and given alcohol before being quizzed over 11 burglaries - which he admitted while under the influence.

But the plan backfired when it emerged Sean was already behind bars at the time of five of the break-ins.

During the interview Sean managed to make a phone call to his solicitor saying he had been plied with alcohol by police. His solicitor demanded the custody sergeant breathalyse the youngster and he tested positive for alcohol.

The officers were suspended and the Independent Police Complaints Commission was called in to carry out a full investigation.

But the two Cardiff-based detectives have kept their jobs after a gross misconduct hearing held by South Wales Police behind closed doors.

Detective Constable Neville Bradbury, who bought the Strongbow cider, was given a final written warning for gross misconduct.

Detective Constable Geraint Jones escaped with a written warning after the panel found he failed to challenge the provision of alcohol to the under-age suspect - or report it. Both officers were found guilty of misconduct for being obstructive when Sean asked for a solicitor.

The two detectives arrested Sean in February 2010 while he was in a young offenders' institution. The hearing, held in private, was told alcohol was given to a ‘vulnerable male’ who was an under-age drinker at the time.

The police officers were cleared of giving the teenager a KFC meal, cigarettes and a trip to see his mother as inducements to get him to confess to the crimes he did not commit.

The allegations unfolded after Sean, now 19, was collected from Parc Young Offender Institution in Bridgend, South Wales - where he was being held after admitting two thefts.

He was allegedly taken on a trip around the Cardiff suburbs of Rumney and St Mellons where the officers pointed out locations where burglaries had been carried out. They then took Sean to Cardiff Bay Police Station and allegedly asked him to confess to the raids telling him admitting the crimes would not increase his sentence when he appears before a crown court judge.

South Wales Police could boost its detection rate by showing it had solved the crimes - and claim to be providing a better service.

But during interviews the youngster telephoned his solicitor, Nadeem Majjid, and said the officers had given him cider. Mr Majid demanded the custody sergeant breathalyse Sean and tests showed he was over the drink drive limit.

Mr Majid said today ‘Getting my client to admit things he hadn't done in the hope it will improve crime figures takes policing back 25 years. ‘It's likely in his condition he'd have agreed to anything.

‘Sean and his family are pleased that the IPCC upheld their complaint and the matter can be put to a close. ‘This goes as a warning that such behaviour will not be tolerated.’

His mother Angela Rosier, 42, yesterday slammed the decision of South Wales Police to allow the two officers to remain in their jobs. Mrs Rosier said: ‘I think it is disgusting, how can they keep their jobs, they're definitely in the wrong career.

‘Sean cannot believe how they are allowed to stay. ‘I'm not leaving it like this, I am going to take this as far I can and am currently talking to my solicitor about further action.’

Sean's brother Luke, 22, added: ‘This is not on is it? They really stitched Sean up and they should have got more than a slap on the wrist.’

Original report here

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2012-01-16T14:30:00.001+10:00

How Arkansas police 'forced innocent boy, 12, to confess to strangling his sister, 11'

A 12-year-old boy found guilty of murdering his 11-year-old sister said he was forced to confess to the murder after hours of 'terrifying' police interrogation - although he had nothing to do with it.

Police suspected Thomas Cogdell, now 18, had strangled his sister at their Camden, Arkansas home after his shock at her death stunned him into silence. Hours later, he admitted he was to blame.

Although found guilty, Cogdell insists he had no part in her murder and was coerced into a confession. After two years in jail, he was released when a judge found he was unfairly questioned.

During questioning following the 2006 crime, the boy - an intelligent bookworm - told police 36 times he had had no part in the killing. But when he asked for food, officers switched off the tape recorder. Three-and-a-half hours later they switched it on again - and Cogdell confessed to the murder.

They had allegedly used tactics such as threatening him with the death penalty. He was unaware a child cannot be sentenced to such a penalty.

He eventually told police he had snapped because his sister was bossy and he put the bags over her head to teach her a lesson, The Commerical Appeal reported. But in reality, he had made up the confession, believing that DNA evidence would clear him.

Police had told him they found a fingerprint on the plastic bags. He can be heard at the end of the recording whispering to his mother: 'I didn't do it. It's OK, Mom. They won't find my fingerprints.'

As it turned out, police were unable to read a clear print and the boy was found guilty of murdering his young sister as she slept.

'I was terrified,' Cogdell, now 18, said in a recent interview. 'They wouldn't believe me and they said they would give me the death penalty.'

The case is just the latest example fuelling the debate about whether police interrogations should be recorded.

In August 2006, Cogdell was awoken by his mother, Melody Jones. Together they found 11-year-old Kaylee sprawled on her bed.

Her head was covered with two Walmart bags, and she had been tied up with the family dog's lead and a measuring tape, The Commerical Appeal reported.

When his mother became too hysterical, he calmly called 911 and gave directions to their family home. Police dragged him in for questioning, turning their attentions away from his mother, who Cogdell and his grandparents insist is guilty of the murder.

Melody Jones admitted to police she had repeatedly smacked her daughter the night before her death when she refused to come home as she had been told. They ignored her confession that she was on Social Security disability due to mental illness, including bipolar disorder, and that she sometimes failed to take her medicine.

A video of the questioning show investigators repeatedly telling the boy: 'You or your mother did it.'

Although an unknown male's DNA was found on Kaylee, investigators ruled out the possibility of an intruder as there were no signs of a break in.

Cogdell said when the recorder was off, he was told he could go home if he told investigators he was to blame and he'd go to jail if he didn't, according to The Commerical Appeal.

But in at least 36 recorded denials, he is heard pleading with police. 'I wouldn't kill my sister. I didn't do it, OK?,' he said. 'I didn't. I didn't kill my sister. Is there any way I can prove that to you?'

Crying, he offered to swear on a Bible or take a polygraph test. One of the detectives asked: 'What are you crying for?' He responded: 'Because you are accusing me of something I didn't do -- of killing my sister.' When police left, Thomas let out shrill cries and said to himself: 'Why? ... I didn't do it, but they won't believe me. Help. I'm scared.'

He was eventually convicted of second-degree murder by a Ouachita County judge in March 2008.

The high court threw out the confession in 2010 - but on technical grounds as he had told police he didn't understand what it meant to waive his rights to remain silent and have an attorney with him. He served two years in jail but has not been cleared.

'I lost my faith in the justice system,' Cogdell said. 'I don't believe in any of it anymore.'

Memphis defense attorney Gray Bartlett told The Commerical Appeal that police are often trained in the type of military tactics used in questioning suspected terrorists. 'It's so contrary to common sense,' he said of false confessions. 'But what happens in these interrogation rooms is that they break down people's will.'

Steve Drizin, a lawyer with the Center on Wrongful Conviction of Youth, said: 'The interrogation is one of the most riveting examples of psychological torture I have ever seen.'

But prosecuting attorney Robin Carroll to the Appeal: 'No evidence or court holding has been forthcoming to cause my office to doubt anything done in the case, or its basis.'

Original report here

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2012-01-15T16:44:00.001+10:00

I fought the law and I won: Clash roadie wins damages over racist beating by 19 British cops in 23-hour ordeal

He would have got millions in the USA

Don Lorenzo has been awarded damages for the physical and racial abuse he suffered at the hands of police. A former roadie for The Clash who was called a ‘f****** n***er’ as he was viciously assaulted by a group of policemen has won more than a year’s wages in damages.

The judge said he made the award to Don Lorenzo, a Rastafarian, to show ‘the courts and society’s disapproval of the racial slurs’.
Mr Lorenzo , 58, suffered cuts and bruises to his entire body in a 23-hour ordeal that happened outside his home and even in a police station after he was arrested for a crime he didn’t commit.

The incident in 2007, in which up to 19 officers were involved, left him with carpel tunnel syndrome in his wrists which ended his career as an African drummer.

Now in his case against West Midlands police a jury found in his favour following a six-day trial at Birmingham County Court.
The judge, Recorder Adrian Jack, awarded the former freelance drummer - a roadie for rock legends The Clash, who sang the hit I Fought The Law And The Law Won - damages totalling £17,000 - including £5,000 in aggravated damage.

He also awarded Mr Lorenzo 100 per cent of his costs estimated in the region of £50,000 against the Chief Constable of the West Midlands.

Mr Jack also pointed out that Mr Lorenzo’s ‘extreme distress’ was ‘excacerbated by the racial abuse received on arrest’.

After the award his solicitor Nick Turner said: ‘I’ve dealt with some cases of assault by police in my time, but this is tinged with terrible racism and leaves an awful taste in the mouth.
‘An innocent father was dealt with in a deplorable way and that was partly to do with the colour of his skin. ‘The case against the police was black and white and the jury rightly found in Mr Lorenzo’s favour.’

On November 20, 2007, Mr Lorenzo’s teenage daughter called the police falsely alleging he’d hit her when he arrived home in Edgbaston, Birmingham, accompanied by the caretaker for his block of flats. His daughter Kaya, now 20, had no marks on her and Don thought the police would tell her off for wasting their time.

But instead began a 23-hour ordeal with him being racially abused and assaulted numerous times by police officers, the court was told.

He was punched in the mouth several times, kicked and dragged down five flights of stairs from his fifth storey home and then when taken to Bournville Lane Police Station - where he was assaulted again, the court heard.

After his victory in court Don said: ‘All along I realised what was going on and that my action was against all the odds. ‘I am a realist and I knew that there was just me saying that 19 police officers were wrong.

‘I was acquitted in the criminal courts and this case was no different. The police officers have been shown to be racist. ‘They were shown to have called me a f***ing n***er when I was on the floor outside my home.

‘They continually racially abused me as they dragged me down the stairs. But justice has now been done with the jury finding in my favour and the judge awarding substantial damages.’

Mr Turner added: ‘The costs for bringing this claim are expected to be in the region of £50,000 on each side - that’s a bill of £100,000 for the British taxpayer.

‘There should be no place in society for racists, to find them in the police force is absolutely sickening. ‘Whilst the Metropolitan Police appear to be learning the lessons of the Macpherson Report they are clearly very hard of hearing in the West Midlands. ‘This was a very highly violent, racist assault by officers of the West Midlands force on a UK citizen with Afro-Caribbean heritage and it was compounded by his false imprisonment for more than 23 hours.

‘It is astonishing that the police have never once apologised for their actions - particularly with the damages being fixed so close to the conviction of Gary Dobson and David Norris for the murder of Stephen Lawrence when abhorrent racism is so prominent on our agenda as a society.’

West Midlands Police requested leave to appeal. The force could not be reached for comment.

Original report here

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2012-01-14T17:26:00.001+10:00

Iraq war veteran captures police brutality on mobile phone

An Iraq war veteran has captured dramatic footage of a police officer punching a homeless woman in the face on a city bus back home in Los Angeles.

Police are investigating the assault after Jeremiah Green shot the video on his mobile phone and smuggled the memory card past the officers when they demanded it.

Mr Green was able to pass the card into his mouth while smoking and then to his fiancée with a kiss.

“It turned my stomach,” he said. “You just don’t just swing and sock someone in the face. I think that’s real uncalled for.”

The attack happened after the homeless woman – believed to be mentally ill - called the deputy sheriff a "big shot".

Original report here. A somewhat longer account here. The cops are toughing it out so far.

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2012-01-13T12:42:00.002+10:00

NJ: Man beaten by Passaic cop got $350,000 settlement

Ronnie Holloway, the schizophrenic man beaten by Passaic Police Officer Joseph Rios III during an arrest two years ago, accepted a $350,000 settlement earlier this year in which he agreed not to sue the city, documents show.

The settlement, obtained by The Record and Herald News on Friday, precludes Holloway or any of his heirs from collecting further damages from the city, the Passaic Police Department, Rios, or his partner during the arrest, Erica Rivera.

Rios was acquitted last week of police brutality charges in state court, and the settlement prohibits Holloway from any further legal action, such as filing a civil rights lawsuit in U.S. District Court. The settlement also releases the city from responsibility for future medical costs associated with the beating.

Taxpayers are still not off the hook, however. Rios was suspended for two years without pay while awaiting trial. Now that he's been acquitted, Rios is seeking reinstatement — and that will likely cost the city nearly $200,000 in back pay, based on his salary of $97,294.

"Our position is that Officer Rios should be reinstated as soon as we work out the details," said his attorney, Anthony Iacullo. "We plan to meet with Mayor Blanco, the City Council and Chief Diaz sometime next week."

The city is not expected to oppose Rios' reinstatement, although the timing of his return to the department could not be worse. The city is stuck in a budget crisis and planning the layoff of 45 employees beginning Aug. 14.

Rios, a seven-year veteran of the Passaic Police Department and an Iraq war veteran, was accused of beating Holloway, a diagnosed schizophrenic, after spotting the man standing on the corner of Main Avenue and Sumner Street around 11 a.m. on May 29, 2009. Rios was riding with Rivera, who spotted the man with no shirt on underneath his hooded sweat shirt and ordered him to "zip up."

When Holloway didn't immediately comply and words were exchanged, Rios got out of his squad car and repeatedly beat Holloway with his nightstick, then threw him across the hood of the car. Holloway was arrested, spent the night in jail, but was never charged.

The altercation was captured on a surveillance video camera located outside a tavern on the corner. The incident made national headlines when the video went viral, and the Passaic County Prosecutor's Office began an investigation, which led to his indictment on charges of aggravated assault and official misconduct.

After a nine-day bench trial, Judge Donald J. Volkert Jr. cleared Rios of both charges. In his verdict, Volkert acknowledged that the video shows Rios using a lot of force, but said it was a "textbook" case of police using their power to subdue an unruly man.

Many Passaic residents disagree and are threatening to protest at City Hall when Iacullo meets with city officials next week.

"That's going to open up a whole can of worms," said Kasim Washington, a community activist and onetime City Council candidate. Washington says it would be dangerous for Rios to be put back on patrol.

"We don't want him coming back wearing a Superman's 'S' on his chest," Washington said. "Think about the first time he has to make an arrest. Our position is that he should be transferred out of the city. We don't want him in the city no more."

Holloway, who lived with his mother on Burgess Place off Main Avenue, has since moved. The settlement agreement precludes him, his friends or any family member from talking about the case to the media.

Keith Furlong, a spokesman for the city, said the city had no legal grounds to oppose Rios' reinstatement. But as of late Friday he hadn't heard of any meeting between Rios and city officials.

Original report here

Another account of what happened:

New Jersey cops appear to specialize in unprovoked assaults on harmless people who suffer from mental illness.

On May 29, 2009, Ronnie Holloway was standing on a street corner near a restaurant when Officers Joseph Rios III and Erica Rivera pulled up in a cop car and berated the 49-year-old man for having his jacket unzipped. As is usually the case in such encounters, things went dramatically downhill in a hurry.

Rios, an Iraq combat veteran, appeared to be on "contact patrol" – that is, prowling the neighborhood looking for an excuse to throw somebody to the ground. Holloway, an unassuming man on medication for schizophrenia, presented a perfect target of opportunity.

A video recording of the event shows Holloway meekly zipping up his jacket. As he did so, Rivera exits the vehicle and distracts Holloway while Rios blind-sides him, slamming him to the ground and beating him repeatedly with his fists and baton. After a brief pause, Holloway – who is clearly terrified, but not putting up any physical resistance – is able to rise to his feet before being slammed onto the hood of the police car.

"I didn't know if I was going to see tomorrow at that point," Holloway later said of the assault, which left him battered and bloody and with a serious injury to one of his eyes. The beating continued until backup – in the form of two additional police cars – arrived to help drag Holloway off to jail.

Despite the fact that he had behaved like a properly docile Mundane, absorbing an unprovoked beating without making any effort to flee or fight back, Holloway was charged with resisting arrest and "wandering," supposedly in search of narcotics.

In filing their official report of the incident, Rios and his partner did what police in such circumstances always do: They committed perjury in the form of "creative writing." Rios claimed that when he and Rivera told Holloway to leave the corner, Holloway "verbally challenged" them. "Step on the sidewalk, you'll see," Holloway supposedly said to Rios, assuming a "fighting stance" as he did so.

Rios had no right or authority to demand that Holloway – who had done nothing to anybody – leave the street corner. It's also clear from the video that the beating began before Holloway would have had an opportunity to fling a verbal "challenge" at Rios. Some measure of Rios's reliability as a witness is found in the fact that his Use of Force Report claims that Holloway wasn't injured in the attack.

After the May 29 assault was publicized, the Passaic Police Department "pulled a Mubarak," as it were: They defied public outrage for as long as possible, keeping Rios on active duty, and then suspending both Rios and Rivera (the latter for failing a fraudulent claim of a job-related injury during the incident) when the outrage failed to dissipate.

Owing entirely to public pressure put on the Passaic municipal government, Rios has been charged with aggravated assault and official misconduct. He has entered a plea of "not guilty by virtue of a government-provided wardrobe." "I did what was proper," lied Rios in a June 2009 press conference. "I did what I was trained to do under circumstances that existed at that time. I stand by my actions."

His attorney, Anthony J. Iacullo, defended the assault as a pre-emptive strike against some unspecified threat posed by an uppity Mundane: "Based upon what Officer Rios feared might happen, and based upon his not submitting to arrest, the actions were taken."

Holloway's "resistance" consisted of cringing and covering up in confusion and terror as Rios rained down punches and baton strikes. In New Jersey – as is the case elsewhere in the Soyuz – even such minimal and reflexive attempts to protect one's self from State-sanctified violence is treated as a criminal offense.

Original report here

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2012-01-12T15:52:00.001+10:00

NY: Testimony continues in wrongful conviction suit

Coerced confession

A man wrongfully convicted of trying to kill his wife was back in court. Daniel Gristwood is suing the state for his time in prison. Back in 1995, he was conviction of attempted murder, which was overturned after another man confessed. Our Iris St. Meran was in court and tells us what Gristwood has to say about how this experience impacted his life.

Daniel Gristwood became a free man in 2005, after being wrongfully convicted of attempting to kill his wife with a claw hammer in 1996 in the Town of Clay.

Another man, Mastho Davis, confessed to the crime. Now Gristwood is seeking damages from the state for that wrongful conviction.

During day two of his damages trial, Gristwood testified post-prison life has been difficult.

Gristwood said, "Instead of having road rage, I think I get store rage. I get so claustrophobic. I don't like being around people. I don't even like leaving the house. That's why my garage is there because I feel comfortable in my own little domain."

He was also questioned about his relationship with his five children. He says he missed some important milestones in their lives. He also testified about not being able to find steady work after being released.

Gristwood told the court he was broke and had to turn in his 401K in 2005 and had limited income last year. "Maybe $10,000 or $15,000,” Gristwood said. “I had a very low income."

After his testimony, an economist, Professor Daniel McGowan, took the stand. He had estimates of Gristwood's monetary loss of earnings while in prison, calling the estimate conservative.

"The total nominal amount, it is not present value. The total nominal dollars for each of the future years lost is summed together was $1,536,626," said McGowan.

What Gristwood will actually get is up to the court and that decision could take months.

The trial continues Wednesday. Others expected to take the stand are Gristwood's son, brother and a social worker.

Original report here

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2012-01-11T15:53:00.001+10:00

British cop forced to say sorry for church leader’s wrongful arrest from pulpit during service

A policeman was forced to apologise from a church pulpit after a woman was wrongfully arrested for assault. Detective Sergeant Nick Westwood publicly said sorry to church leader Alison Richardson after a court made the Metropolitan Police pay her compensation.

Mrs Richardson, 43, was arrested at her home in Croydon, South London, in February 2008 after calling the police to stop bailiffs clamping the family car in a dispute over a fine.

But she was arrested after an officer claimed to have been punched in the face. She was convicted and given a community service order.

However, she was exonerated on appeal by a judge who queried the police’s evidence.

Mrs Richardson sued the Met, highlighting how she had to step down from her church role after losing her criminal records bureau accreditation.

On Saturday, the Met sent Mr Westwood to apologise at Greenwich Seventh Day Adventist Church in London. He said: ‘I hope that this apology goes some way to putting to rest formally and finally the upset and distress that the Richardsons as a family have had.’

In February 2008, Mrs Richardson called police to her Croydon home as bailiffs tried to clamp a car belonging to her husband Clive. They were trying to recoup a traffic penalty linked to a church minibus that was briefly registered to him.

Up to eight police officers arrived and Mrs Richardson was arrested after a woman officer claimed she had been punched in the face. The churchgoer was held in custody for eight hours before being charged with assaulting a police officer and resisting arrest. She was convicted after a crown court trial and a judge ordered her to work for free in the community.

But she appealed and was exonerated by another judge who questioned the police evidence and found officers had unlawfully entered her home.

Mrs Richardson then sued the Met highlighting how the case forced her to step down from her church role as she lost her criminal records bureau accreditation.

Standing in the pulpit, Mr Westwood said it is ‘only right and proper’ to apologise when mistakes are made. ‘It is not surprising when on a day to day basis there are so many police officers and so many people they come into contact with that we get things wrong occasionally,' he said. ‘It is only right and proper that when we make mistakes and errors we are willing to apologise and put those mistakes right.’

His four-minute speech was punctuated with shouts of ‘Amen’ and murmurs of approval before ending with an embrace from the Richardsons.

Speaking afterwards, Mrs Richardson, who has three daughters, said: ‘I felt that the apology was humble and genuine. ‘The apology was necessary because of the humiliation, disgrace and embarrassment that I experienced when I was arrested, charged, tried and convicted of assaulting a police officer, a false allegation of a crime that I had clearly not committed.

‘The public apology helps to heal the wounds and also to close this traumatic chapter, so that I can move forward with my family and get on with my life.’

Last night, Mrs Richardson’s solicitor Terence Channer said: ‘Central to this case was Mrs Richardson’s exemplary character in contrast to the unlawful actions of the officers.’

Original report here

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2012-01-10T14:22:00.000+10:00

Piracy in Virginia

The Washington Post recently ran an editorial denouncing the treatment of Victor Ramos Guzman and the process by which Mr Guzman and the parishioners of his church, Nuevo Renacer, were relieved of their money by the Virginia State Police. We recommend the editorial but would like to add some commentary and a few clarifying details based on the accounts relayed to us.

On November 1st, Victor Ramos Guzman and Jose Jeronimo Sorto were driving a rental vehicle on Interstate 95. Their church had raised money to buy a trailer and a parcel of land. Guzman and Sorto were transporting $28,500 in church donations to make the purchases on behalf of Nuevo Renacer.

They were pulled over on I-95 by a Virginia State Trooper, CL Murphy, after the officer ran parallel to them. The trooper did not issue any tickets or warnings to Guzman or Sorto. However, the trooper asked if they had anything in the car. They informed him of the church donations. Trooper Murphy checked their papers, legal status, rental information, et cetera. Having found no violations, the trooper also called the FBI and ICE. The FBI declined involvement. The officer confiscated the cash and issued a receipt for it.

Guzman and Sorto were told by Trooper Murphy that the seizure was being executed “on order of ICE” but that no ICE agents were available because they were in a meeting. Guzman asked that they contact the church to verify their account of the currency trooper Murphy declined to do so and, apparently, told them to shut up. They were also told that they would be contacted by ICE Norfolk.

Having not been contacted by ICE or the Virginia State Patrol, the church contacted attorney Claudia Flower on November 4th. Flower contacted the state police and ICE. ICE, at that point, declined involvement. Later that day, Flower was able to talk to CL Murphy. Flower inquired of the probable cause for the seizure and was told

1) The members stated that the cash was not theirs but belonged to the church.

This wouldn’t seem to be such a problem as they also told officer Murphy that they were members of the church (Guzman being the Secretary of the church), transporting the money for the church, and possessed and showed a 501(c)(3) IRS letter of recognition for the church.

2) The church was located in Baltimore MD, while the address of the individuals was in Virginia.

Which wouldn’t seem to be much of a problem as many people regularly commute between Baltimore and Virginia.

3) Guzman and Sorto appeared confused.

That might be. Ramos was, apparently, told to shut up when explaining their story and had $28,500 of his church’s money lifted from him by an officer of the law. Confusion seems like one of many understandable emotions. Anger and frustration would seem understandable as well.

4) Guzman and Sorto did not know where they were going.

Guzman and Sorto were driving south bound towards Fayettville, and then to Atlanta, GA as they had told the officer. They knew where they were going and why.

Murphy then stated to Flower, ”People lie to me all the time why do I need to listen to you? The money was seized on behalf of ICE, J.T. Slayton of ICE Norfolk, maybe the chain of command does not know because he has not had time to file a report.”

Murphy then yelled at Flower and hung up.

Flower contacted us at Americans for Forfeiture Reform seeking recommendations on a forfeiture attorney in Virginia. We contacted David B. Smith. Smith offered to represent Mr Guzman, Mr Sorto, and Nuevo Renacer for free.

Most people are effectively precluded from fighting these seizures. Mr Guzman, Mr Sorto, and Nuevo Renacer have received pro bono counsel from Claudia Flower and David B. Smith. Smith is one of the top forfeiture attorneys in the country, a leading expert on forfeiture rules and practices, the former supervisor for forfeiture litigation in the US Attorneys Office, and the Chairman of the Forfeiture Committee in the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Flower is a committed advocate and a former DHS prosecutor. Our friends at the Institute for Justice have also joined the fight. Few victims of civil forfeiture have such attorneys at their disposal. Far fewer have such attorneys donate their services.

We raise their credentials not so much to praise (although that can and should be done) but to question: What shot does a normal person have without an accomplished pro bono legal team and an easily verifiable story? How bad have civil forfeiture practices become that the government isn’t sufficiently shamed (and scared) to return church donations seized without cause, when it can easily verify that the seized funds are church donations?

Too often, victi are left with the choice of either hiring prohibitively expensive counsel (after their funds have been seized… frequently starving them of access to effective counsel) or attempting to navigate the complex, uncertain forfeiture laws on their own. Uncertain because current practice is to share custody of forfeiture cases, vacillating between state and federal custody for convenience and gain. These custody vacillations make it easier for law enforcement to seize property, more difficult for you to defend your property, and make it more profitable for law enforcement to commit seizures (sometimes by explicitly circumventing state law).

Mr Guzman has an obvious and traceable path for the money, complete with collaborating parishioner testimony. Mr Guzman has signed an affidavit attesting to the source of the currency seized. The Nuevo Renacer church confirms the story. The parishioners confirm the story. They even have the donation envelopes to confirm the story. The currency seized hasn’t been accused of any crime. Yet, the government retains the money. If being able to verify the legitimate source of currency isn’t enough to accomplish the return of seized property, what is? How many people are having their possessions taken that can’t afford to fight the government, or are scared to do so, or estimate the fight as a pointless and unwinnable endeavor? The story of the seized church money is a modern low. Formerly, we existed in an environment where property was regularly seized on mere accusation and/or mere suspicion. In this case, there is no accusation and the suspicion has been refuted. Yet, the government retains the money. Is the idea of private property a retired notion? The government’s retention of the church money implies that we are merely holding on to our possessions until, or if, a government agency wants to claim it.

According to the Washington Post editorial, the police are now claiming that Guzman and Sorto were travelling 86 mph in a 70 mph zone. If that were the case, the officer would have, presumably, written a ticket. There is no evidence to corroborate the accusation of speeding. Indeed, there is evidence against the accusation. Guzman’s affidavit claims that they were pulled over after the trooper ran parallel. The absence of so much as a warning implies-given the excessive speed now claimed and the tesstimony that the trooper ran parallel first- that no such speeding took place. Even if there were evidence of speeding, it should not provide sufficient cause to seize the parishioner’s funds.

Original report here

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2012-01-09T14:31:00.001+10:00

Australia: Man to be released after decade without trial

His imprisonment may have been reasonable but doing so without a trial to test the allegations is most certainly not. He has always denied the allegations

A mentally impaired West Australian man who spent 10 years behind bars without ever standing trial will be released from prison shortly.

Marlon Noble has spent the past decade in a WA prison on child sex assault charges despite having never faced trial because he was deemed intellectually disabled.

It is alleged he sexually assaulted two children in the state's Gascoyne region in 2001.

Last November the Mental Health Review Board recommended he be released under strict conditions and the State Government has agreed.

Greens spokeswoman for Disabilities Alison Xamon says those conditions are too harsh. "[The conditions] really stop his ability to be able to walk around Geraldton, which is his home town," she said.

Ms Xamon says advocates for Mr Noble will continue to pressure the Government to reduce or abolish the restrictions imposed on him. "I think people need to be aware that the struggle to free Marlon Nobel is far from over," she said. "We're really relieved that he is finally going to be out of prison, but the next step is to be to ensure that the conditions attached to his release are lessened and finally removed."

Original report here. (Via Australian Politics)

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2012-01-08T16:53:00.001+10:00

Crooked British cops withhold exculpatory evidence

Police retained a secret diary that could have cleared a man jailed for life for killing his wife, it was revealed yesterday.

Eddie Gilfoyle protested his innocence for nearly two decades after being convicted in 1993 of murdering his pregnant wife, Paula, and making it look like suicide. But it has emerged that a padlocked box existed containing two volumes of a diary covering ten years. The journal reveals her troubled past and how she had previously tried to take her life.

These facts were not disclosed to Mr Gilfoyle's lawyers or told to the jury. In fact, the diary contradicts the image presented to the murder trial of Mrs Gilfoyle as a happy woman with everything to live for.

Police refused to say where the box had been over the years – because the case is being reviewed by the commission that investigates miscarriages of justice.

Mr Gilfoyle, 59, who was released in December 2010 after two unsuccessful appeals, said yesterday: 'I am completely devastated that the police had these diaries and failed to hand them over to my defence.

'I am disgusted, appalled, words just fail me. They should have been disclosed prior to my two appeals but they were kept hidden. 'I have told the truth all the way through. The police have lied all the way through.'

His solicitor Matt Foot, said: 'Mr Gilfoyle has protested his innocence for 19 years. Meanwhile the police have held on to a locked box containing material that directly contradicts their case. How has this happened?'

Mrs Gilfoyle, 32, who was eight-and-a-half months pregnant, was found hanged in the garage of the couple's home in Upton, Wirral, in 1992.

A suicide note was discovered in her handwriting but prosecutors said Gilfoyle dictated it to her, telling her he needed it for a course in his job as an auxiliary nurse.

Relatives and friends told the jury she was a happy, bubbly woman but the diaries and other personal papers which she kept in the marital home reveal she took an overdose of pills when she was 15.

They also show that as a teenager she was engaged to a boy who was convicted of killing a girl. She bought him a wedding ring while he was in prison.

It was when that boyfriend, Mark Roberts, threatened to leave her that she took an overdose, writing in her diary: 'Mark went mad but I done it to him.'

The new evidence also revealed that two of Mrs Gilfoyle's former boyfriends threatened suicide and among her possessions was a note from one – using similar words to the note found where she died.

Mr Gilfoyle's lawyers have asked the Criminal Cases Review Commission to refer his case back to the Court of Appeal to be overturned.

Merseyside police confirmed they handed papers to Mr Foot last year but refused to comment further.

Original report here

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2012-01-07T13:12:00.001+10:00

Corrupt British cops paid off

Yard chiefs who quit over phone hacking 'are given £500,000 in secret cash pay outs'

Two of Britain’s most senior police officers pocketed substantial pay-offs after resigning over the phone-hacking scandal, the Daily Mail can reveal. Former Scotland Yard Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson and his colleague John Yates are thought to have received up to £500,000 between them.

The cash was handed out after the pair signed gagging orders which bar them from suing the Metropolitan Police or speaking about their treatment.

The exact size of the payments, at a time of savage cuts to police budgets, was a closely guarded secret. But speculation was mounting that the total cost to the taxpayer, including fees racked up during weeks of legal wrangling, could be as much as half a million pounds.

The pay-offs underline how the scandal plunged the Met leadership into chaos amid a flurry of revelations about their close links to News International.

The force is now braced for further criticism after the Audit Commission, a public spending watchdog, ordered a review of how the pay-offs were agreed. Critics highlighted how both officers appeared to have been handsomely rewarded despite choosing to leave as a result of their own failings.

But supporters said the payments reflected the shambolic way in which they were treated as the force’s political leaders panicked. They laid the blame at the door of the Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA), London Mayor Boris Johnson and Home Secretary Theresa May.

Jenny Jones, a member of the MPA, said the payments were ‘completely wrong’. She added: ‘When people resign they should just go, there is no question of a severance package or settlement deal. ‘They went because of their mistakes and should accept that. ‘It is wrong for any public organisation to be so secretive about something that is in the public interest and involves public money.’

The payments were agreed by lawyers at the soon-to-be-abolished MPA, which is a separate organisation from the Met. At first officials there insisted that as both officers made a ‘personal decision’ to resign they were entitled only to their pensions. But after being confronted with evidence of ‘termination payments’ by the Mail, they were forced to admit money had been paid.

The MPA refused to reveal how much the deals were worth but said the amount will be published in its annual accounts later this year.

Sir Paul, who earned £276,000 a year, resigned after admitting taking a £12,000 five-week freebie at a luxury health spa while he recovered from a cancer scare. Difficult questions were raised after it emerged that the spa was promoted by former News of the World executive and hacking suspect Neil Wallis. Mr Wallis was also hired as a consultant by the Met’s communications director, who remains on ‘extended leave’ over the £24,000 contract.

Mr Yates resigned from his post as Britain’s top anti-terrorism officer, with a £200,000 salary, several weeks later. He admitted being a close friend of Mr Wallis amid claims he improperly helped to secure a civilian job for the journalist’s 27-year-old daughter at Scotland Yard. Both officers were later cleared of any misconduct after an inquiry by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC).

Mr Yates is now preparing to move to Bahrain where he will advise the Government on police reform.

A Metropolitan Police Authority spokesman said: ‘Both Sir Paul Stephenson and John Yates signed compromise agreements at the request of the Authority to prevent any future disputes. ‘Payments made and recorded in those compromise agreements were based on their contractual entitlements.’

A Met spokesman said: ‘This is entirely a matter for the Police Authority.’

Original report here

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2012-01-06T12:24:00.001+10:00

Rapist gets 32 years for framing victim

NEW YORK: A private detective who raped his former girlfriend and then framed her for a series of fictional crimes has been sentenced to 32 years in prison, bringing to a close one of the most bizarre cases to come before a court.

Using knowledge he gleaned partly from watching crime dramas like CSI, the private detective, Jerry Ramrattan, orchestrated what prosecutors called one of the most elaborate framing schemes in recent history.

Ramrattan's former girlfriend, Seemona Sumasar, had accused him of raping her. After she refused to drop the rape charges, he concocted a scheme that landed her in jail for seven months, making it seem as though Ms Sumasar was the likely perpetrator of a series of armed robberies, for which she was accused of impersonating a police officer.

At his trial in State Supreme Court in Queens, prosecutors produced evidence that Ramrattan cajoled and extorted witnesses to testify falsely that she had robbed them. He even staged crime scenes, prosecutors said, in which he planted evidence, handcuffing one of Ms Sumasar's supposed victims to a pole and planting bullets at the scene of one of the imaginary crimes.

Before Ramrattan was sentenced, Ms Sumasar delivered a stinging victim impact statement, noting his lack of remorse as he stared ahead, stone-faced, while she spoke. "I don't have words for you," she said. "You are evil. You are a sociopath. The only thing that helps me sleep at night is that what happened to me was for a reason: someone needs to put a stop to your madness."

During her seven months in jail, awaiting a robbery trial, Ms Sumasar, a former Morgan Stanley analyst, was separated from her young daughter. She lost her business, and her house went into foreclosure. Her bail was set at $US1 million, which she could not afford. Ramrattan was free until an informer came forward late in 2010 and exposed his ruse.

He was convicted in November of a series of charges, including rape, conspiracy and perjury.

The trial offered two opposing plot lines that were seemingly irreconcilable. Prosecutors characterised Ms Sumasar as a single mother charmed by a conman who ruined her life; the defence portrayed her as a scorned woman who falsely accused her former boyfriend of rape after the relationship soured.

Members of the jury said the guilty verdict hinged on the jury's belief that Ramrattan had raped Ms Sumasar, giving him a motive to set his plot in motion.

In his plea for leniency, Ramrattan insisted that he was innocent, saying that he had spent years helping the police solve cases as an informer.

But Justice Richard Buchter said he deserved no mercy, calling him a "diabolical conniver who shamelessly exploited the criminal justice system".

The Queens District Attorney's Office and the Nassau County District Attorney's Office had insisted on Ms Sumasar's guilt until she was freed weeks before her robbery trial was to begin.

Legal experts said the case was a cautionary tale that illustrated the ease with which the justice system could be manipulated by someone who understood police procedure and was adept at telling lies.

Judge Buchter said: "The police were duped by liars by whom they had a right to be suspicious, and as a result a rape victim was framed by her rapist. She was victimised by the rapist and then again by the criminal justice system." He also said: "The defendant is the architect of his own ruin. He deserves no mercy from me, and he won't get any."

Last month Ms Sumasar filed a civil suit against the New York Police Department and the Nassau County Police Department. In the lawsuit, she says New York police officers protected Ramrattan because he was working as an informer.

Original report here

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2012-01-05T10:41:00.001+10:00

Australian man Jailed for Christmas on 'no evidence'

A FATHER who spent Christmas in jail accused of running down an officer has been released because prosecutors are not sure he was behind the wheel.

Christopher Lucas has been in Yatala Labor Prison since December 9, when he was refused bail on charges including causing serious harm by dangerous driving. At the time, police said Lucas - the sole carer for his ill, elderly mother - seriously injured a police officer while avoiding an alcohol breath-testing station at Cavan.

Yesterday the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions asked the case be called back into Port Adelaide Magistrates Court so Lucas's release could be arranged.

Lucas's lawyer, Damon Ind, said that after discussing the charges with prosecutors, he expected them to be withdrawn. "It seems that now police have finally done some work on this matter, they have realised this once flimsy case is actually non-existent," he said.

"They now have doubts my client was the driver of the vehicle, and there is no evidence to support him being at the scene of the alleged incident. "Indeed, it would seem they have now found evidence to the contrary."

Prosecutors did not dispute Mr Ind's submission and declined to comment to The Advertiser last night.

Lucas, 47, of Salisbury East, has yet to plead to offences including causing serious harm by dangerous driving, driving while disqualified and breaching bail. He faces a maximum 15-year jail term.

Court documents allege that on December 8 he drove a VN Commodore with Queensland registration plates on Churchill Rd North, Cavan.

Lucas allegedly knocked down a police officer - who was wearing a reflective vest and carrying a torch - at an alcohol breath-testing station, then fled. The officer required surgery for serious leg fractures. The car was found dumped at nearby Swan Court, Mawson Lakes.

Last month police prosecutor Sergeant Alex Ross told the court inquiries were ongoing. "The car is registered in someone else's name and there are two sets of keys," he said.

"Lucas, when spoken to by police, had one set ... he claimed he had been given those keys by someone else in the afternoon before the incident. "Although the incident was captured by a camera fitted to a police vehicle, I understand that does not identify this defendant."

He said Lucas could interfere with investigations if released. "There are further inquiries being made with persons who were in possession of the car prior to the incident, and they are Lucas's family members," he said. "We are opposed to any form of bail."

Mr Ind said Lucas's mother and teenage daughter, who has an intellectual disability, relied on him for care and support. "The mother has chronic pain in her hip and knees and mobility problems, and my client receives an income for caring for her," he said.

"Having read the police file so far, there appears at this stage to be not enough evidence to make out the case."

At the time, Magistrate David Whittle refused to release Lucas on bail. He also declined to consider granting him home detention bail.

Yesterday Mr Ind told the court that the case had been called back at the DPP's request, not his. "This is an unusual application for bail as it's the DPP's application," he said. "There has been a change of circumstances, and a change in the prosecution's attitude toward this matter.

"This man has spent Christmas in custody, New Year's in custody, away from his family and mother, who relies on him for care."

Magistrate Alfio Grasso released Lucas on bail, with the sole condition that he reside at his home address. Mr Grasso ordered Lucas return to court next month.

Original report here

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2012-01-04T16:44:00.001+10:00

Obie Anthony: Life after 17 years in prison

Corrupt witness testimony

Inside prison, Obie Anthony dreamed of what he was missing as he served out a life sentence for a murder he insists he did not commit. He thought of the green grass, of washing dishes, of biting into the juicy pineapple Teriyaki burger he saw on television ads for Carl’s Jr.

He also thought about how he would change his ways if he ever got out. There would be school and jobs. But first, he would get rid of the tattoos that were a permanent reminder of his old life.

Today, Anthony, 37, is living out that prison dream of freedom from his new home in Apple Valley.

His murder conviction for a 1994 killing outside a South LA brothel was overturned in September 2011 after the prosecution's key witness, a pimp, admitted he lied to the jury.

Anthony was released from prison after serving 17 years, with the help of the Northern California Innocence Project and Loyola Law School’s Project for the Innocent.

It’s been hard for him to get back to society.

Kate Germond, director of Centurion Ministries, a non-profit organization, has been handling wrongful conviction cases for 25 years. She regards the innocent people in prison as heroes for the dignity and fortitude they show in persevering through their wrongful convictions.

Within the prison culture, most people are cynical about any claims of innocence. According to Germond, inmates who say they’re innocent are abused by guards or fellow inmates when they first make these declarations. As time goes by, they get a grudging respect from the guards and fellow inmates, but it’s hard won.

“When they get out, they suffer from post-traumatic stress disorders,” Germond said. Effects of wrongful convictions include drinking, drug issues and violent thoughts. “Their freedom is not the end of their torture,” she said.

Recently Anthony got his California identification, social security card and a bank account. He took his driver’s license test, but needs to re-take it and get two more questions right to pass it.

Anthony was raised in South Central Los Angeles by a single mother. His parents were separated when he was too young to remember. His mother was once addicted to drugs—cocaine, heroin and pills. She passed away at 42 when Anthony was 19 and before he went to prison.

His problems with the law began when he was a teenager. Anthony was involved in gangs and got expelled several times for scuffles at high schools. “At that time I was too weak as a child to make a choice to say I can do what I want to do instead of following behind somebody,” he said.

In 1995 the prosecution’s key witness testified against Anthony in exchange for a lighter sentence in another case. Anthony lied during the trial and testified that he didn’t know his co-defendant Reggie Cole. He regrets the lie, but says he was a scared kid who thought that saying he didn’t know his co-defendant would somehow put him in a better position.

The jury found him guilty and he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He was 19.

The hardest time for Anthony came two years into his prison sentence. “I was really alone at that point. I didn’t have much contact with anybody,” he said.

He sent out letters to family and didn’t get responses. His phone calls were blocked by friends. The only support he had was from his grandmother in St. Louis who regularly talked to him over the phone and encouraged him never to give up and come home.

“The one thing that kept giving me hope while I was in prison was I knew I was innocent,” he said.

Anthony hated the food in prison -- Eggs, potatoes, and sausage links for breakfast; and tasteless veal, chicken, burgers, hot dogs and Chili Macs.

During the last few years in prison, he never went to the chow hall thanks to his fiancée, Denise Merchant, who bought him cereal, rice, beans, chocolate, meat, lotion and all kinds of stuff.

They had known each other when they were teenagers. “He was always riding a little scooter, and I noticed he was always staring at me,” said Merchant, who is four years older than Anthony. They reconnected when Merchant got a call from her brother saying he was in the same prison as Anthony. She asked her brother to give Anthony her number and when Anthony called her from prison, “all the feelings I had for him when I was 16 all came back,” she said.

They started dating after her first prison visit, and got engaged a year and a half ago.

In prison, Anthony learned upholstery, how to put office cubicles together, landscaping, and clerical work. Apart from the set schedules of two meals a day, inmate count time, yard time, and shower time, he spent most of his time in the law library, studying his own case. “I didn’t know the law,” he said. “I tried to learn it. Man, it was difficult.”

Despite the difficulties, he pursued his freedom as vigorously as he could. He filed motions to different courts but all got denied.

“Even though I couldn’t get nobody else to hear me, I knew the Creator heard me. I knew that he knew I wasn’t guilty of anything. I find solace in that,” he said.

Anthony went to the Hebrew church in prison every Saturday for 15 years.

He kept trying to figure out who or how he could reach out to find some help. “You got to be strong and continue to look for something in the books you got in front you, and think one day it’s going to happen,” he said.

His efforts paid off in 2008 when he got a response to his letter to the Northern California Innocence Project. The Northern California Innocence Project--with the help of Loyola Law School’s Project for the Innocent--took on the case and helped convince a judge that the prosecution’s key witness lied to the jury.

“The evidence that we were able to turn up showed that there is absolutely nothing that connects him to the crime,” said Paige Kaneb, one of Anthony’s attorneys and a supervising attorney at the Northern California Innocence Project.

The witness admitted he never saw clearly the gunmen at the crime scene, and he based his identification of Anthony and his co-defendant from descriptions of others at the scene, according to Kaneb.

Anthony was “denied due process of law and was denied a fair trial” in 1994, says the writ habeas corpus. His conviction was overturned on September 30, 2011.

Seventeen years in prison changed his life. “It’s made me into a more straightforward, honest and truthful person,” he said.

He now tries not to leave things unsaid in a conversation. “Before I wasn’t that way, I would beat around the bush with certain things. I kind of was mindful about not wanting to hurt your feelings with the truth. I realize now keeping the truth from an individual hurts more than it does anything,” he said.

Anthony doesn’t harbor any anger toward what he maintains was a wrongful conviction. “Anger is weight that can hold you down and prevent you from being prosperous and progress in life,” said Anthony.

Anthony chooses to recognize the things that make him angry, acknowledge it and move forward. He no longer has to follow any set schedules of when to get up, when to eat and when to take a shower.

However, the transition from prison life to a free life has not been easy. Anthony is trying to find a job. He doesn’t want to rush too much and get frustrated. So far he has sent out two job applications and is waiting for a reply.

Kaneb said it would be hard for Anthony to get a job as he missed out on years of growing and learning, and having a resume that includes 17 years of work. “He is charismatic. He is really a good person. I think people will see that, but you just have to give him a chance,” said Kaneb.

Original report here

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2012-01-03T15:47:00.001+10:00

Nearly 1,000 serving British police officers and PCSOs have a criminal record

More than 900 serving police officers and community support officers have a criminal record, official figures show.

Forces across England and Wales employ policemen and women with convictions including burglary, causing death by careless driving, robbery, supplying drugs, domestic violence, forgery and perverting the course of justice.

Those with criminal records include senior officers, among them two detective chief inspectors and one chief inspector working for the Metropolitan Police.

At least 944 currently serving officers and police community support officers (PCSOs) have a conviction, according to figures released by 33 of the 43 forces in England and Wales in response to Freedom of Information requests.

Many forces could not provide details of criminal records dating from before their staff joined the police, meaning the true figure will be significantly higher.

The Metropolitan Police, Britain's largest force, came top with 356 officers and 41 PCSOs with convictions.

It was followed by Kent Police (49), Devon and Cornwall Police (44), Essex Police (42), South Yorkshire Police (35), Hampshire Police (31) and West Midlands Police (27), although not all the figures are directly comparable.

The criminal records include:

Devon and Cornwall Police - a Pc convicted of burglary as a teenager.

Essex Police - one inspector convicted of dangerous driving; another inspector convicted of possessing and supplying cannabis; a detective constable convicted of robbery; a Pc convicted of data protection breaches for viewing intelligence records relating to friends, relatives or other people living in the local area, and a special constable convicted of stealing a set of car number plates, putting them on another vehicle and obtaining petrol without paying.

Hertfordshire Police - a sergeant convicted of dangerous driving.

Kent Police - a Pc convicted of perverting the course of justice in 1998.

Merseyside Police - five officers convicted of assault and one convicted of causing death by careless driving.

Norfolk Police - a Pc convicted of causing death by careless driving.

North Wales Police - an officer convicted of forgery.

Staffordshire Police - an inspector convicted of assault causing actual bodily harm and a Pc convicted of keeping a dangerous dog.

Surrey Police - a detective constable convicted of obstructing police officers; a Pc convicted of wounding; a Pc convicted of drink driving in 1988 and resisting arrest a decade later, and a Pc convicted of animal suffering in 2006.

Most of the convictions are for traffic offences such as speeding and drink-driving, but the records also include a South Yorkshire Police officer convicted of fishing without a licence.

Home Office guidelines issued in 2003 say police officers should have "proven integrity" because they are vulnerable to pressure from criminals to reveal information.

The guidance says forces should reject potential recruits with convictions for serious offences - including causing actual bodily harm, burglary, dangerous driving and supplying drugs - unless there are "exceptionally compelling circumstances".

Original report here

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2012-01-02T20:28:00.001+10:00

FL business struggling after owner's arrest, exoneration

Arrogant deputy does a lot of harm

It only took about seven minutes late September for the reputation of a local business owner to be shattered. Now, the previously publicized criminal charges against him have been dropped, but he and his wife are still fighting to restore their name.

Four cameras at the store, which recorded the events and were viewed by the State Attorney's Office, captured the event. If not for the cameras, Dan Ferrena, co-owner of Palm Coast Fine Jewelry & Coins, might still be charged with aggravated assault with a firearm.

At 11:53 a.m. Sept. 30, 28-year-old Josh Newby and his child entered the store looking for a watch. Two other customers, Dan and his wife Edith were already in the store. A minute later, a train of four other small children came in, accompanied by Newby's wife Dariane and a friend, Rosemary Garcia.

Some of the children were grappling onto the store's glass counters, which hold gold, jewelry and coins.

Edith Ferrena said in a News-Journal interview in December that she was worried that the glass would break and hurt the kids. She told the group that a jewelry store isn't for children. This upset the Newbys, who left the store and told the Ferrenas they would take their business elsewhere, according to the Flagler County Sheriff's Office case report.

The phone number provided by the Newbys to law enforcement officials at the time of arrest was disconnected when a reporter tried to reach them for comment. Garcia did not return a call seeking comment.

At 11:56 a.m., Josh Newby reentered the store and told the Ferrenas he'd let all of his colleagues at a local hospital know how awful the store was. An argument ensued, and Newby called Edith two derogatory curse words. That set Dan off. "I said 'Look, you piece of crap. You have some nerve saying that to my wife,' " Dan Ferrena said of Newby's cursing. Dan Ferrena angrily pointed his finger at Newby.

The police reports and video show both men yelling at each other as Newby stood outside of the store's courtyard and Ferrena stood in the store's doorway before taking a few feet into the courtyard.

At 11:57 a.m., Ferrena walked back toward the store's door.

The best camera angle, filmed from the courtyard, is distorted, but an angle from inside the store shows Ferrena quickly turning around as he opens the store's door. He pulled a Walther PPS handgun from his right side.

Newby said in the police reports that Ferrena pointed the gun at him, but it's difficult to see in the video. Ferrena said he never pointed the gun at Newby and kept it at his side after he heard Newby charging toward him.

"Don't you remember what he said?" Edith Ferrena said to Dan during a News-Journal interview. "He said 'I'll kill you, (expletive).' "

Dan Ferrena added: "I turned around and he was charging me" from about 15 feet away. "By this time I've made the determination that he's not normal, so I pulled my gun out so he can see. I had no intention of shooting him." "So as soon as he saw the gun, he stopped. I came in. I started calming the customers down and the next thing I know the cops are here."

Deputies arrived at about noon that day. They interviewed one of the customers inside the store, but not the other.

Dan Ferrena told them he had video of the exchange and that it was self-defense, but the video wasn't viewable right away. It needed to be downloaded. But the deputy didn't call someone in to look at the tape and instead arrested Dan Ferrena.

Florence Devany, a 74-year-old retiree from Palm Coast, was the customer who deputies didn't interview. She didn't find out Ferrena was arrested until she read about it in the newspaper. "I was shocked," she said. "I was in total shock."

Devany went back to the store in late December and said she couldn't believe Dan Ferrena's appearance. It looked like he lost about 20 pounds, she said. "It certainly had a terrible effect on their business," Devany said.

It's that terrible effect that the Ferrenas have been fighting against since the charge was made against Ferrena.

An aggravated assault with a firearm charge supposes that a person unlawfully used a weapon to instill a well-founded fear that violence is imminent in another person. But, self-defense negates that charge.

On Nov. 15, Assistant State Attorney Joshua Davis sent Josh Newby a letter stating that he had reviewed the video from all angles and spoke with three independent witnesses. He told Newby that "this case does not support the charge of aggravated assault with a firearm." Two weeks later, Davis dropped the charge against Ferrena.

But, damage has been done to the Ferrenas. The News-Journal wrote a story from a Sheriff's Office press release, that included a mugshot, at the time of Ferrena's arrest. So did Flagler County newspapers. TV news stations plastered Ferrena's mugshot on newscasts, as well.

"It's been having an effect since the day it happened," Dan Ferrena said.

The store has seen fewer customers at times, but has been supported by a lot of regular customers who have frequented the store since it opened in 2008. "But there's always people out there who are going to be scared to get involved with us because they don't know what to think. They think, arrested? He's guilty," he said.

Flagler County sheriff's spokeswoman Debra Johnson wrote a press release after Ferrena's arrest. A former longtime newspaper journalist, Johnson said four themes typically lead to a press release being issued for an arrest -- if it's in the public interest, informative, unusual and serves as a public service announcement. "Obviously any time firearms are used or people are threatened, that is going to trigger a press release," she said.

When people call her to say a charge has been dismissed, she refers them to the state attorney's office or to reporters.

Johnson said that keen reporters would likely have found the story even if she didn't put the story out. Each arrest's incident report is compiled into a daily report and reporters can pick them up each morning.

Three months after the incident, Ferrena is trying to restore the reputation of he and his wife's store by using the same medium that caused their store to lose business.

A sign says only four people are allowed inside at a time. The couple has also installed a buzzer on the door to the store. They plan on hitting the emergency buzzer anytime a customer gets loud to alert police to a potential problem.

Original report here

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2012-01-01T19:55:00.001+10:00

Astounding Canadian case

How lucky do you have to be to have the real culprits come forward voluntarily? I know of only two previous such cases here and here.

Bad eyewitness ID again

The Ontario government is paying out $392,500, plus legal costs, to a Bayham man who spent 594 days in custody for crimes he didn't commit.

The Ontario Court of Appeal set aside Joseph Webber's conviction on 13 charges – including armed robbery, forcible confinement and extortion - after it found fresh evidence that demonstrated Webber did not commit the crimes.

This week the province announced a payout to Webber, 30. “I'd like to offer my sincere apologies to Mr. Webber for the miscarriage of justice that occurred,” Attorney General John Gerretsen said in a release.

On Feb. 8, 2008, Webber was sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in jail after he was convicted on 13 charges stemming from a violent gunpoint home invasion southwest of Tillsonburg.

According to testimony provided during the trial, two men who were armed and wearing disguises entered an Eden Line home on Nov. 3, 2006. The suspects held the occupants at gunpoint inside the home and demanded money. One of the suspects took the homeowner to a bank and retrieved money.

At the trial, the homeowner identified Webber as one of the suspects.

But two men later came forward and admitted they were responsible for the crimes.

“It is my hope that Mr. Webber and his family will now be able to move forward and put these events behind them,” Gerretsen said.

Original report here

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2011-12-31T14:33:00.000+10:00

Inquiry sought for Texas prosecutor over wrongful conviction

Michael Morton, 57, is officially exonerated after serving 25 years in prison in connection with his wife's murder. His lawyers allege misconduct in the case.

Lawyers for a Texas man officially exonerated Monday after serving 25 years of a life sentence in connection with his wife's murder requested a special judicial inquiry into alleged misconduct by the lead prosecutor.

After Michael Morton, 57, was released in October, his lawyers continued investigating the lead prosecutor in the case, former Williamson County Dist. Atty. Ken Anderson, now a District Court judge. On Monday, they filed a report summing up their investigation and argued that Anderson acted improperly while prosecuting Morton for the fatal 1986 beating of his wife, Christine, at their home in the Austin suburb of Georgetown.

The 144-page report, accompanied by 60 pages of exhibits, faults Anderson for refusing "to take any personal responsibility" for Morton's wrongful conviction. "The problem in the Morton case is not that the system failed, but that Judge Anderson did not play by the rules," the report says.

At the hearing before District Judge Sid Harle in Georgetown, Morton's lawyers asked the judge to establish a "court of inquiry" to examine allegations that Anderson illegally suppressed evidence that could have undercut the prosecution's case by failing to provide documents requested by Morton's trial judge.

Harle said he would take the request under advisement and invited Anderson's lawyers to file a response.

After the hearing, Morton celebrated before a crowd of reporters. "Revenge is a natural instinct, but it's not my goal here," he said. "Just accountability."

Barry Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project and one of Morton's lawyers, said the lawyers hope the case sets a precedent.

"We are really hoping there will be hearings and not just in Texas, but across the country to get a remedy to this problem," Scheck said, "to make sure this never happens to anybody else again."

Eric Nichols, an Austin attorney who represented Anderson at Monday's hearing, called the portrayal of his conduct "one-sided." He noted that Anderson had apologized to Morton publicly and recognized that, given the DNA analysis that was unavailable at the time of the trial, Morton's conviction was wrong. However, Nichols said, "Anderson stands firm in his belief that the prosecution and trial were handled ethically and appropriately." Last month, Anderson called a news conference to say he was sorry "for the system's failure," but denied any misconduct.

State law allows Harle to ask that a "court of inquiry" be convened if he determines there is probable cause that a state law has been broken. Normally, his request would go to the district's presiding judge, but that judge has already recused himself, meaning the request would probably go to the state Supreme Court.

Once a judge is selected to handle the inquiry, the local district or county attorney assists, examining witnesses and evidence.

If the inquiry finds Anderson committed serious misconduct, it could lead to disciplinary action by the state bar and possibly criminal prosecution.

After Morton's release, the State Bar of Texas began examining how prosecutors handled the case, a spokeswoman said, but no findings had been released Monday.

Original report here

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2011-12-30T23:13:00.001+10:00

Helmig Struggles After Wrongful Conviction Release

A central Missouri man who was freed from prison last year after his conviction for killing his mother was overturned is struggling to adjust to his freedom.

Dale Helmig, 55, has been unable to find a job since his December 2010 release, The Kansas City Star (http://bit.ly/umPT4z) reports. Helmig was serving a life sentence for the 1993 death of his mother, Norma, before a judge overturned the conviction as the result of a tainted trial. His freedom was further secured in April after Osage County prosecutor Amanda Grellner decided to not refile charges against him.

“I’m still in limbo,” Helmig said. “I can’t move forward and get on with my life until I find a job and get my own place.”

Helmig continues to live with his brother in Rocky Mount, near the Lake of the Ozarks north shore and a short drive from his adult son in Eldon and a 16-year-old daughter in Jefferson City. Rich Helmig has staunchly supported his brother since he was initially accused in the early 1990s of killing their mother, whose body was found tied to a concrete block along the Osage River during the 1993 Midwest floods. She was 55 when she died.

Sean O’Brien, the Kansas City attorney and law school professor who led the legal fight to exonerate Helmig, said his client would be in far worse shape without that kind of support. “If not for Rich he would be homeless,” O’Brien said.

The weak economy has also hindered Helmig’s attempts to find work as a maintenance man or janitor in the lake area or Jefferson City. He’s also convinced his prison stint has helped scare away potential employers.

Helmig doesn’t attempt to hide his 15-year detour through the Missouri prison system, said O’Brien, who teaches at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Rather, he uses news clippings about his case to show that a northwest Missouri trial court judge found he was the victim of a “fundamental miscarriage of justice.” The state Court of Appeals upheld that ruling,

“His biggest handicap is he’s very honest,” the attorney said.

DeKalb County Senior Judge Warren McElwain ruled in 2010 that Helmig was “actually innocent of the crime.” The judge said a former special state prosecutor and the Osage sheriff misled the trial court and jurors, while the special prosecutor and Grellner’s predecessor as county prosecutor relied on false testimony by a state trooper who mischaracterized a statement from Helmig as a confession.

Helmig spends much of his idle time fishing with his brother. “Being in prison, no matter how you got there, is one mark against you,” Helmig said.

Original report here

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2011-12-29T18:32:00.001+10:00

Lying Australian police

POLICE involved in the deadly car chase of a teenager have been forced to admit they were speeding at almost 180km/h through suburban streets. Their admission came after hi-tech data proved their original statements were false.

In a Victorian first, investigators and international experts took GPS data from the officers' vehicle to prove they were going much faster than they told several inquiries - including an internal ESD inquiry, an OPI probe and a coronial hearing. Two officers could now be referred to the DPP, with the crash killing the young driver and leaving an innocent driver maimed.

Only after being presented with GPS evidence in the Coroner's Court case did the officers admit statements regarding the chase were wrong.

There are now calls for high-speed chases to be reviewed following the death of 19-year-old father of one Shane Bennett.

Mr Bennett's family said while he "absolutely" should have pulled over, he paid the "highest penalty for his stupid decision" and the "dangerous chase" contributed to his death in 2008.

The two officers leading the chase, Senior Constables Cameron Orr and Michael Bednarczyk, are awaiting Coroner Peter White's findings.

The Herald Sun can reveal Sen-Constable Orr was not licensed by Victoria Police to drive more than 150km/h, but admitted in court to reaching 177km/h before Mr Bennett crashed.

The chase began after a police car sighted Mr Bennett's unregistered car, sporting cardboard licence plates, in Frankston, the court heard. He was not wanted for any other reason.

The chase wove through the back streets of Seaford, with Mr Bennett running at least two red lights at more than 100km/h.

The officers were ordered to cease the chase about 15 seconds before Mr Bennett went through another red light - this time crashing into Diane McCready, leaving her with critical injuries. Mr Bennett died in hospital after suffering head and internal injuries.

Ms McCready and Mr Bennett's mother have called for a review of police chase protocols.

The officers originally said they pulled over after hearing command calls for them to stop, the court heard. But after being shown GPS data, they later admitted in court they were still "moving" 15 seconds after the abandon-chase call.

A witness originally complained to the OPI, claiming police were still chasing Mr Bennett when he hit Ms McCready, but that claim was not proved.

Under questioning from counsel assisting the coroner, Tony Burns, the officers denied they ignored important safety measures.

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-12-28T17:54:00.001+10:00

Siobhan Reynolds, RIP

She fought the insane bureaucracy that the DEA has become

I’m saddened to learn this morning that Siobhan Reynolds was killed over the weekend in a plane crash.

I met Reynolds several years ago when I attended a forum on Capitol Hill on the under-treatment of pain. Her story about her husband’s chronic pain was so heartbreaking it moved me to take an interest in the issue. I eventually commissioned and edited a paper on the DEA and pain treatment while I was working for Cato.

Reynolds was fierce and tireless. She ran her advocacy group the Pain Relief Network on a thin budget, and often used her own money to travel to towns and cities where she felt prosecutors were unfairly targeting a doctor. Then she would fight back. And sometimes she’d win. The DEA and the federal prosecutors she fought weren’t really accustomed to that. They were accustomed to holding self-promoting press conferences, where they’d hold up big bags of pills, thus winning glowing write-ups from clueless reporters. Reynolds put those bags of pills into context. She encouraged pain patients whose lives these doctors made better to speak up and speak out. And she educated journalists.

There aren’t very many people who can claim that they personally changed the public debate about an issue. Reynolds could. Before her crusade, no one was really talking about the under-treatment of pain. The media was still wrapped up in scare stories about “accidental addiction” to prescription painkillers and telling dramatic (and sometimes false) tales about patients whose lazy doctors got them hooked on Oxycontin. Reynolds toured the country to point out that, in fact, the real problem is that pain patients are suffering, particularly chronic pain patients. And because of the government’s harassment, there are increasingly fewer doctors willing to treat them. After Reynolds, the major newsweeklies, the New York Times, and a number of other national media outlets began asking if the DEA’s war on pain doctors had gone too far.

Reynolds’ passion stemmed from watching her ex-husband agonize, and later her belief that his death was due to his inability to get treatment. She feared her son would contract the same condition, and face the same obstacles. What infuriated her was that this was never a problem of not knowing what relieves chronic pain. This wasn’t about the need for more research. Her husband had found relief in high-dose opioid therapy. The problem was that in its ceaseless efforts to stop people from getting high, the government had blocked that relief, imprisoned the doctor who administered it, and thus condemned her husband to suffer. (Watch The Chilling Effect, the movie Reynolds produced about her ex-husband’s fight here.)

Reynolds was admirably persistent. I often thought she was often a bit too idealistic, or at least that she set her goals too high. She told me once that she wouldn’t consider her work done until the Supreme Court declared the Controlled Substances Act unconstitutional. That’s an admirable goal, if not a particularly practical one. She often frustrated efforts to build a coalition on the issue because she’d grown weary of medical organizations and academics who, while concerned about the issue, she thought were too cowardly to take a more aggressive stand.

But Reynolds did begin to win her battles. She deserves a good deal of the credit for getting Richard Paey out of prison. She got some sentences overturned, and hooked accused doctors up with attorneys who know the issue. Which let to some acquittals.

Of course, the government doesn’t like a rabble rouser. It’s especially wary of rabble rousers who start to accumulate some victories. And so as Reynolds’ advocacy began to move the ball and get real results, the government hit back. When Reynolds began a campaign on behalf of Kansas physician Stephen Schneider, who had been indicted for over-prescribing painkillers, Assistant U.S. Attorney Tanya Treadway launched a blatantly vindictive attack on Reynolds’ right to free speech. Treadway opened a criminal investigation into Reynolds and her organization, attempting to paint Reynolds’ advocacy as obstruction of justice. Treadway then issued a sweeping subpoena for all email correspondence, phone records, and other documents that, had Reynolds complied, would have meant the end of her organization. Treadway wanted records of Reynolds’ private conversations with attorneys, doctors, and pain patients and their families. It was unconscionable. The government was demanding that she turn over all records of her conversations with suffering patients. (Some of whom undoubtedly sought out extra-legal ways to relieve their pain, since the government had made it impossible for them to find legal relief.)

So Reynolds fought the subpoena, all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. And she lost. Not only did she lose, but the government, with compliance from the federal courts, was able to keep the entire fight sealed. The briefs for the case are secret. The judges’ rulings are secret. Reynolds was barred from sharing her own briefs with the press. Perversely, Treadway had used the very grand jury secrecy intended to protect Reynolds as a gag to censor her. The case was a startling example not only of how far a prosecutor will go to tear down a critic, but of how much power they have to do so.

The sad thing is that it worked. The Pain Relief Network went under. Reynolds also lost a good deal of her own money. She was never charged with any crime. But that was never the point. It was a transparent and malicious effort to neutralize a pestering critic. And it was successful. (I wrote a piece for Slate on Treadway’s vendetta against Reynolds.) Despite all that, the last time I spoke with Reynolds she working on plans to start a new advocacy group for pain patients.

Reynolds was an unwearying, unwavering activist for personal freedom. She not only became a martyr for the rights of pain patients, but also for free expression and political dissent. And she died fighting.

Original report here

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2011-12-27T21:15:00.000+10:00

Australia: Hopelessly corrupt Victoria Police face further brutality claims

People have to file civil claims in order to bring the goons to justice

FURTHER allegations of police brutality have emerged in the state's north-east, with civil claims filed over the alleged bashing of two women, including a disabled woman who was allegedly knocked to the ground and capsicum-sprayed, and a man who says police kicked him in the testicles.

The allegations are the latest in a series of police brutality cases that lawyers and community workers say is a problem in the region and which, they say, the Victoria Police watchdog, the Ethical Standards Department, fails to properly investigate.

The Age last week revealed details of an incident on May 2 in which two Mansfield officers, Senior Constable Paul Bell and former senior constable David Eric Farrell kicked, punched and hit with batons two men who had been caught doing burnouts outside the police station. They pleaded guilty to offences including intentionally causing injury after an Ethical Standards investigation uncovered a video of the incident, captured on the dashboard camera of a patrol car.

Mansfield officers Sergeant Cameron McPherson and Senior Constable Paul Storey also face allegations, accused of unlawfully entering a property in Merton, where the elderly mother of two alleged victims lives, on June 13, 2009. It is understood the officers were responding to a complaint by neighbours.

The officers allegedly came through the gate with batons drawn and tried to enter the house without authority, at which point an argument broke out and they are accused of assaulting the alleged victims with batons and capsicum spray.

Martyn Cooper, then 39, who was living at the address and was known to police, alleges he was kicked in the testicles and beaten. His sister, Catherine Louise Alexiadis, also known to police, alleges she was hit with a baton, capsicum-sprayed and suffered extensive injuries, including bruising to her breast, neck, head, legs and buttock and psychological trauma.

Susan Lesley, in her 50s, alleges she received injuries to her shoulder, hip, back and exacerbation of psychological trauma. She is partially wheelchair-bound and uses a walking frame. The three, and another man who was present, were charged with offences including assaulting police, resisting arrest and hindering police, but the charges were struck out in November 2010.

Mr Cooper's mother, 83, was inside the house at the time on oxygen, but said she was not involved in the altercation. The incident was reported to Ethical Standards, which did not find evidence of wrongdoing. But the claims will be tested in a civil court.

In a writ filed in the County Court at Wangaratta on December 13, the plaintiffs claim damages, interest and costs incurred.

A Victoria Police spokesman said an investigation had found the claims "completely unsubstantiated" and the result had been routinely reviewed by the Office of Police Integrity. He said neither Victoria Police nor the members had received any notification of civil action and Victoria Police was not aware of any writs being lodged in the County Court.

Senior counsel Dyson Hore-Lacy previously told The Age that in dozens of cases he had handled over many years involving serious claims of wrongful conduct against police, nearly all were substantiated by the civil courts or settled in the complainants' favour. But he could recall only one of these cases being substantiated by Ethical Standards, and that was when a police officer unexpectedly confessed.

Other parties, including one of the victims bashed on video on May 2, are understood to be considering civil action in relation to three alleged incidents of police brutality within the past two years.

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-12-26T20:29:00.001+10:00

‘The state ceased to exist’: Damning verdict on lazy British police during summer riots

Rioting spread across Britain during the summer because police ‘lost control of the streets’, a devastating report by MPs says today. The home affairs select committee accuses police of failing to appreciate the ‘magnitude’ of the task they faced.

The committee’s chairman, Keith Vaz, said that some parts of the country ‘the state effectively ceased to exist - sometimes for hours at a time.’ He adds: ‘This is an utterly unacceptable situation and should never occur again.’

Groups on the Left have attempted to find other explanations for the riots, which broke out in Tottenham, north London, on August 6, following the fatal shooting by police of Mark Duggan. They then spread to other parts of the capital and other English cities, including Birmingham, Liverpool, Nottingham, Manchester and Salford – leaving five people dead.

A joint report by the Guardian and London School of Economics claimed that deep-seated anger and frustration towards the police was a significant factor behind the riots, with officers’ incivility a major concern. Political, social and economic grievances contributed to the unrest, the report said.

But the MPs lay the blame squarely at the police’s door. In terms of motives, the MPs say there is no ‘clear element of protest or clear political objectives’.

They said the perception that police had lost control of the streets was the most important reason why the violence and looting spread. Mr Vaz said: ‘Individual police officers acted with great bravery, and we commend them for their actions.

‘However, in London and other areas, in contrast with the effectiveness of police responses in some towns and cities, there was a failure of police tactics. ‘This situation might have been avoided had police appreciated the magnitude of the task.’

The committee’s report found the operation to police the disorder in many towns and cities, and especially in London, was flawed. Forces were not quick enough in flooding the streets with officers, there was no system to give businesses in areas affected by the riots early and consistent advice on what to do.

The report says: ‘What ultimately worked in quelling the disorder was increasing the number of police officers on the street. ‘If numbers could have been increased more rapidly, it is possible that some of the disturbances could have been avoided.

‘We regret that this did not happen and, with the benefit of hindsight, we regard the operation to police the disorder in many towns and cities, and particularly in London, as flawed.’ In the future, a ‘strong police presence should also have a deterrent effect on those opportunists considering joining in the disorder’, the report said. It added: ‘The single most important reason why the disorder spread was the perception, relayed by television as well as new social media, that in some areas the police had lost control of the streets.’

The committee’s report said the specific causes behind the riots were still unknown. The MPs say: ‘It has been clear from the start that the death of Mark Duggan acted as a trigger. It is also clear that there was a great deal of ‘copycat’ activity. But the clarity ends there. ‘Even in Tottenham, it is not clear that the circumstances surrounding the death of Mark Duggan were the only influences at play. ‘In other locations, the link to the original trigger is even more tenuous and provides no explanation for what went on.

‘Unlike some events in the past, including the riots in the 1980s, there does not seem to be any clear narrative, nor a clear element of protest or clear political objectives.

‘There may also have been some engagement by gangs, but in general this seems to have been opportunistic rather than organised and, on this occasion, appears not to have been a significant cause of the rioting and looting.

‘Many people seem to have been drawn into criminal activity almost on the basis of joining in a big party and without any sense of the seriousness of the acts they were undertaking.’

The MPs call for the Government to speed up the process of reimbursing people for damages and to review whether the £15 victim’s surcharge should be increased for future riots.

Last week, Home Secretary Theresa May said most rioters were hardened criminals driven by a desire for ‘instant gratification’.

Original report here. (Via POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

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2011-12-25T17:59:00.000+10:00

Australia: A very worrying police force

THE tacky, disturbing and totally unnecessary case of Bruce Rowe versus misplaced authority came to an end in the District Court on Monday. Well, it could have, although Constable Benjamin Arndt, who was found guilty of assaulting Rowe in 2006 in Brisbane's Queen Street Mall, could appeal to the Supreme Court or, conceivably, beyond.

The immovable Rowe, who turned 71 on Sunday, was a comparative stripling of 65 when he crossed paths with Arndt and a bunch of other police about 9 o'clock on the night of July 9, five-and-a-half years ago.

In an incident that was widely seen on TV (and is still out there on YouTube), Rowe was arrested, charged and convicted of obstructing police and failing to obey a police order after a disagreement that began in the public toilets and ended with him being held down by four officers and kneed by another.

It dragged through the Magistrates Court, the District Court and the Court of Appeal. The first court convicted Rowe, the second confirmed the conviction but the third overturned it.

The rematch came in the Magistrates Court in February when Rowe launched a private prosecution resulting in Arndt being found guilty of assaulting Rowe, fined $1000 and ordered to pay him $2250 court costs, although no conviction was recorded.

The established forces of investigation or law and order were conspicuous by their absence.

Then Arndt disputed the magistrate's findings but this week Judge Brian Devereaux tossed out the appeal. Watch this space.

The appeal largely revolved around claims that magistrate Linda Bradford-Morgan had relied on information extraneous to the case.

Arndt argued that the wrongful consideration of extraneous materials constituted a substantial miscarriage of the Magistrates Court trial, justice was not seen to be done and the trial was not conducted according to law.

Judge Devereaux was sympathetic to a point but decided it was open to the magistrate to convict Arndt on the original evidence without the distraction of the extraneous material.

He watched the distasteful video "many times" and declared: "It is unnecessary to say I reach precisely the same conclusions ... having due regard to the findings and conclusions of the magistrate but mindful of the errors I have found in her honour's reasoning, I have formed my own conclusion that the force used in the application of the four knee strikes was not authorised or justified or excused by law. "It was unlawful because it was not reasonably necessary and was unjustified in the circumstances."

How did it all come to this and why did it take so long to resolve?

Had Rowe been just another homeless, friendless and vulnerable man it might have been a simple issue resolved in court just after the morning drunks' parade.

In nine cases out of 10, that might have happened. However Rowe, although grieving and troubled, was also a stubborn and courageous man who refused to take a step backwards in the face of what he perceived as injustice.

He ultimately turned out to be more than capable of looking after himself and seeking justice. Perhaps, it is the other nine out of 10 cases we should be worried about.

At the time of Arndt's assault case, Police Union president Ian Leavers expressed concern that the conviction had "dire consequences for all police officers doing their job". "I am very, very concerned now that police officers across the state will be reluctant to do their job and the community will suffer," Leavers said.

It is a seductive sentiment for those who haven't the wit or the humility to ever imagine themselves in Rowe's shoes. However, it is ultimately even more harmful to the community to pretend that police cannot do their job without breaking the law.

And it is an affront to the thousands of police who do manage to do their difficult jobs without breaking the letter or the spirit of the law and apply the police motto of "With honour we serve" to all citizens, regardless of their station or their situation.

Equally worrying is that justice was delivered despite, not because of, the Police Ethical Standards Command and the Crime and Misconduct Commission, which found there was insufficient evidence to charge any of the police officers over the incident.

Subsequent court findings that Rowe was not only innocent but had been unlawfully roughed up must raise questions about the quality and diligence of both investigations.

Had it not been for the toughness and pigheadedness of Rowe, whose "age and slight frame" were noted by the magistrate, a serious wrong would have gone unpunished.

Had it not been for the video evidence, his might have been the feeble voice of an ordinary man who had fallen on hard times against that of police.

The inadequacies of the investigations into this event - and similar failings and inconsistencies in many others - are hardly likely to inspire confidence among the public or the police, who have an equal entitlement to justice.

The Roman poet Juvenal is credited with asking "Who will guard the guardians?" We are yet to adequately answer that, but surely it is not a 71-year-old man.

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-12-24T12:20:00.000+10:00

Otto Zehm, a mentally handicapped, 36-year-old unemployed janitor, was beaten to death in a Spokane convenience store in March 2006

Seattle, Spokane -- are there any good cops in WA?

"All I wanted was a Snickers bar," pleaded the battered and bloody man before he was gagged by his assailant.

On November 4, Karl Thompson, the man convicted of killing Zehm, was taken to jail. Several dozen members of Thompson’s gang were gathered outside the courtroom – most of them proudly wearing the colors – to “show their honor” by offering the murderer a public salute. Thompson – whose hands weren’t cuffed, in violation of long-established rules – smiled and returned the gesture. Zehm’s still-grieving mother and several other relatives stood just a few feet away.

The gang in question is the Spokane Police Department, which even now refuses to acknowledge that Thompson – who was a nominee to become Chief at the time he murdered Zehm – ever did anything wrong when he clubbed, tased, and suffocated a terrified, innocent man who did nothing to provoke the attack, and who put up no violent resistance to the assault.

Zehm had done custodial work at Fairchild Air Force Base and was well-known, and equally well-liked, by many people in his neighborhood, some of whom were aware that he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. He was in the daily habit of visiting a convenience store called Zip Trip to purchase junk food – usually Pepsi and a candy bar.

On March 18, 2006, Zehm retrieved some money at an ATM near Zip Trip. Something in his behavior struck two girls as odd, so they called the police. Although there was no reason to believe that Zehm had committed a crime, Thompson entered the store as if he were pursuing a dangerous fugitive. Security video documents that Thompson approached Zehm from behind, while retrieving his custom-made, over-sized ironwood nightstick.

Thompson introduced himself to Zehm by shouting at him to drop the two-liter bottle of Pepsi. According to the officer, the startled and puzzled man responded by quite reasonably asking, “Why?” Thompson interpreted that Zehm’s fleeting non-compliance as an immediate and intolerable threat to officer safety. So he rushed at the terrified man and began to beat him with his nightstick – clubbing him first in the legs, then on the shoulders, neck, and head. Blows to the head are defined as lethal strikes under the Spokane PD’s use-of-force policy, justifiable only when a suspect threatens the life of a police officer or bystanders.

As the security video demonstrates, Zehm never put up a fight. He retreated from Thompson, and then made a pitiable attempt to use his bottle of soda to deflect blows aimed at his face. Thompson escalated his assault by tasering him at least three times. Thompson was eventually joined by six other other police officers. Eventually, Thompson was actually sitting on Zehm, who was face-down on the floor.

The victim was hog-tied in a “four-point restraint,” meaning that his hands were shackled to his ankles. Department policy guidelines emphasize that suspects restrained in this fashion are never to be placed face-down, since this posture can result in “positional asphyxia.” Yet Zehm was left in that position for about seventeen minutes, and at one point an officer actually pulled his feet backwards – which increased the risk of suffocation by placing pressure on the victim’s diaphragm.

After emergency personnel arrived, they were instructed to dig the Taser barbs out of Zehm’s flesh. They were also asked to provide a “non-rebreathing” oxygen mask; this was placed over the victim’s face, supposedly to prevent him from assaulting the officers by spitting on them. This mask was not designed or intended to be used without being attached to an oxygen supply. Once the mask was placed on Zehm’s face, the traumatized and panicking man – who was already at severe risk of hypoxia – was forced to breathe through an easily obstructed opening roughly the size of a quarter.

Did Thompson and his cohorts deliberately set out to suffocate Zehm? Every step they took led inexorably to that outcome, and incompetence can only explain so much. That was the outcome, whether it was the result of deliberate malice or depraved indifference. Zehm stopped breathing about seventeen minutes after Thompson’s initial assault, and died in a nearby hospital about two days later. But the police department’s assault on Zehm continued while he struggled for life in the hospital, and didn’t end with his death.

On the day of the beating, Police Chief Jim Nicks told the media that Zehm had “lunged” at Thompson, thereby threatening his life. Other officers claimed that Zhem had a prior arrest for assaulting an officer. Both claims were conscious, deliberate lies.

About two weeks after Zehm’s death, Detective Terry Ferguson, who “investigated” the incident for the Spokane PD, filed a report claiming that none of the seven officers who assaulted Zehm committed a crime. Ferguson had little time to investigate what was done to Zehm, because she was too busy investigating the victim. The detective persuaded a judge to issue warrants to pry into every aspect of Zehm’s medical, employment, and personal history, on the pretext that the deceased was suspected of “assaulting a police officer.” This was actually an unsuccessful effort to exhume something – anything – that could be used to denigrate the victim.

After the pressure of a threatened lawsuit, Spokane County Prosecutor Steve Tucker released the video recordings of the assault, which he and the police had diligently suppressed. The recordings contradicted every critical element of Thompson’s version of the event, beginning with the claim that Zehm had “lunged” at the officer.

With no criminal charges filed against Thompson, Zehm’s family announced its intention to sue the City of Spokane, and the Justice Department began a civil rights inquiry. In March 2009 – three years after the killing – Chief Anne Kirkpatrick (who had replaced Chief Nicks) issued a public statement offering her “unequivocal support” to Thompson. “Based on all the information and evidence I have reviewed, I have determined that Officer Karl Thompson acted consistent with the law,” Kirkpatrick insisted.

A few months later, Chief Kirkpatrick assigned Thompson – who was, recall, the subject of a federal civil rights investigation – to help train other Spokane police officers how to deal with “high-risk liability incidents,” which have been plentiful.

Spokane’s municipal government, which paid out $2.5 million to resolve police-related lawsuits between 1996 and 2007, has a policy of filing counter-suits accusing citizens of “conspiracy to misuse the judicial process.” This is made possible by a state statute intended to protect police against supposedly frivolous lawsuits. Given all of this it’s not surprising that Chief Kirkpatrick’s unqualified endorsement of Thompson’s actions was coupled with an unyielding official line blaming the victim for his own death. “Any injury or damage suffered by Mr. Zehm was caused solely by reason of his conduct and willful resistance,” proclaimed the City of Spokane’s official response to the family’s civil lawsuit.

Mr. Zehm’s “conduct” – which, according to Chief Kirkpatrick and Spokane’s municipal government, justified the use of lethal force -- consisted of doing exactly nothing. Then again, he was armed with a bottle of Pepsi, which apparently left the heroic Officer Thompson no choice but to stage a preemptive strike with his club and Taser. Perhaps if it had been Mt. Dew, the use of tactical nukes would have been appropriate.

“If all [the victim] wanted to do was surrender, he could have done so,” insisted Officer Terry Preuninger, the Spokane PD’s SWAT Team Leader and patrol tactics instructor, during the trial. “[Officer Thompson’s] assessment was accurate. He continued to use force. It did allow him to keep that man from hurting him or anyone else.”

Thompson began his attack within seconds of arriving at the store – before Zehm had a chance to “surrender.” Furthermore, the victim was backing away from the officer. According to Preuninger – who, as SWAT leader, approaches such situations with a militarized close-and-kill mindset – this didn’t matter: “Picture wrestlers or boxers. It’s definitely not an indication that they don’t want to hurt or assault you because they move back.”

“A police officer becomes an expert in evaluation of behavior or picking out little things that are different,” Preuninger asserted on the stand. Victor Boutros, chief prosecutor during the trial, treated that claim with laudable contempt, mocking this supposed preternatural gift of discernment as a “Spidey sense” that “can’t be impeached by citizen eye witnesses or video. Only [Thompson] could have seen those things.”

Furthermore, according to Preuninger, police have plenary authority to use lethal force even when their perceptions are in error: “A police officer can make a mistake. An officer could believe their [sic] life was in danger or they [sic] were in danger of being assaulted when in fact we could go back in hindsight and show that’s not true. But the force would be authorized.”

This is to say: From the perspective of the individual who trains the Spokane PD regarding the use of force, Karl Thompson was completely right – but he could have been entirely wrong, and he would still have had the authority to kill Otto Zehm.

Following Thompson’s guilty verdict, U.S. Attorney Mike Ormsby asserted that “This is not an indictment of our entire police force.” Oh, yes it is.

Original report here

From Wikipedia:

On June 22, 2009, a federal Grand Jury handed down an indictment on Spokane Police Officer Karl Thompson. Thompson is a veteran of the force and was the first of seven officers that responded to the Zip Trip. The 2 counts are: unreasonable use of force and making a false entry into a record being investigated by a federal agency. Both counts are felonies and could hold a 20 year maximum sentence if Thompson is convicted on both charges. The unreasonable use of force stems from the surveillance video that shows Thompson approaching Zehm from behind and striking him to the ground, followed by multiple blows with his baton and deploying his taser. Zehm was not acting combative at the time of the initial blow and only started fighting back after Thompson engaged Zehm with force. Federal prosecutors did confirm that the unreasonable use of force is only pertaining to a civil rights violation for Zehm's injury and not his death. It is unclear at this time if more indictments will be handed down for Zehm's death or for his improper restraint for being hog-tied on his stomach with a non-rebreather mask. Thompson has been put on immediate paid administrative leave pending the trial.

The Federal Trial against Thompson began on Wednesday, October 12 with jury selection. The trial was moved from Spokane to Yakima, Washington after defense attorneys raised concerns about the extent of local media coverage of the controversy. U.S. District Court Judge Fred Van Sickle also ruled to exclude Spokane County from the jury pool. While Van Sickle said he’s not persuaded that the publicity has created “actual” or “perceived” bias against Thompson, he decided to move the trial nonetheless.

On November 2, 2011 the jury found Officer Thompson guilty on both counts; excessive use of force and lying to investigators about the confrontation.

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2011-12-23T15:43:00.000+10:00

More Seattle charmers

Both the report below and the one yesterday suggest that the Seattle cops have a serious attitude problem

He was nearly killed in a horrific roadside accident, and now a jogger is furious at the wise-cracking cops who mocked him as he clung to life.

Lying in a pool of his own blood after being hit by a truck, Seattle man Tim Nelson had blacked out when first responders arrived.

One officer was operating under the mantra of 'to serve and disrespect' as he remarked to a colleague: 'That's why you drive a car. 'Don't jog to work you dumb f***!'

Mr Nelson was left with a broken back, cracked ribs and fractured skull. But it wasn't until weeks later, as his lawyers tried to discover who was at fault in the accident, that they came across video footage of the police officers' disrespectful comments.

Minutes after arriving on the scene, Seattle's not-so-finest can be heard on tape mocking the critically-injured man in the following exchange:

Officer 1 'They say he flew up in the air and landed on his noggin.'

Officer 2 'Hey, that ain't my problem!'

Officer 1 'That's why you drive a car!'

Officer 2 'Yeah, don't try to jog to work, you dumb f***!'

Soon afterwards the officers are heard directing their ill-judged sense of humour at the driver of the truck, poking fun at his accent.

Officer 1 'I don't know. It uh, hit da truck! I don't know!'

Officer 2 'He goes, 'What happen now? I get ticket?'

With a major city viaduct closed, Mr Nelson was merely following the advice of the city when he decided to jog to work the day of the accident. He is now demanding an apology from the city or the officer in question.

The accident survivor said: 'We pay their salaries and I understand they have stressful jobs but this cop was not under any duress. 'He was joking and making remarks about the truck drivers' foreign accent'

The American Civil Liberties Union said police should be respectful to all the public. 'It should never be acceptable to make statements that denigrate members of the public whom they serve,' the group said in a statement.

Deputy police Chief Clark Kimerer told the KIRO 7 network that the officer's behaviour was 'unacceptable'. He said: 'We expect 100 percent professionalism from our officers. We also, with them, have to recognize that they are often in stressful situations and also that there is sometimes more than meets the eyes.'

The incident is the subject of an internal investigation.

Original report here

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2011-12-22T14:29:00.001+10:00

Another video catches cop in routine lies

Seattle police were raked over the coals by a U.S. Justice Department which found a pattern of excessive force. In spite of that two officers pull this little routine.

According to the police officers two men came to a stop sign and failed to stop, so the police pulled them over. The police report claimed the men almost hit pedestrians crossing the road. But the video shows otherwise. The two Hispanic men stopped at the sign in a full stop and there were NO pedestrians.

Police not only pull the men over on these false charges but immediately begin manhandling them and shouting abusively at them. An attorney says it appears the cops were intentionally trying to bait the men into getting physical so they would have an excuse to rough them up.

Once again a video tape has shown that cops do lie about the people they pull over. They manufacture false accusations against innocent people and get off on being violent and aggressive.

This will continue until we take a zero tolerance policy with police. First, any penalty that applies to private citizens for violating the law ought to be doubled for police officers. They should be held to a higher standard if they are going to be the enforcers of the law.

Second, all damages should be paid by the officers and not by the taxpayers—even if this means they lose their homes and doughnut collection.

Finally, we have to abolish all laws that are being used by the police to harass individuals videotaping the officers. If we are going to have any law on the matter I would prefer one that says all individuals with cell phone cameras are required to capture all arrests and police incidents they witness and offer the recordings to prosecutors. Now, I wouldn't do that, but if there is only a choice between making such recordings illegal, and making them mandatory, we'd be better off with them being mandatory.

Original report here. (Video at link)

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2011-12-21T19:00:00.001+10:00

With unrestrained seizure powers, Philly code-enforcement agents go pillaging

Normally, when we cover stories of unjust seizure and forfeiture in the United States, the guilty agency or agent is a law enforcement agent associated with the criminal justice system. Unfortunately, the access of law enforcement to vast seizure and forfeiture powers has led other public agencies in non-law enforcement sectors to obtain seizure and forfeiture powers.

Of particular concern to me are the efforts by municipalities to endow municipal code enforcement task forces with broad powers (like the Cedar Falls (IA) municipal government or the Columbia (MO) Neighborhood Response Team).

Today’s story comes to us from Philadelphia, where a scandal is breaking involving officials with the Community Life Improvement Project (CLIP), an anti-blight campaign targeting ‘quality of life’ code violations through the city’s Neighborhood Transformation Initiative (NIT).

And when I say “a scandal is breaking”, I mean CLIP officials are being charged with felony offenses including racketeering, perjury, theft, and gun running. Apparently this municipal government agency has become a haven for pirates, who enter private residences at will to loot and plunder. From Courthouse News:

Accusing CLIP crews of committing a city-funded “crime wave” of “break-ins and thefts,” a Grand Jury in 2009 found that the crews “didn’t simply pocket stray knickknacks. They drove trucks to the houses and took everything …

“In several cases, the property owners were forced out or locked out of their houses, even though the CLIP crew had no legal authority to enter the properties or displace the occupants,” the Grand Jury found.

CLIP was designed to allow officials to respond quickly to property-code violations, by giving owners 20 days to remediate a violation or face unilateral action by city workers, who could cut weeds, remove trash or otherwise clean a property, then bill the owner for the services.

But what may have begun as a well-intentioned anti-blight program quickly transformed into something far more nefarious.

According to the Grand Jury: “One 75-year-old woman was at home … with her husband and disabled daughter when one of the CLIP crew members climbed in through her kitchen window and an … inspector broke in through her basement door. After removing the family from the house, the crew ransacked their home, stealing over $25,000 in cash and almost all of the furniture.

The elderly woman walked two miles back to her house to see what was going on, but the supervisor would not ‘allow’ her stay. When she later asked the supervisor of the crew what had happened to all of the money and furniture from the house, he told her to get a lawyer. One of the crew members testified that the supervisor, Rick Sicinski, allowed them to take money from houses, saying it was ‘a fire hazard.’”

Using city-owned tools, cameras and vehicles, code-enforcement officials entered least six homes “over the course of several years” without consent and proceeded to “systematically” steal valuables, Tengood says.

“Once inside the homes, the conspirators systematically stole items of value from the premises. In the most egregious instances City trucks were actually driven to the target homes and their contents removed en masse: televisions; dining room furniture sets; floor safes; silver flatware settings; clothing; family heirlooms; and several large gun collections,” the complaint states, citing the Grand Jury report.

“The scheme was comprehensive in scope and specifically designed to intimidate, rob, and/or extort money and property from select residents of the northeast section of the City,” Tengood says.

And as if plundering the homes were not enough, the cooked-up violations “were served together with fraudulent or inflated bills for municipal services deemed necessary to remedy the violations,” according to Tengood’s complaint.

He claims the scheme was a cooperative effort among multiple city departments and “sub-departments,” including the Mayor’s Office of Community Services, the Solicitor’s Office, the Department of Licenses & Inspections and the Department of Streets.
Perpetrators ranged “from lower level inspectors, to program managers, and up through to the executive tier,” Tengood claims.

If only there were some Constitutional protection against this kind of general search power and the petty tyranny it engenders…

Original report here

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2011-12-20T18:10:00.001+10:00

Judge upholds cop's conviction for assault

Why was no criminal conviction recorded against this scum? It is a sad day when citizens (such as Mr Rowe and Miss Eaves) have to launch private prosecutions to prove police misbehaviour. The police brass obviously believe there is a degree of assault by police that should be permitted. That is however an entirely extra-legal view.

The Commissioner himself is tainted by his inaction in these cases -- even more so since he used taxpayer funds to defend the erring officers and take their cases to appeal

One can only hope that there will now be disciplinary action against Arndt after the failure of his appeal confirms what garbage he is

A policeman who was found guilty of assaulting a homeless man in a Brisbane mall has had his appeal against the verdict dismissed.

Constable Benjamin Arndt was fined $1000 in February, with no conviction recorded, for assaulting 65-year-old Bruce Rowe in Brisbane's Queen St Mall in 2006.

He was one of four officers who restrained Mr Rowe after he failed to obey a cleaner's request to leave a public toilet in Brisbane's Queen St Mall where he was getting changed.

Security video of the incident, which attracted national media attention, formed the basis of Mr Rowe's assault complaint. He had originally been found guilty of obstructing police and disobeying a lawful direction, but the decision was overturned on a second appeal. Mr Rowe then launched a successful private prosecution for common assault against Const Arndt.

In documents lodged in the Brisbane District Court, Const Arndt argued the magistrate erred by considering the previous court cases between Mr Rowe and Const Arndt when making her decision in the latest case.

Const Arndt also alleged evidence was improperly led during the private prosecution and claimed the magistrate had failed to make sufficient rulings on a number of pertinent issues including the lawfulness of a "move on" direction given to Mr Rowe before the incident.

Judge Brian Devereaux dismissed these claims in Brisbane's Court of Appeal on Monday. He found the magistrate had erred by considering previous court cases but that the guilty verdict stood.

"Mindful of the errors I have found in her Honour's reasoning, I have formed my own conclusion that the force used in the application of the four knee strikes was not authorised or justified or excused by law," the judge said.

The Police Ethical Standards Command and Crime and Misconduct Commission had found there was insufficient evidence to charge any of the police officers over the incident.

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-12-19T14:44:00.001+10:00

The disturbing reason why a growing number of parents in Britain are being falsely accused of shaking their babies to death

Standing together in the dock of the world’s most famous criminal court stood two confused and sobbing parents, accused of the worst offence imaginable: beating and shaking their own baby to death.

According to prosecutors, four-month-old Jayden Wray was gripped and twisted so brutally that bones throughout his body shattered, while vicious blows to his head damaged his brain.

The injured baby was rushed to hospital where doctors said he could not survive. Three days later, paediatricians at Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital in London switched off his life-support machine.

So certain were doctors and police that Jayden had been hurt by his parents that the couple were barred from their son’s bedside before he died. They were not allowed to attend his hospital christening and lost the chance to say their last goodbyes.

This horrific story unfolded over six weeks in a panelled courtroom of London’s Old Bailey. Yet today, Jayden’s father and mother — Rohan, 22, and 19-year-old Chana — are free. The case against them was thrown out ten days ago after 60 medical and forensic experts at their murder trial disagreed over what really killed their son.

Finally, the judge told the jury to find the couple not guilty because Jayden’s post-mortem revealed he had rickets, a serious childhood bone disease which had once been eradicated in this country nearly a century ago.

Rickets is linked to a lack of vitamin D, which the body synthesises from sunlight or absorbs from eating foods such as oily fish and eggs.

The disease causes the skulls of children to weaken and their bones to easily break — symptoms which closely mimic those of a deliberately shaken baby.

Hospital doctors in Jayden’s case, it transpired, had missed a vital clue when the baby got sick and then died: his mother, Chana, had so little vitamin D in her body that Jayden did not receive the vitamin while inside her womb or when she breastfed him.

After the case, the Wrays’ lawyer Jenny Wiltshire said: ‘These parents have been through hell. They can now grieve for the son they loved and cherished.’

Yet theirs is a case which has profound implications for all families. For it serves to highlight a growing medical problem — one which is not only leading to false allegations of abuse against innocent parents, but which is endangering the health of children right across Britain.

As Jenny Wiltshire said: ‘The real criminality here is that if the money spent on bringing this case had been used to tell all breastfeeding mothers to take vitamin D supplements, Jayden’s death wouldn’t have occurred. ‘Rickets, which is now back to epidemic proportions, would have been wiped out.’

Indeed, a growing number of experts believe that Britain is in the grip of a childhood rickets crisis on a scale not seen since Victorian times, when children working long hours in the factories and the mines were particularly vulnerable to the ailment.

The condition was largely eliminated after World War II, when the government provided free orange juice enriched with vitamin D and cod liver oil for every child in the country.

The difference today is that it is not only a disease of the poor. Those living in middle-class homes are just as likely to suffer from the condition — notorious for causing bowed legs and knock-knees — as those from the poorest inner-city estates.

Doctors say the alarming rise is often due to today’s children spending large periods of time indoors playing computer games and watching television.

At the same time, many parents worry about exposing their children to sunlight — due to the repeated warnings about skin cancer — and cover them in high-protection creams, which impede the body’s ability to produce vitamin D and, in turn, to grow strong bones.

But until now, few have pointed out one of the most worrying aspects of the crisis: babies with a vitamin D deficiency display remarkably similar symptoms to those who have been deliberately shaken by their parents or carers. This may have led to other controversial criminal trials of parents accused of harming their children when — like the Wrays — they were completely innocent.

Earlier this year, Nafisa and Mohammed Karolia, of Blackburn, Lancashire, were imprisoned for child cruelty despite their defence team arguing that vitamin D depletion led to their baby daughter’s injuries and subsequent death from broncho-pneumonia, aged seven months, in 2009.

The Karolias were accused of inflicting many terrible injuries on the child, including breaking her leg, her arm, and her rib. The police and prosecution lawyers said they had been caused by twisting, shaking and rotating the child’s limbs.

However, a very senior paediatric consultant who has examined evidence given at the trial has told the Mail: ‘It is very likely that there was an issue here with low levels of vitamin D in the mother and her daughter. But it appears that when it was mentioned in court, the prosecution nearly had a fit because they insisted this child had been shaken and abused.’

Now one coroner has become so alarmed by the rise of rickets that he has demanded the Government take action.

North London Coroner Andrew Walker sent a written notice to the Department of Health, under Rule 43 of the Coroner’s Rules, saying mothers must be warned of the dangers of not taking the vitamin D supplements.

The notice requires the Health Secretary Andrew Lansley to respond within 56 days, detailing what action his department plans to take.

Mr Walker acted after presiding over the inquest into the death of three-month-old Milind Agarwal. The baby was taken to the doctor this summer with a suspected viral infection and was sent home with saline nasal drops. A later call to another doctor by his parents resulted in them being told to give him paracetamol.

When Milind became critically ill at 10pm one evening in July this year, his parents called an ambulance and he was taken to Northwick Park Hospital in North London. A few hours later, he died of septic inflammation of the heart and associated problems.

An eminent paediatric pathologist and a leading authority on signs of child abuse, Dr Irene Scheimberg, who conducted a post-mortem examination on baby Milind, told the inquest that vitamin D deficiency may have accelerated the baby’s illness because his immune system was weakened. She said afterwards: ‘In the 21st century, in a civilised country, this is outrageous. It is only the tip of the iceberg.’

The highly respected Dr Scheimberg, based at the Royal London Hospital, added: ‘I hope that the doctors treating sick children now open their eyes to this vitamin deficiency and the problems it causes. It is a really serious issue and a matter of justice for parents who are accused of abusing their children.’

The parents of Milind, who live in Wembley, London, agreed to talk to the Mail about what happened. They do not want their real first names used in this article to protect their family’s privacy. Both parents, whom we have called Gayen and Shrina, were born in India.

Research has shown that those with darker complexions process vitamin D from sunlight much more slowly than people with paler skin and are, therefore, prone to deficiency — and more likely to pass it on to their babies.

When I met the bereaved couple this week at their small flat, they were still raw with grief about their baby’s death. He was born in March, a wonderful first son. A slight muscle weakness in his heart, discovered soon after his birth, was corrected with a simple procedure, and in June, Milind was given a clean bill of health.

‘We are talking about him now because it is important for other families,’ says Gayen, a computer engineer, aged 34. ‘We had no idea that the legacy of Milind would be to help spread the word that vitamin D is essential for all mothers and their babies.’

Jayden had obvious signs of ricketts. It would have left the baby with weak bones, including a weak skull. They show me his picture, a bright-eyed and smiling child looking straight at the camera. Then they remember his last hours with tears in their eyes.

By tragic coincidence, Shrina, 29, had been told she had a vitamin D deficiency two years before Milind was born. She had a pain in her right knee and her local GP put her on vitamin D tablets. However, as she explains: ‘I had stopped taking them well before I became pregnant. No one, including the GP, the midwife or doctors at Northwick Park Hospital, ever told me to take the pills while I was pregnant or my new son would be in danger.’

Since Milind’s death, she has revisited her GP and had blood tests. They show that she has very low levels of the crucial vitamin. 'I am now taking pills all the time and trying to get out in the sunshine,’ she explains.

By coincidence, the child pathologist Dr Scheimberg, who unravelled the truth about Milind’s death, also helped clear the parents of Jayden Wray.

The prosecution insisted that Jayden’s injuries to his skull, knee, elbow, shoulder, hip, ankle and wrist could only have been caused by him being intentionally shaken and having his head hit against something hard.

However, a post-mortem examination by Dr Scheimberg discovered Jayden’s ‘obvious sign of rickets. It would have left the baby with weak bones, including a weak skull, and led to a series of fractures’. She is appalled at the way that these innocent parents have been treated. ‘Some people should be hanging their heads,’ she said.

‘These young parents were stopped from even saying goodbye to their child before he died, and then accused of murdering him.’

One can only hope that their cases will lead to a growing realisation among all parents — and some in the medical profession — about the return of a condition that can be prevented by a simple pill or exposure to sunshine.

Original report here

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2011-12-18T14:09:00.001+10:00

Tainted evidence: science in the dock

Comment from Australia

Television teaches us forensic science is always right but increasingly courts are begging to differ, writes Stuart Washington.

When a sledgehammer-wielding robber broke through the front doors of the Willoughby Hotel early one January morning in 2008, his balaclava-clad image was captured by a security camera.

Fewer than 30 minutes later the same robber, still bearing a sledgehammer and still wearing a balaclava, was photographed stealing just over $13,500 at the P.J. Gallagher's Irish Pub in Drummoyne.

Twenty-three months later, a Tempe man, Raymond George Morgan, was found guilty in the District Court of two counts of robbing more than $58,500 in the heists and sent to jail.

The security cameras helped convict Morgan of the crimes when an expert witness linked him to the scene of the crimes through a science used in court known as "body mapping".

Earlier this month Morgan won a retrial because the expert's evidence was rejected by the Court of Criminal Appeal. The court found the body mapping was "simplistic" and did not use one measurement.

In the appeal court's view, the "science" of body mapping used in the case of Morgan was wearing no clothes.

So much for all those toned and svelte CSI forensic investigators running around on television each week.

Morgan's robbery convictions have been overturned at a time when increasing concerns are raised about "junk science" appearing before the courts: unreliable expert evidence leading to contaminated criminal trials.

At its worst, such evidence could result in innocent people being sent to jail. At the very least, such evidence could tilt trials unfairly.

Disturbing examples of the fallibility of expert evidence have played out in two recent Supreme Court appeals involving Gordon Wood, found guilty of murdering his girlfriend Caroline Byrne, and Jeffrey Gilham, found guilty of murdering his parents.

Judgments are reserved in both cases, but the court has made no secret it has dim views on the credibility of expert evidence in both cases

An academic in Canada, Emma Cunliffe, has also raised serious questions about the robustness of expert evidence used to convict the Novocastrian Kathleen Folbigg of killing her four children.

The state of forensic science appears to be so parlous that further examples seem likely.

Gary Edmond, a University of NSW law academic who has researched expert evidence over the past four years, wrote in a paper in the Australian Journal of Forensic Sciences earlier this year: "A good deal of the opinion evidence produced by forensic science and medicine appears to be unreliable or of unknown reliability, and obtained in conditions that make few, if any, sustained attempts to minimise known risks and dangers."

In 2009, the peak body of US scientists, the National Academy of Sciences, released a report that found only DNA testing among the broad range of forensic sciences was sufficiently grounded in science to regularly and accurately identify a suspect. (And even then serious concerns remain about DNA evidence, including the ability to wrongly convict people on tainted or rigged samples).

The flip side is that almost every other field of forensic science - the science used by expert witnesses in court to establish guilt or innocence - does not have the same level of scientific rigour.

The pall cast by the report hangs over areas that have developed a TV-inspired mythos of infallibility: blood spatter examinations, bullet rifling and even fingerprinting.

"What we see on TV is a super science," says Richard Kemp, a University of NSW psychologist who is studying the way juries react to expert evidence. "And that is so at odds with the reality of what is occurring. You want scientists doing science, which on the whole is really dull. It doesn't make for good TV."

The arguments of Edmond and Kemp are familiar to those at the highest levels of the judiciary, with the chief judge at common law in the NSW Supreme Court, Justice Peter McClellan, talking about a future need for structural reforms to help courts deal with the way they assess expert evidence.

"I have written over many years about the issue of the capacity of courts under the conventional structure to decide between the views of scientists where there are issues of controversy," Justice McClellan says.

He says that as the complexity of science grows "courts will have to be alert to ensure that the science which is admitted in the courtroom is good science if not the best science available".

Kemp gave evidence in the case about Morgan, raising questions about the science that helped secure the conviction.

Evidence against Morgan was based on body mapping in which distorted and poor quality images on security cameras from both hotels were compared to images of Morgan's body, head and face shape.

The comparison, made by a University of Adelaide biological anthropologist and anatomist, Maciej Henneberg, was able to find "a high level of anatomical similarity".

Henneberg's comparisons were able to find similarities including a broad "orthognathic" nose, an elongated "dolichocephalic" head when seen from above and a "straight" posture.

The comparison was made remarkable by the fact the robber was dressed head-to-toe in black, including a close-fitting balaclava and a hoodie pulled over his face.

The appeal court sided with defence experts including Kemp about the deficiencies of Henneberg's comparisons and excluded his evidence.

The court found Henneberg's reliability was affected by his failed attempt to compare images with Pauline Hanson after nude photographs purporting to be of Hanson were published in 2009. Henneberg had told the media he was "99.2 per cent sure" the photographs were of Hanson. The photographs were later found to be not of Hanson.

The court also agreed Henneberg's methodology was "simplistic" and found it was concerning there was no research into the validity, reliability and error rate of body mapping.

Edmond is calling for such problems to be addressed by the introduction of a specific reliability test for expert evidence to be heard by the courts. At present there are lower conditions placed on expert evidence under the Evidence Act: it must involve specialised knowledge based on his or her training; and the opinion expressed must be wholly or substantially based on that knowledge.

Kemp expresses some incredulity that reliability is not specifically demanded by law. There are explicit requirements for reliability of evidence in the US, Canada and, shortly, Britain. "When I speak to fellow scientists, they can't believe that such a statute doesn't exist," he says.

The confronting message being pushed by Edmond is being heard within some of the most senior institutions in forensic science in Australia, with some reservations.

James Robertson, who joined the University of Canberra as forensics professor after a 21-year career with the Australian Federal Police, joined Edmond to organise a conference that aired perceived problems about expert evidence earlier this month.

But Robertson, and several other senior forensic experts spoken to by the Herald, denies there is a crisis of confidence in the expert evidence appearing before courts. Robertson says Australia, through accreditation systems and other safeguards, leads the world in terms of a consistent approach to the way forensic experts conduct their work.

Morgan's court appeal victory was bittersweet. He made no contest to two other charges of possessing almost $30,000 in proceeds of crime and remains in jail on those charges. And two bundles of money found in his possession were neatly bundled in the way the Willoughby Hotel bundled its notes.

On technical grounds about directions given by the trial judge, Morgan successfully appealed against a conviction of receiving an Audi stolen from Mosman on the night of the robberies and used as the getaway car.

But the court of appeal referred to evidence that Morgan had possession of the car keys and lock-picking implements. In total there was enough evidence without body mapping that would allow a jury to convict on the robbery charges, meaning he faces a retrial instead of an acquittal.

Edmond points out the justice system is built on a foundation that it is better for 10 guilty to go free than allow one innocent person to be jailed. And he warns junk science may erode that foundation. "We have a system that requires people to have a fair trial," Edmond says.

Original report here

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2011-12-17T12:04:00.001+10:00

Scotland: Fingerprint evidence 'should be regarded as opinion not fact’

Evidence from fingerprints should be “recognised as opinion and not fact”, a public inquiry has recommended.

The investigation was ordered after a former police officer was accused of perjury when a fingerprint found at a murder scene was wrongly identified as hers.

Tom Nelson, the director of forensic services at the Scottish Police Services Authority (SPSA), publicly apologised to Shirley McKie and her family for the “errors that took place” and the “subsequent pain” it had caused them.

Mr Nelson said the inquiry’s report “challenges the infallibility of fingerprint evidence”, and added: “We accept that this will be a huge cultural change for fingerprint examiners across the world.’’

Miss McKie, a former detective constable with Strathclyde Police, was tried for perjury after insisting a fingerprint found in the home of murder victim Marion Ross in 1997 did not belong to her. She was later cleared of lying under oath and in February 2006 was given £750,000 in an out-of-court settlement.

In his report, Sir Anthony Campbell, the inquiry chairman, concluded that fingerprint evidence should be “recognised as opinion evidence and not fact”.

A former Northern Ireland appeal court judge, Sir Anthony said the fingerprint in question had been “misidentified as the fingerprint of Miss McKie”.

He also said a fingerprint found in the home of David Asbury, convicted then cleared of murdering Miss Ross, had also been misidentified as belonging to the dead woman.

But he put this down to “human error” and said there was “no conspiracy against Miss McKie”. Sir Anthony also recommended that special processes be developed for complex fingerprint marks, saying these should be examined by three experts who should reach their conclusions independently, making notes at each stage.

Fingerprint examiners perform “important, difficult and at times complex work”, Sir Anthony said, adding that his recommendations were “designed to assist them to these challenges’’.

Forensic experts Hugh Macpherson, Charles Stewart, Fiona McBride and Anthony McKenna had originally identified the mark found in Miss Ross’s home as being made by Miss McKie. They said they were “disappointed in some of the findings of the inquiry”.

The SPSA will draw up a plan to make the necessary improvements and in January will begin a new approach to dealing with complex fingerprint marks, in line with the inquiry recommendations. The SPSA has accepted the inquiry’s findings and recommendations in full.

Last night Miss McKie’s father, Iain, welcomed Mr Nelson’s apology. He said: “He apologised to Shirley and myself and our family for the mistakes that were made in the past. Its an extremely important apology because it’s the first time I have ever heard anyone say sorry.’’

Mr McKie added: “No father can stand by and see his daughter assaulted and abused, because that’s what the system did to Shirley.” Miss McKie, 49, was not present at the press conference when Sir Anthony presented his findings. But her father said she was left “speechless” when he told her the SPSA had apologised.

Original report here

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2011-12-16T12:46:00.002+10:00

Italian court explains why it cleared Amanda Knox

The Italian appeals court that cleared Amanda Knox in the slaying of her British roommate has given the reasons for its ruling: the evidence that had been used by a lower court to convict the American and her Italian boyfriend of murder just didn't hold up.

Those shortcomings included no murder weapon, faulty DNA, an inaccurate time for the killing, and insufficient proof that Knox and Raffaele Sollecito were even at the location where the crime occurred. So said the Perugia appellate court in its long-awaited reasoning behind its October ruling that reversed the lower court's convictions.

British university student Meredith Kercher was found slain in a pool of blood on her bedroom floor in Perugia, Italy, on November 2, 2007.

Knox and Sollecito, who had just begun dating at the time of the murder, were arrested several days later, then convicted in what prosecutors' portrayed as a drug-fuelled sexual assault. They were sentenced to 26 years and 25 years, respectively, in proceedings that made headlines around the world.

On Thursday, the appellate cited among the other failed elements of the prosecutors' case DNA evidence, which was undermined during a re-examination in the appeals trial, and the failure to conclusively identify the murder weapon. The appellate court even contradicted the lower court's time of death, saying it happened at around 10.15pm and not after 11pm. The court said not only had the "building blocks" used to construct the case had failed, but that the material necessary to construct the case was missing.

The only elements of the prosecutors case that were proven, the appeals court said, were the charge of slander against Knox, who was convicted of falsely accusing a bar owner for Kercher's murder, and the fact that the Knox and Sollecito alibis did not match.

That the alibis were out of synch "is very different" from the prosecutors' claim of false alibis, the court said.

The proven elements combined, the court said, are not enough to support convictions against Knox and Sollecito.

After her conviction was thrown out, Knox, 24, returned immediately home to Seattle. She was credited with time served for the conviction of slander for accusing bar owner Diya "Patrick" Lumumba of carrying out the killing.

Prosecutors contended a kitchen knife found at Sollecito's house was the weapon because it matched wounds on Kercher's body and carried traces of Kercher's DNA on the blade and Knox's on the handle. However, the court-ordered review discredited the DNA evidence, saying there were glaring errors in evidence-collecting and that below-standard testing and possible contamination raised doubts over the DNA traces on the blade and on Kercher's bra clasp.

In addition, the defence cast doubt on the knife, questioning why Knox and Sollecito would return it to Sollecito's home if it had been used in the murder. They maintain the real weapon has yet to be found.

A third defendants in the case, Rudy Hermann Guede of the Ivory Coast, was convicted in a separate trial of sexually assaulting and stabbing Kercher. His 16-year prison sentence - reduced on appeal from an initial 30 years - was upheld by Italy's highest court in 2010.

Original report here

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2011-12-15T14:17:00.000+10:00

Australian police arrest suspects who were angry at failed dog searches

They should cop it sweet when they have wrongly detained people. But instead of apologizing they arrest their victims. The failure rate of the sniffer dogs is so great that the whole project would be abandoned by any police force with respect for the innocent

AN INCREASING number of people searched for drugs but not found to be carrying them after being identified by police sniffer dogs are being charged or cautioned for angry outbursts against police.

The failure of a record 80 per cent of sniffer dog searches this year has also raised questions about the potential for legal challenges against police by people not found to be carrying drugs.

Official government figures provided in response to questions on notice show that in the nine months to September more than 300 people were charged for offences relating to their interaction with police while being searched for drugs.

All 307 people were among the 11,248 people found not to be carrying drugs after they were identified by sniffer dogs and searched by police. Last year 305 people were charged for similar offences; in 2009 it was 264, in 2008 it was 85 and in 2007 it was two.

The NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge, who requested the government figures, said there was no excuse for poor behaviour towards police, but questioned the value of intrusive body searches on people suspected of carrying drugs, where in the vast majority of cases no drugs were found.

The Police Minister, Mike Gallacher, said yesterday he supported the use of sniffer dogs, which had a highly acute sense of smell and could detect on people traces of drugs or explosives even after they had been discarded.

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-12-14T12:01:00.001+10:00

Australia: Year in jail before teen walked free

There were apparently at least four people present at the approximate time of death so police at no time had any basis for singling just one out for prosecution. Their informant could have been the guilty party

A TEENAGER suspected of murder was interviewed by police against his will and kept in a cell without a mattress or running water, an inquest has heard.

Jordan Danny Thompson, 17, spent a year in jail on remand accused of fatally stabbing a retired teacher who paid young Aboriginal men for sex. He was freed when the case against him collapsed at trial. No one else has been charged with the murder.

Counsel assisting the Coroner, Elisabeth Armitage, told the inquest yesterday the bungled murder case had prompted an internal police investigation. NT Police Commander Peter Bravos is set to give evidence into the botched investigation.

The inquest heard yesterday that Michael Condrick, 50, died of a "catastrophic haemorrhage" after being stabbed in the neck in his Katherine unit about midnight on June 21 last year. Clothing, an Xbox, iPad, phone and a backpack were stolen from the unit.

The inquest heard Mr Condrick's former students from nearby communities regularly visited his house to drink and smoke cannabis. "It appears he engaged in sexual relationships with some young men that came to his house," Ms Armitage said. None of those men were known to be under age.

Mr Thompson and Mr Condrick's lover, Samuel Wesan, 27, were in his unit on the night of the retired teacher's death. Ms Armitage told the inquest the men accused each other of murder, but the victim's blood was found on both of the men's clothing. Two days after Mr Condrick's death Mr Wesan told police Mr Thompson committed the murder and the teen was arrested.

Ms Armitage said during the investigation Mr Thompson was kept in custody for a significant period and housed in an inappropriate cell.

"There was no mattress and his water was turned off. That was initially to allow for forensic procedures but people forgot to turn it back on. Police received clear advice that he did not want to participate in interviews but interviews occurred." Some were not recorded.

Ms Armitage said it was unclear why Katherine police took charge of the murder investigation instead of the Major Crime unit. She said at the time the Major Crime unit's resources were focused on other cases.

The inquest also heard evidence from two people who discovered Mr Condrick's body. Mark Runyu and Leighton McCartney had gone to Mr Condrick's house to drink alcohol and smoke cannabis. Mr Runyu said he did not report the murder to police because he was "too scared".

Original report here

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2011-12-13T12:50:00.002+10:00

'Gay and stupid' British cameraman wins payout

The unending war on photography continues. No word of action against the rogue cop

Lawyers say a British teenager wrongly stopped by police from taking photographs at a public event in London has been compensated.

A solicitor said officers prevented Jules Mattsson - then 15 - from taking pictures at a military parade in Romford, east London, in June 2010. The Metropolitan Police said compensation had been paid and an apology issued.

Law firm Bindmans, which represented the youngster, said a police inspector had described photographing in public as "anti-social behaviour".

A spokesman for the company said: "He described the act of taking photographs as 'silly' and 'gay' and 'stupid'. When [Jules] continued to state the lawfulness of his behaviour, the inspector declared it was 'dangerous' as he was 'likely to be trampled on by soldiers' from the parade."

Solicitor Chez Cotton, head of the police misconduct department at Bindmans, said: "The police had no legal power to stop him photographing in a public place. The inspector attempted to justify his actions in shocking and absurd ways."

Mr Cotton added: "The treatment of the police towards our client, a 15-year-old, was shocking. The inspector's comments were designed to belittle. "Our client politely and reasonably maintained that the police were not entitled to interfere with his right to report.

"In response the inspector used serious anti-terrorism legislation, cynically telling Mr Mattsson 'I consider you a threat under the Terrorism Act young man. I've had enough'.

"The police have no legal power or moral responsibility to prevent or restrict what journalists record."

Original report here

More details of the absurd police behaviour here.

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2011-12-12T13:27:00.001+10:00

Four British cops who 'stole cash from street beggars' are suspended

A police force has launched an investigation into its own officers after claims that they took cash from street beggars. Four West Midlands Police officers were suspended and sent home on December 1 after suspicious colleagues raised concerns about their conduct.

The force's Professional Standards Unit was then called in to investigate claims that money was stolen from beggars, believed to be Eastern European, in the Bordesley Green area of Birmingham.

The allegations involve the mishandling of property taken from members of the public 'that could amount to theft'.

Deputy Chief Constable Dave Thompson voluntarily referred the matter to police watchdogs, the Independent Police Complaints Commission. It will now examine the matter to see whether it needs to be involved in the investigation. 'We are also working closely with communities to endeavour that any of their concerns are resolved as soon as possible,' he said.

A West Midlands Police spokeswoman would not comment on the beggar claims. She said: 'The allegations involve mishandling of property taken from members of the public that could amount to theft.

'The enquiry came to light when some members of the team highlighted concerning practices.' Street begging and rogue traders are known to operate in the area.

Some Eastern Europeans offer passing motorists car-washing services but because the work is illegal, the practice is classed as begging.

West Midlands Police launched a crackdown on rogue traders and aggressive begging in the city centre in the first week of August, following persistent complaints. During the city centre operation, 17 people were arrested and charged with begging-related offences. Officers involved in the crackdown later donated £120 to homeless charity the Big Issue.

The gesture was made after cops said legitimate sellers of the magazine had told officers that aggressive beggars were having a negative impact on the public's perception of homeless people.

Original report here

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2011-12-11T17:33:00.001+10:00

One case showing the problems of criminal law in America

Edgar Coker was 15 when he had consensual sex with a girl one year younger than himself. The girl, however, terrified of her father, decided to claim she was raped. Edgar was arrested. And he was offered a deal. If he pled guilty his sentence would be much easier, but if he insisted on his innocence, even though he was innocent, he would be tried an adult. Prosecutors love to force people to pled guilty by holding threats over their heads—and whether they really are guilty or not matters none to these petty bureaucrats wanting to become major bureaucrats.

Edgar and his family thought his only chance of surviving the justice system was a guilty plea otherwise the prosecutor would make his life a living hell. Worse, the defense attorney knew the girl had made such claims previously and then, when the judge ordered Edgar be put on the disgusting "sex offenders registry" she did nothing to protest the move—which amounts to a life sentence of harassment.

Then the girl admits she lied. The girls mother joins those defending Edgar and demanding justice. With some effort they got him released from juvenile detention—it's nice to know that they don't incarcerate innocent people for too long after they were proven innocent.

So, everything's good, except for that sex offender registry, but is that such a big deal?

"The family has moved several times, twice because of complaints from neighbors who learned that Edgar Coker Jr. was on the registry. Once, a neighborhood girl made a false sexual allegation against one of his brothers, and someone else left this note on their door when they lived in Stafford County: "We don't want a rapist living in our neighborhood."

As for Edgar he had to receive special permission to go to high school. But he couldn't take that. Seeking a job requires him to reveal he is a "sex offender" even though he isn't. So he doesn't look for work. He sits at home, afraid. What they are finding is that his innocence isn't enough to get Edgar removed from the sex offender registry. They have all sorts of methods and excuses to put people on the list, but apparently no one is sure how to remove someone. Once damned always damned. Edgar's mother says she doesn't believe "that anyone can undo the damage that has been done to him." And, remember, he is innocent of any crime.

People have to realize the Sex Offender Registries have become a sick joke. People are listed on them for the most inane things. Stopping to take a piss at the side of the road is now a "sex" offense. A kid can streak a school event and suddenly find he's a sex offender. The Puritans in America have criminalized virtually everything having to do with sex and nudity so things which before were considered normal are now sex offenses. Kids running around a playground slapping one another's butts were arrested as sex offenders. A woman who gave a blow job to another student when in high school has been on the sex registry for decades and continually loses her home over it, because of the cruel zoning laws that apply to sex offenders only.

We had one case where a man was arrested as a sex offender because he hired a stripper. The prosecutor said he used a stolen credit card and therefore committed a crime for sexual purposes. The theft of a credit card put the man on the sex offenders registry for life. A teenage boy was with a friend who robbed a Dairy Queen, for that he is on the sex offenders list. Apparently a customer was under 18 years of age and the robber made him stay in the store during the robbery. In Georgia forceable detention of a minor is a sex crime—unless I'm sure, if the schools do it. So you can be a sex offender without doing anything sexual.

The registries are a major reason that many sex offenders just choose to disappear now. The registries actually make it more difficult for released offenders from returning to a normal life and increases the risk of reoffending. The registries also tie up police resources because they have to visit all offenders periodically, even those who haven't reoffended and are doing well. It doesn't allow police to prioritize which ones to keep track of. So, in fact, police have made cursory visits to serious offenders and missed things like women being held captive in the back yard. With only a few minutes to spend at each location the visits are more routine than investigatory now. It didn't used to be that way, but the registry makes it so.

And, we have had individuals use registries to gain information on individuals and murder them. One case was a young man who had sex with his girlfriend who was slightly under the state age of consent. It wasn't rape, but that didn't matter. He was executed when he opened his door to a stranger, his mother witnessed the murder. In other cases these registries are so out of date that addresses that haven't been in use for decades are still listed. People who have done nothing but move into a new house have found themselves harassed as sex offenders because of someone who lived in the house some years before. The registries have been a disaster and need to go. At the very least they should be accessible to law enforcement only, and not to any moron with a gun and half a brain.

Original report here

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2011-12-10T18:41:00.001+10:00

Australia: Bungling cops shoot one of their own and try to blame it on a Vietnamese guy

And why weren't they in uniform? The Viet guy had no way of knowing they were cops. He has a good self-defence case. The whole operation reeks of overconfidence and incompetence

WHEN the screaming stops, all that can be heard is anguish in the voices of police as they realise Constable William Crews cannot be saved. "I don't know who shot him, him or me. He's dead," the officer who fired the fatal round is heard to say. Another officer is recorded saying: "Mate, he's dead."

The graphic police-recorded video that captured Constable Crews' final moments was played yesterday at a committal hearing for Phillip Nguyen, the man accused of the young officer's manslaughter.

The 26-year-old officer's family were in court to watch the footage, which also shows the trainee detective lying motionless on the floor of a Bankstown garage.

Nguyen, 56, accused of firing the first shot during the shootout that erupted as officers carried out a search warrant on September 8, 2010, is charged with Constable Crews' manslaughter on the grounds of excessive self defence.

Burwood Local Court was told the police operation, conducted by the Middle Eastern organised crime squad after receiving information that drug deals were being done from within the garage, was deemed to be "low-risk", with Constable Crews among officers dressed in plain clothes.

The search warrant video was the first piece of evidence tendered during the two-week committal hearing for Nguyen that will determine if the case can proceed to a Supreme Court trial.

Gunfire is heard soon after the tape begins, followed quickly by screams of "officer down".

Police can be heard screaming at Nguyen to "drop your gun it's the police, there's a police officer down with a gunshot to the head" before pleading with him to "throw the gun out, we will not hurt you".

The screaming stops soon after and is replaced by the distressed voices of officers as they try to save their dying colleague.

The court heard Nguyen believed officers were "fake police" because they weren't in uniform and thought they may have been robbers.

Crown prosecutor Sevinch Morkaya told Magistrate Brian Maloney that the shot fired by Constable Crews' colleague "was not a careful, well-aimed shot". "His intention was to shoot the accused, but that was the shot that ultimately killed the deceased."

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-12-09T20:55:00.001+10:00

Have the British cops finally got it right this time?

Man, 40, charged with golf club murder of teenager Rachel Manning 11 years ago (after fiancé served six years in jail before being cleared)

Rachel Manning had been strangled before her killer battered her face with a car crook lock. Her body was found in the grounds of Woburn Golf Club, in Milton Keynes, Bucks, on December 12, 2000.

A middle-aged man appeared in court today charged with the murder of a teenager whose half-naked body was found dumped in the grounds of one of Britain's most exclusive golf courses 11 years ago. Shahidul Ahmed, 40, from Bletchley, appeared at Milton Keynes Magistrates' Court and was remanded in custody. He will next appear at Luton Crown Court on December 14.

The investigation into the death of Rachel Manning, 19, was re-opened after her fiance Barri White was cleared of her murder after serving six years in jail. He was in the public gallery for today's hearing.

Rachel had been strangled before her killer battered her face with a car crook lock. She was found in the grounds of Woburn Golf Club, in Milton Keynes, Bucks, on December 12, 2000.

Mr White, now aged 30, was jailed for life in 2002 for her murder, only to be freed after being acquitted of killing her at a retrial.

Mr White's co-accused, Keith Hyatt, 58, served two-and-a-half years for perverting the course of justice, relating to the post-death battering of the victim’s face, before also having his conviction quashed.

Rachel had been on her way home from her future mother-in-law's 40th birthday party in Milton Keynes when she disappeared.

She had left Chicago’s nightclub in Milton Keynes, dressed in a Seventies-style outfit of white, knee-length boots with platform heels, short black skirt, white blouse and blue wig.

The event, on December 9, 2000, was a late party to mark future mother-in-law Sharon Shaheed’s 40th birthday. Rachel, Barri and other friends went on to another club, going their separate ways around 2.15am.

Her body was then found by a man walking his dog on the morning of December 12, in undergrowth at Woburn Golf Club, with the stoplock discovered 1,600ft away.

It was in 2002, at Aylesbury Crown Court, Bucks., that Mr White was convicted of her murder and jailed for life. Mr Hyatt was convicted of moving her body and disfiguring her and was subsequently jailed for five years.

A large campaign then began to have the men freed and the convictions quashed, with Dr Peter Bull, ‘the father of geo-science forensics in the 1990s’, who worked on an investigation for BBC’s Rough Justice programme, labelling the evidence 'totally implausible'. That programme was aired in March 2005, three years before Mr White finally walked free.

Detective Superintendent Rob Mason, leading the investigation said yesterday: 'The man [Shahidul Ahmed] was arrested at his home address at 7am this morning.

'He was due to answer police bail on December 12 but was re-arrested after new forensic evidence came to light. 'Due to the fact this is a live investigation and we have someone in custody, I am unable to give any further details at this time. 'Rachel’s family have been informed.'

Original report here

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2011-12-08T15:35:00.001+10:00

Latino Man Wrongly Convicted of Murder?

Hollywood actor Martin Sheen is using his political muscle to try and help a Latino man he says was wrongly convicted of murder.

At a press conference Monday, Sheen, who is Latino himself, said he met with the man, Jon-Adrian Velasquez, hours earlier and believes his case “cries out for justice.”

The meeting with Velasquez "confirmed my belief that he is an innocent man," the actor said. "I came away inspired. He is a young man on fire with the truth."

Sheen's appearance trained some star power on a case that involves a longstanding issue getting new attention from the U.S. Supreme Court: the reliability of eyewitness identifications of suspects.

Convicted of fatally shooting retired police officer Albert Ward in an underground betting parlor in 1998, Velazquez is serving 25 years to life in prison. But he and lawyers Robert C. Gottlieb and Celia A. Gordon are trying to persuade Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus. R. Vance Jr. to reinvestigate the case and exonerate Velazquez. Vance's office is reviewing the case, spokeswoman Erin Duggan said Monday.

With no DNA or other physical evidence against Velazquez, "this case is strictly the result of eyewitness misidentification" from photo arrays and lineups that weren't properly conducted, Gottlieb said.

Retired from the police force since 1977, Ward, 59, was in a Harlem betting parlor when two men came in and announced a stickup on Jan. 27, 1998, authorities said. Ward pulled his gun and fired, and the robbers fired back, hitting him in the face and killing him, according to authorities.

After a witness picked Velazquez's photo out of a police book, that witness and three others identified him in an in-person lineup.

Velazquez and another man, Darry Daniels, were charged. Daniels, who pleaded guilty to first-degree robbery and was sentenced to 12 years, testified during his plea that Velazquez was his partner in the robbery and had shot Ward. Daniels wasn't called to testify at Velazquez' trial.

Two eyewitnesses have since given Velazquez's lawyers sworn statements recanting their identifications of him, and the other two who identified him now say they aren't sure, his lawyers said.

While the suspect was described as a black man with braids, Velazquez is Hispanic and wore his hair short, his lawyers have noted.

His mother, Maria, has long said Velazquez couldn't have been involved in the shooting because he was on the phone to her, from his home, moments before it happened. But "as his mother, I wasn't believed," she said Monday.

Eyewitness identifications are a venerable and crucial part of the criminal justice system, but they also have played critical roles in many cases in which people were wrongly convicted and later exonerated through DNA evidence.

The Supreme Court heard arguments last month in a case involving a New Hampshire man who was convicted of theft based on eyewitness testimony; he wants to extend judges' power to exclude such testimony in some circumstances. The high court hasn't yet ruled.

Since taking office nearly two years ago, Vance — a former defense lawyer — has taken the unusual step of establishing a unit that explores claims of wrongful convictions.

It has received about 100 referrals and reinvestigated about a dozen, Duggan said. One case was dismissed before trial; another case is on track for retrial after the initial conviction was vacated, she said. Prosecutors concluded two other convictions were sound; they're continuing to review the other cases.

Velazquez's lawyers say they're hopeful prosecutors will reach the same conclusions they have about the case.

"I don't think there's anybody who's fair-minded who's not going to be outraged by this," Sheen said Monday. He became aware of the case through his own lawyer, who is a friend of Gottlieb's. Sheen said he'd read Velazquez's voluminous submission to the DA's office and part of the trial transcript.

He went to meet Velazquez intending to encourage the inmate not to lose heart, but instead, "he's encouraging us. He's telling us to stick to it like a stamp," Sheen said. "He's telling us that justice will prevail."

Original report here

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2011-12-07T16:29:00.001+10:00

British police force that failed to sack officer who 'had sex with married mistress while on duty' is under investigation

A police force which initially failed to fire a hero officer who allegedly had sex with his mistress while on duty is to be investigated itself, it emerged today. The police watchdog will look at how Gwent Police dealt with the controversial case relating to armed response officer Pc Shaun Jenkins.

The 35-year-old was only fired after the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) ordered a re-investigation of his case. The IPCC said today that it was 'concerned' at how Gwent Police dealt with such a serious complaint. It fears the matter could potentially undermine public confidence in the complaints system itself.

Jenkins, who had two awards for bravery, was sacked in December 2010 for gross misconduct. It followed allegations he drove to the home of his lover for afternoon sex while an officer apparently waited outside in a squad car. Jenkins allegedly wore his uniform and left his loaded firearm on the dressing table during the 40-minute daylight tryst.

His secret life unravelled when the woman's husband found out and complained and Jenkins was hauled before police chiefs. When he was given a final warning but allowed to continue patrolling the streets of Caerphilly, the woman's husband complained to the IPCC. It ordered the re-investigation of the complaint which culminated in Jenkins being sacked.

Now it has decided to investigate the way Gwent Police dealt with the disciplinary matter. 'The IPCC has received a voluntary referral from Gwent Police which relates to how a complaint received by the force on November 2, 2010 was dealt with and the subsequent disciplinary action on December 2, 2010. 'The investigation is into how a complaint was dealt with against a police officer who was alleged to have had sex on duty with the complainant's wife.

'The complainant appealed to the IPCC about the discipline outcome, which was a final written warning. 'The IPCC upheld the appeal and the force then held a full powers misconduct hearing which decided to dismiss the police constable.'

Tom Davies, IPCC Commissioner for Wales, said: 'I am concerned at how Gwent Police dealt with a serious complaint, as this could potentially undermine public confidence in the complaints system. 'I have therefore decided this matter should be investigated by IPCC investigators. 'The case itself has recently been reported extensively in the media and relates to a firearms officer.

'We will publish our findings in due course, which I hope will help allay any public concerns about the way police complaints are dealt with.'

Original report here

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2011-12-06T13:59:00.001+10:00

Jonathan Whitworth’s dismissed civil suit

Last week, U.S. District Judge Nanette Laughrey granted summary judgement to dismiss the civil rights suit (raised under 42 U.S.C. § 1983) of Jonathan Whitworth, Brittany Whitworth, and their son. The civil rights claim stems from a February 2010 Columbia, Missouri SWAT raid that went viral when police footage was obtained by the Columbia Tribune.

At issue in the motion for summary judgement was whether the police officers’ discretionary behavior was reasonable, in the context of the situation, and whether it violated clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would be aware (Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800 (1982), Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386 (1989)).

Such motions, under Rule 56 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, are to be looked at in the most favorable light to the non-movant (Whitworth).

In reality, law enforcement is afforded such favorable light, via judicial imaginings of what might have been reasonable, that “qualified immunity provides ample protection to all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.” Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335 (1986)

It is no surprise that Judge Laughrey was able to rationalize a context in which it might have been reasonable for an officer to kick Jonathan Whitworth in the head while he lay face down, unarmed, before a fully armed SWAT tactical unit.

“Thus, even if Hendrick indeed kicked Whitworth, a single kick to force swift compliance with an order, and to deter hesitation incompliance with future orders from a dangerous suspect, would be objectively reasonable in this context. It is also uncontested that Whitworth suffered no injury from this contact except pain.” Whitworth v. Bolinger

In the execution of the warrant, a paramilitary SWAT team entered the Whitworth’s family home. Police fired seven shots while in the Whitworth home. Both of the Whitworth family dogs were shot. One of the dogs was killed. The couple’s seven year old child was witness to the raid. Jonathan Whitworth was kicked in the head. Brittany Whitworth and her child were directed at gun point. As a result of the the raid, the police were able to find some drug paraphernalia and a small amount of cannabis. The police, initially, charged the Whitworths with child endangerment.

“The Court agrees that ideally officers would execute search warrants without pointing a gun at women and children not suspected of committing a crime. On the other hand, where officers are aware that a dangerous suspect and two large dogs are on the property, a reasonable officer could, in the heat of the moment, rely on such tactics to prod individuals to move swiftly through a potentially dangerous situation. This is especially true, where shouting and gun-pointing occurred as Mrs. Whitworth and P.M. stepped over Mr.Whitworth–who was lying on the floor–and the danger of resistance by any of the Whitworths was arguably at its highest. In this context, the behavior alleged by the Whitworths did not violate a clearly established constitutional right. The SWAT officers are thus entitled to qualified immunity on this claim.” Whitworth v. Bolinger

This is entirely consistent with scores of cases wherein citizens were plainly wronged and yet can find no corrective, civil recourse.

The Whitworth warrant was predicated on unnamed sources that claimed Jonathan Whitworth was a major cannabis dealer. That was more than five years after Columbia, Missouri passed a proposition to make the enforcement of cannabis the lowest priority by law enforcement. The measure passed by a 61% to 39% vote.

An estimated 130-150 SWAT raids occur everyday in the United States. That is some 40,000-50,000 paramilitary operations every year.

We are simultaneously escalating domestic paramilitary activity, increasing immunity from prosecution, and ceding budgetary control.

Original report here

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2011-12-05T14:56:00.001+10:00

Australia: Bad evidence convicted woman of killing her children, says - academic

WHEN Kathleen Folbigg was jailed for 30 years, there was almost universal condemnation for a mother who had done the unthinkable: killing four of her children as they lay in their beds.

A headline after the NSW Supreme Court guilty verdict read: "Incapable of love, compelled to kill: the diaries of a tortured mother."

Now, after six years researching the case, a legal academic living in Canada believes Folbigg was wrongly convicted based on unreliable evidence from medical experts.

And Emma Cunliffe is calling for NSW to introduce the same "last resort" mechanism that was used in the Northern Territory to quash Lindy Chamberlain's murder conviction.

The attack on the reliability of expert evidence in Folbigg's trial follows a court ruling on Friday allowing Jeffrey Gilham a retrial on his charge of murder, and possibly even an acquittal, after evidence from experts was found to have been flawed.

The claims by Dr Cunliffe in her book Murder, Medicine and Motherhood stand against the combined weight of the jury verdict in Folbigg's 2003 trial and two unsuccessful appeals.

The arguments also seek to address the damning impression made by Folbigg's diaries, in which she wrote of her third child Sarah: "I know I was short tempered and cruel sometimes to her & she left. With a bit of help."

Folbigg was the unremarkable Singleton mother whose trial became a media sensation when she was charged with killing Caleb, Patrick, Sarah and Laura between 1989 and 1999. The children were aged 19 days, eight months, 10 months and 19 months when they died. At its simplest, Dr Cunliffe believes that because no cause of death could be established for

Folbigg's four children, there was never enough evidence to convict her of their murders.

And she says in the absence of medical evidence and a confession, circumstantial evidence from Folbigg's diaries and her husband, Craig, was not enough to convict her. "At the end of the day I felt that the diaries worry me, but they don't satisfy me beyond a reasonable doubt," she said.

She argues medical experts at the trial failed to give evidence that fully reflected the prevailing uncertainty in the scientific community about repeated unexplained infant deaths in a single family.

And she says the experts' evidence became misleading to the extent "it was unreliable under evidentiary rules". "They gave a very incomplete account of the medical research that then existed," Dr Cunliffe said.

Folbigg is serving a reduced sentence of 25 years in protective custody at the Silverwater women's jail, where her only visitors are Salvation Army officers and a few friends. She has maintained her innocence, writing in a letter quoted in the book Inside Their Minds: Australian Criminals: "I'm simply waiting for the truth to be seen or uncovered or proven."

Dr Cunliffe, who spoke in Sydney on Saturday at a conference about the use of expert evidence, started her research for a doctorate with fixed views about Kathleen Folbigg.

"I came to the case believing her to be guilty," Dr Cunliffe, an assistant professor of law at the University of British Columbia in Canada, said in an interview. "It was really the process of investigation that made this thing fall apart for me."

Dr Cunliffe's views have won support from prominent forensic pathologists, who also believe a review of Folbigg's conviction should be considered by the NSW Attorney-General, Greg Smith.

Professor John Hilton, a former director of the NSW Institute of Forensic Medicine, was a prosecution witness in the Folbigg trial who gave evidence about the post-mortem examination he conducted on Sarah.

"I think Emma has done a very good job. Her book is a valuable contribution to this whole matter and is deserving of notice by the relevant authorities," Professor Hilton said.

Professor Stephen Cordner, the director of the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, has reviewed the book for the Australian Journal of Forensic Sciences. He was not involved in the Folbigg case.

"I think she's written a very even-handed book based on substantial research and persuasively concludes … that Kathleen Folbigg has been wrongly convicted," he said.

Dr Cunliffe says the medical uncertainty that existed at the time of Folbigg's trial and the appeals had since moved to a consensus view: that repeated unexplained infant deaths in a single family can and do occur.

"Based on my findings that the jury was misled about the state of medical research at the time of the Folbigg trial, and coupled with the developments in medical research that have occurred since 2003, I believe that Kathleen Folbigg's conviction is unsound and should be reviewed," she said.

Original report here

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2011-12-04T18:53:00.000+10:00

Even police dogs enjoy a double standard

Police are routinely judged by a different standard, a double standard under the law that allows them to pepper spray peaceful by-standers, to beat into unconsciousness unresisting 'suspects' and, generally, to violate every civil liberty protected by the Constitution. The police do so with impunity. They can (and they do) get away with murder while the the average, non-uniformed person is tossed into jail for forgetting to pay a traffic ticket.

A recent news story illustrates how deeply embedded this double standard has become. An “off-duty” and unleashed police dog was enjoying a walk with his partner when he spotted an 8-year-old boy playing hide-and-seek with his cousin. The dog attacked the running child, dragging him to the ground, shredding his sweatshirt, puncturing his T-shirt and leaving marks on the boy's arm.

What is the police response? They praise the dog's record as a crime-buster and drug-sniffer. No mention is made of sanctioning the police officer or taking the dog off the street. Any other dog would be 'put down' for attacking a child without provocation; any other owner would be liable in civil court. But this dog was excused with the explanation that he could not distinguish between a fleeing suspect and a playing child...in short, the dog was just doing his job.

"They're [police dogs] trained that anything running could be a potential threat, and all he's doing is reacting and doing what he was trained to do," explained Sergeant John Rusnak from the Campbell Police Department.

The Agitator makes an interesting observation: “And if someone had come to the kid’s defense and shot the dog, as on- and off-duty cops routinely do, that person would be in custody right now. Of course, the problem isn’t the dog, it’s the handler. And when cops kill the family pet, the problem also usually isn’t with the dog.”

It is my understanding that no police dog attacks without a verbal command. If I am incorrect, then every police dog out there is a standing menace to every child it encounters. Clearly this dog is a vicious loose-cannon and this officer was negligent. There is no mention of any sanctions or repercussions for the officer. Apparently leash laws do not apply to everyone. As Orwell observed in Animal Farm, “"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." Orwell was speaking of the pigs. So am I.

Original report here

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2011-12-03T14:58:00.001+10:00

Former New Orleans cop sentenced to five years for Katrina shootings cover-up

A FORMER New Orleans police officer was sentenced to five years in prison Thursday local time (today) for his role in covering up the shootings of unarmed civilians in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Robert Barrios had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to obstruct justice over the September 4, 2005 shootings in which two people died and four others were injured, the New Orleans Times-Picayune reported.

Fellow former officers Kenneth Bowen, Robert Gisevius, Robert Faulcon and Anthony Villavaso were each found guilty earlier this year on counts of violating the civil rights of those killed and injured in the shootings and of participating in a cover-up of the incident, though a federal jury found that none of their actions rose to the level of murder.

Sergeant Arthur Kaufman was also found guilty of involvement in the cover-up. Those five officers are scheduled to be sentenced in district court on February 14, AFP reported.

The shootings, one of the darkest stories to emerge from the chaotic days following Hurricane Katrina, took place on the east side of the Danziger Bridge in New Orleans.

Bowen, Gisevius, Faulcon and Villavaso reportedly fired indiscriminately on the civilians after responding to reports of looting and reports that someone had been firing at police.

Before sentencing Thursday, Barrios, 30, said, "I hope the families find it in their heart to forgive the role I played in this."

US District Judge Eldon Fallon told him that police officers were both given great responsibilities and significant respect. "We expect [police] to live up to that responsibility. When they lie to us, it creates a problem not only to the people you lied to and hurt but all of us."

Original report here

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2011-12-02T15:24:00.000+10:00

Botched trial of corrupt British cops

Was the botch deliberate? Looks like it. Cops covering for cops again

The biggest trial of police officers in British legal history collapsed in farce yesterday – leaving taxpayers with a bill of more than £30million.

Britain’s top prosecutor, Keir Starmer QC, said he was ‘extremely concerned’ that an eight-year probe into alleged corruption surrounding one of the UK’s most infamous miscarriages of justice had fallen apart. A judge threw out the case after he said the trial had become ‘unfair’ after key evidence was binned. [By another cop!]

The prosecution admitted crucial papers surrounding the murder of prostitute Lynette White – stabbed 50 times in February 1988 – had been destroyed by one of the corruption investigation officers.

Last night there were demands for an inquiry into the fiasco.

More than 23 years after Miss White’s murder, eight former officers went on trial in July this year accused of framing three innocent men for her death. Stephen Miller, Yusef Abdullahi and Tony Paris, who became known as the ‘Cardiff Three’, were wrongly jailed for the 20-year-old’s murder in 1990.

They were later freed by the Court of Appeal in 1992 when a judge heavily criticised the original police investigation.

South Wales Police mounted an eight-year inquiry into the case which led to the eight officers being accused of fabricating evidence to frame the ‘Cardiff Three’ and two other men, cousins John and Ronnie Actie who were acquitted in 1990.

Chief superintendent Thomas Page, 62, and chief inspectors Graham Mouncher, 59, and Richard Powell, 58, were alleged to have colluded with five other detectives – Michael Daniels, 62, Paul Jennings, 51, Paul Stephen, 50, Peter Greenwood, 59, and John Seaford, 62 – to pervert the course of justice.

Four other ex-policemen, also jointly accused of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, were due to stand trial separately next year.

Mr Justice Sweeney halted the trial at Swansea Crown Court, telling the jury: ‘When a trial has become irredeemably unfair it must stop.’

All of those involved, including the four who were due to stand trial, were cleared after it emerged that the officer who led the corruption inquiry, Detective Chief Superintendent Chris Coutts, had ordered files of evidence be destroyed.

South Wales Police Chief Constable Peter Vaughan yesterday referred the matter to the Independent Police Complaints Commission.

The accused officers have remained suspended since 2005 on full pay. Legal experts said the cost of the police inquiry and bungled prosecution would top £30million. But the bill is expected to rise as the acquitted officers are considering suing for malicious prosecution.

Thomas Page said: ‘I’m just relieved that it’s all over now after six-and-a-half years. ‘This would have been my seventh Christmas on bail and we’ve just had stalling tactics from the prosecution.’

Simon Clements, the CPS reviewing lawyer in the case, said: ‘We were satisfied at the time that this was a case which should go before a jury for trial.’

Original report here

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2011-12-01T16:06:00.001+10:00

Senate Rejects Amendment to ‘Indefinite Detention’ Bill

The Senate has overwhelmingly voted down an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would have provided oversight to check the military’s power to arrest U.S. citizens as suspected terrorists on American soil and detain them indefinitely without trial.
Guard Tower

“The Senate soundly defeated a move to strip out controversial language requiring mandatory detention of some terror suspects, voting it down 61 to 37 and escalating a fight with the Obama administration over the future course of the war on terror,” reports the National Journal.

The amendment, introduced by Colorado Senator Mark Udall, was an attempt to weaken Section 1031 of the NDAA bill, which would basically turn the entire “homeland” into a battlefield and allow the military to arrest individuals accused of being terrorists and detain them indefinitely without trial. Americans would be stripped of all constitutional rights and posse comitatus would cease to exist.

Confusion surrounding whether or not the bill would apply to American citizens was firmly put to bed by Republican Congressman Justin Amash yesterday, when he pointed out that the language clearly gives the executive branch the power of discretion to decide who is a terrorist, whether they are a U.S. citizen or not.

Amash described the ‘indefinite detention’ provision of the bill as “one of the most anti-liberty pieces of legislation of our lifetime.”

Senator Rand Paul has introduced a separate amendment that strikes Section 1031 from the bill altogether, but seeing as the Senate firmly rejected Udall’s watered down version, it’s unlikely Paul’s will be met sympathetically.

Although President Obama has threatened to veto the bill, political observers aren’t convinced that he will do so.

“He has said he will. Whether he will is a difficult question because, politically, it’s difficult to veto a defense spending bill that 680 pages long and includes authorization to spend on a whole range of military programs,” Daphne Eviatar, Senior Associate, Human Rights First’s Law and Security Program, told Democracy Now.

Eviatar’s organization has which has obtained signatures from 26 retired military leaders urging the Senate to vote down the legislation if the ‘indefinite detention’ provision is not removed.

“This would be the first time since the McCarthy era that the United States Congress has tried to do this,” warned Eviatar. “In the 1950’s, that was actually repealed before it was ever used. In this case have seen the administration very eagerly hold people without trial for 10 plus years in military detention, so there’s no reason to believe they wouldn’t continue to do that here. So we’re talking about indefinite military detention of U.S. citizens, of lawful U.S. residents as well as of people abroad.”

Original report here

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2011-11-30T17:17:00.001+10:00

More bad law coming up

Amend S. 1867 to Prevent Indefinite Detention of Americans!

Drafted in secret by Senators Carl Levin and John McCain, S. 1867, the Senate version of the National Defense Authorization Act contains a dangerous provision allowing American citizens to be detained by the military under the Authorization of Use for Military Force (AUMF) against Afghanistan.

Rep. Justin Amash, one of only five Republicans to vote against the House version earlier this spring, wrote on his Facebook page, the act would “permit the federal government to indefinitely detain American citizens on American soil, without charge or trial, at the discretion of the President.”

Completely ignoring the Constitution, Senators Levin and McCain are basically creating a provision giving the (current and future) President dictatorial powers to decide whom the military should arrest and whether they should be tried in military tribunals or civilian courts at the President's whim.

Thankfully, Senator Paul has introduced an amendment (SA 1062) to repeal the offending Sec. 1031 of S. 1867.

You can help stop this egregious provision from passing by contacting your senators today at 202-224-3121 and urging them to vote YES on Senator Paul's Senate Amendment 1062 to strike Sec. 1031 of S. 1867, the National Defense Authorization Act.

Original report here

Further commentary

Congress is now considering legislative language to mandate indefinite military detentions of US citizens suspected of present or past associations with alleged terrorist groups, with or without evidence to prove it. More on that below.

The 2006 Military Commissions Act authorized torture and sweeping unconstitutional powers to detain, interrogate, and prosecute alleged suspects and collaborators (including US citizens), hold them (without evidence) indefinitely in military prisons, and deny them habeas and other constitutional protections.

Section 1031 of the FY 2010 Defense Authorization Act contained the 2009 Military Commissions Act (MCA). The phrase "unprivileged enemy belligerent" replaced "unlawful enemy combatant."

Language changed but not intent or lawlessness. Obama embraces the same Bush agenda, including keeping Guantanamo open after promising to close it, allowing torture there and abroad, and treating US citizens as lawlessly as foreign nationals.

MCA grants sweeping police state powers, including that "no court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider any claim or cause for action whatsoever....relating to the prosecution, trial, or judgment of a military commission (including) challenges to the lawfulness of (its) procedures...."

MCA scraped habeas protection (dating back to the 1215 Magna Carta) for domestic and foreign state enemies, citizens and non-citizens alike.

It says "Any person is punishable... who....aids, abets, counsels, commands, or procures," and in so doing helps a foreign enemy, provide "material support" to alleged terrorist groups, engages in spying, or commits other offenses previously handled in civil courts. No evidence is needed. Those charged are guilty by accusation.

Other key provisions include:

• legalizing torture against anyone, letting the president decide what procedures can be used on his own authority;

• denying detainees international law protection;

• letting the executive interpret or ignore international and US law;

• letting the president convene "military commissions" at his discretion to try anyone he designates an "unprivileged enemy belligerent," detaining them indefinitely in secret;

• denying speedy trials or none at all;

• letting torture coerced confessions be used as evidence in trial proceedings, despite US and international law prohibiting cruel and inhuman treatment at all times, under all conditions, with no allowed exceptions;

• letting hearsay and secret evidence be used; and

• denying due process and judicial fairness overall.

On May 21, 2009, Obama addressed national security and civil liberties issues, including Guantanamo detainees, military commissions, and torture.

Saying his "single most important responsibility as president is to keep the American people safe," he bogusly claimed Al Qaeda "is actively planning to attack us again (and) this threat will be with us for a long time...."

He added that uncharged detainees "who cannot be prosecuted yet who pose a clear danger to the American people" (with or without evidence to prove it) will be held indefinitely without trial.

Obama's March 7, 2011 Executive Order authorized military commission trials for Guantanamo detainees with revamped procedures, despite pledging to close the prison.

Congress Considers New Freedom-Stripping Legislation

On October 17, 2011, the ACLU addressed Section 1031 of S. 1253: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, saying it "significantly curtails existing protections against indefinite detention without charge or trial."

It goes beyond previous laws by hardening them extrajudicially.

The last time Congress authorized indefinite detentions for uncharged US citizens without trial was in 1950. The Emergency Detention Act provision of the Internal Security Act authorized incarceration for those considered likely to commit espionage or sabotage.

It was never used, then repealed by the 1971 Non-Detenton Act, stating:

"No citizen shall be imprisoned or otherwise detained by the United States except pursuant to an Act of Congress."

At issue was never again subjecting US citizens to lawless internment the way Japanese Americans were treated in 1942, forcing loyal citizens into War Relocation Camps.

Section 1031 of S. 1253 "would be the first exception to the statute's protections." Subsection (d) provides US citizens "little or no" indefinite detention protections domestically or abroad.

The provision refers solely to "citizens or lawful resident aliens of the United States." However, the Constitution fully protects them.

"Section 1031 could cause cleared naturalized United States citizens and cleared immigrants to be sent to a foreign country, even in the absence of any wrongdoing."

Subsection (c) provides four options:

• indefinite detention without charge;

• military commission trials;

• trial by another tribunal; or

• transfer "to the custody or control of the person's country of origin, any other foreign country, or any other foreign entity."

Even someone erroneously arrested and cleared of wrongdoing could be held indefinitely without charge, given non-civil trials, or sent abroad.

Post-9/11, Arab and/or Muslim Americans lawlessly experienced "roundups" because of their faith and ethnicity. Latino immigrants face similar abuse.

Section 1031 would authorize similar practices. Military forces could be used. US citizens would be terrorized, detained and held indefinitely without charge or trial, based solely on suspicions, baseless allegations or none at all.

No reasonable proof is required, just suspicions that those detained pose threats. Under subsection (b)(1), indefinite detentions can follow mere membership or support for suspect organizations.

US citizens at home and abroad could be detained. Presidents would have unchecked authority to arrest, interrogate and indefinitely detain law-abiding citizens if accused of potentially posing a threat.

Constitutional, statute and international law won't apply. Martial law will replace it. As a result, anyone for any reason or none at all could be indefinitely detained for life without charges or trial.

Section 1031 exceeds the laws of war. Its ambiguities and excesses would institute extrajudicial national security state terror. No one anywhere would be safe.

It calls "covered persons" anyone captured or detained, even unconnected to hostilities. In other words, the executive could order anyone indefinitely incarcerated on his say alone. The provision would exceed current presidential authority.

Like the companion House bill, detention would be authorized based on alleged prior associations with suspect groups. US military personnel anywhere in the world would be able to seize US citizens and others.

Anyone could be incarcerated for life with no possibility for redress. Section 1032 requires suspects held in military custody, outside constitutionally mandated civil protections.

Due process and judicial review won't apply. Police state lawlessness could terrorize anyone suspected of terrorist group ties without proof.

In other words, presidents could order anyone imprisoned for life without cause. Despotic regimes operate this way. So would America more extrajudicially than ever.

Tyranny will replace constitutional law. Middle of the night arrests could become common. No one anywhere would be safe, including unjustly accused citizens.

The ACLU calls indefinite detention without judicial review "an appalling abuse of power. We know that our government has already mistakenly detained hundreds of people on suspicion of terrorism over the past 10 years."

"Many have languished in custody for years with no way to even assert their innocence or address the evidence against them. All people are entitled to due process."

Imagine new likely power abuses, including claiming OWS protesters threaten America.

Imagine human and civil rights workers, as well as anti-war activists targeted.

Imagine anyone challenging wealth and power interests at risk.

Imagine an America more than ever not fit to live in, and nowhere to hide.

Original report here

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2011-11-29T11:38:00.001+10:00

Police 'killed deaf cyclist with stun gun after he failed to obey instructions to stop'

A police officer killed an elderly, deaf and mentally disabled man riding his bicycle by shooting him with a Taser stun gun after he failed to obey instructions to stop.

Roger Anthony, 61, was killed as he made his way home in Scotland Neck, South Carolina, after officers responded to a 911 call about a man who had fallen off his bicycle in a car park. The caller told dispatchers that the man appeared drunk and that it looked like he had hurt himself.

Officers said they repeatedly told Mr Anthony to get off his bike, but when he didn't respond, they shocked him. The state Office of the Medical Examiner hasn't yet determined a cause of death.

Family members claim Mr Anthony had hearing problems and suffered from seizures. Now they're considering whether to file a lawsuit against the town. His brother Michael said: 'What did they tase him for? It's hurting me. It's really hurting me.'

Scotland Neck Mayor James Mills said he wouldn't blame the family for suing. 'There has been no information that this man was a threat to anybody,' he said. 'If I was a family member, I'm sure I'd be thinking the same way.'

Mills said he has tried to get information from the police department about what happened to Mr Anthony, but they have turned him away.

Police Chief Joe Williams says the officer is on administrative leave while the SBI conducts its investigation. He declined to comment further. Anthony's family said they hope the case is resolved soon.

Mr Anthony's niece, Porsha Anthony said: 'I'm sad. I lost an uncle. 'Hopefully it will be rectified so that not another family in Scotland Neck has to go through this'.

The State Bureau of Investigation in South Carolina said they are looking into Mr Anthony's death.

Original report here

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2011-11-28T17:33:00.001+10:00

Wisconsin exonerated Forest Shomberg, then abandoned him

It's hard to get a conviction overturned when the original trial judge is presiding. It's even harder when the prosecution is opposed. So attorney Byron Lichstein was not optimistic when he appeared before Dane County Judge Patrick Fiedler on Nov. 12, 2009, seeking the dismissal of Forest Shomberg's conviction for the sexual assault of a UW-Madison student in 2002.

"I was thinking our best shot was going to be in the Wisconsin Court of Appeals," says Lichstein of the Wisconsin Innocence Project at UW Law School. Plus, he adds, "I always try to manage expectations because I don't want a client to have false hope."

But at about 4 p.m. on a Friday afternoon, after a two-day hearing, Fiedler issued his ruling. Based in part on new DNA evidence, all charges against Shomberg were dropped and he was free to go.

But where to? Shomberg, 45 at the time, had just spent six years behind bars, two of them in the state's most notorious prison, the Wisconsin Secure Facility Program (formerly Supermax) in Boscobel, where he was confined most of the day to a six-foot-by-six-foot cell.

Lichstein lent Shomberg a cell phone so he could make arrangements to be picked up at the Dane County Jail, and jail staff rustled up some civilian clothes for him to wear. Eventually Shomberg's fiancée at the time came to get him.

There had been no preparations for reintegrating Shomberg into the community, acknowledges Lichstein. "We hadn't been in touch with social workers or family to get a support system in place."

Shomberg is now back in jail, serving out a one-year sentence for possessing a firearm he bought to commit suicide. Due to a prior felony conviction, Shomberg is prohibited from having a gun.

Lichstein and other supporters say Shomberg did not stand much of a chance when he walked out the courthouse door a free man two years ago. "There was no transition," says Michael Lieberman, Shomberg's current attorney. "There was nobody there to help give him any structure."

And there's a sad twist. Had Shomberg's 2002 conviction stood, the state would have provided him upon release with, among other services, counseling and job assistance. "Ironically, he would have been entitled to more benefits upon release if he had actually been a rapist and served out his entire sentence," Lieberman wrote in a sentencing memo to the court.

Keith Findley, founder and co-director of the Wisconsin Innocence Project, says this is a common plight facing all those exonerated by the state. "If you're guilty of a crime, you get more support from the state when you're released than if you're innocent."

Lichstein does not fault the Department of Corrections for this lapse. "They have no authority over people whose conviction is overturned," he says. "There is nothing crafted to deal with this kind of situation."

But the state fails to make reparations to exonerated people in other ways too. "Lawsuits are almost impossible to bring because most of the actors have various types of immunity from lawsuits," says Findley.

And the Wisconsin Claims Board — authorized to compensate individuals injured in a variety of ways by the state — is now "horribly out of date," says Findley. "It's the least adequate compensation package of any in the nation."

Shomberg is still waiting for resolution on the wrongful imprisonment claim he submitted to the board. Even if he prevails, the most Shomberg could receive is $5,000 per year of incarceration, with total compensation capped at $25,000. "The compensation amounts are so horribly outdated and grossly inadequate they're really a slap in the face of the people who have been wrongly convicted," says Findley.

With advances in DNA technology, and an increasing number of wrongful conviction rulings over the last 10 to 15 years, this is an area that needs addressing, says Lichstein.

Findley is working with state Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Madison) on draft legislation that would update the state's monetary compensation for victims of wrongful conviction and provide them with other types of support once released from prison.

The bill "taps into existing social services" and makes the system responsible for ensuring that exonerated people know about resources and how to access them, says Findley.

People released after a wrongful conviction react in a variety of ways, he says. "Some go out and rise above it and enjoy inspiring success. Others really struggle, but everyone who goes through this is damaged in one way or another. [Wrongful conviction] is a very damaging thing to do to a human being."

A victim of repeated child sexual assault, Shomberg struggled with panic attacks, post-traumatic stress disorder and attention hyperactivity disorder even before his six years in prison. He remains sensitive to loud noises from the time spent at the Wisconsin Secure Facility Program, and his vision is permanently damaged from, as his attorney puts it, "staring at walls just six feet away for 23 hours a day."

After being released, Shomberg battled depression and had trouble finding work. He sought help for his drinking problem but, without anyone monitoring his progress, did not follow through.

Because Shomberg is now back in the system, he will have access to services. "Treatment is finally available to him," says Lieberman.

After finishing out his one-year incarceration sentence — he has about six months more to go — Shomberg will be on supervision for two years and assigned to a federal probation officer, says Lieberman. Shomberg will spend his first year outside prison in a halfway house, where he will have structure and receive alcohol treatment.

Says Lieberman: "He will transition back from being an inmate to being a free person again."

Original report here

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2011-11-27T17:19:00.001+10:00

Post-conviction DNA testing proposal stirs debate among advocates, DAs

Massachusetts lawmakers are currently considering a bill that would grant convicted criminals the right to test DNA evidence that could prove their innocence. But district attorneys in the state have raised specific concerns that, while they support the concept of DNA testing, the bill has major flaws.

The proposed bill was passed unanimously by the state Senate during the summer and is currently pending approval in the House of Representatives.

Massachusetts is one of two states, along with Oklahoma, without a post-conviction DNA testing law. In addition to providing the post-conviction DNA testing, the proposed bill would also require the state to preserve evidence in a trial for the length of the convict’s prison term.

Gretchen Bennett, director of the New England Innocence Project, said the proposed bill would provide clear mechanisms to allow post-conviction DNA evidence testing. Bennett said this is a better alternative to keeping post-conviction DNA testing a decision for judges, who in many cases were the ones to deliberate over the convict’s trial. “The problem is right now we don’t have a process,” Bennett said. “It’s up to individual judges. Instead of judges’ opinion, it should be process. Justice should be evenly administered across the commonwealth. Everyone should know the rules and play by the rules.”

Bennett emphasized that the proposed law would not allow convicts to be exonerated simply based on the DNA testing results and that a DNA test request would not be considered a motion for a new trial. But Bennett said the proposed law could allow the defendants to obtain the test results for use at a potential new trial.

Currently, the ability for prison inmates to have evidence in their trials tested for DNA is governed by Rule 30 of the Massachusetts Rules of Criminal Procedure. Rule 30 allows convicts to argue their innocence in court, despite the number of appeals filed previously, if a judge decides that justice has not been done.

However, Bennett said that in the cases she is advocating for, to prove that justice has not been done, it first requires DNA testing of evidence that prison inmates currently don’t have a right to.

“Our system is obviously fallible, as is every human system,” Bennett said. “Even if it’s a tiny percentage, it’s still a few people, and a few people too many. This (wrongful conviction) could happen to anyone and absolutely ruin their lives. I would not want to spend a day in prison, let alone years.”

District attorneys across the state have said that they support the concept of post-conviction DNA testing.

“We are committed to the imperative and the principle of justice,” said Bristol County District Attorney Samuel Sutter. “And justice mandates that we do everything we can to convict the guilty and exonerate the innocent.”

However, Sutter and other district attorneys have identified several aspects of the currently proposed post-conviction DNA testing bill now on Beacon Hill that they consider major flaws.

Sutter said one major flaw is that the proposed bill allows “virtually unlimited opportunity” to DNA testing for defendants who professed their guilt through an extensive colloquy with a judge during their trial, resulting in lengthy prison sentences.

“To me, that’s not reasonable,” Sutter said.

While there have been 23 post-conviction DNA testing exonerees in other states who pleaded guilty during their case, Sutter said this has never happened in Massachusetts, perhaps because the colloquies are so extensive here.

Sutter added that the only caveat in this situation would be a North Carolina v. Alford plea, which, if made during a trial, allows the defendant to enter a guilty plea (in the hopes of avoiding a harsher sentence) while also maintaining that he did not commit the crime. This type of plea is very rare in Massachusetts because the court wants certainty, Sutter said.

Another flaw Sutter identified is the cost of unlimited motions for post-conviction DNA testing — testing that costs thousands of dollars — and the cost of unlimited preservation of evidence.

Cape Cod and the Islands District Attorney James O’Keefe, who is vice president of the Massachusetts District Attorneys Association, brought up one example in which requests allowed for post-conviction DNA testing in anything except mistaken identity would result in a harmful and counterproductive situation. His example was a conviction for aggravated rape and murder of an elderly woman, with the defendant claiming it was consensual, before later requesting for DNA testing.

O’Keefe said the currently proposed bill does not allow a judge to consider the circumstances of the defendant, while Rule 30 does.

Despite the flaws Sutter pointed out, the Bristol County District Attorney stressed that the basic principal of access to DNA testing to exonerate the innocent is something he and his colleagues completely support.

Original report here

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2011-11-26T18:35:00.000+10:00

IL: Two men angry over what they say is wrongful murder conviction

Harold Richardson and Michael Saunders didn’t mince words about how miserable they felt for what they say is their wrongful conviction. “I’m mad as a m----------- right now,” Richardson, 33, said Friday — his first day of freedom after 17 years in prison for the 1994 murder and rape of Nina Glover. “I lost the Christmas spirit, all of that [while I was incarcerated]. I’m hoping to get it back now.”

Saunders, who also spent 17 years behind bars for the prostitute’s slaying in Englewood, said he’d be lying if said he wasn’t bitter. “I’m very, very angry,” the 32-year-old told reporters outside Cook County Jail. “There’s a lot of resentment.”

On Wednesday, Criminal Court Presiding Judge Paul Biebel Jr. tossed out the men’s convictions and ordered a new trial for them and two others. Biebel, in his ruling, cited mostly new evidence that linked dead felon Johnny Douglas’ DNA to Glover’s body.

Officials with the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office said they were reviewing the judge’s order. But Saunders expects that prosecutors will eventually recommend that the charges be dropped.

“The proof is already in the pudding. Everyone knows we didn’t commit this crime, and we’re just waiting for our day in court for us to be vindicated,” he said. “I’m here for the long haul.”

Saunders, who said he was beaten into confessing to the crime, said he wanted to enjoy the day and spend time with his 17-year-old daughter.

Richardson said he was planning “to chill” with family, friends and lawyers later in the evening.

Despite their anger and bitterness, both men had smiles on their faces Friday. “It’s a new beginning, man, and I’m just happy to be free,” Saunders said. “This is the most beautiful day of my life. …Words can’t describe how I’m feeling.”

Terrill Swift, 34, and Vincent Thames, 34, have already been released after serving more than a dozen years for the crime.

Original report here

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2011-11-25T18:16:00.001+10:00

Australian police force loses one -- and it costs them

Supreme Court of Victoria rules person is entitled to do runner if not under arrest

A SUPREME Court judge ruled today that a person who is not under arrest is entitled to do a runner from police seeking to question them.

Justice Stephen Kaye said Sydney man Andrew Hamilton was under no obligation to stop and speak to police when they approached him after receiving a complaint over an unpaid restaurant bill.

The judge said that it was an ancient principle of the common law that no one has to stop and speak to police or answer their questions, and there was no legislation in Victoria that alters that right. "The respondent (Mr Hamilton) before being placed under arrest did not have any obligation to stop when requested to do so, or to answer questions asked of him," Justice Kaye said.

The judge dismissed an appeal by the Director of Public Prosecutions and made a costs order in favour of Mr Hamilton.

Mr Hamilton had a charge of resisting police thrown out earlier this year after a magistrate found it was not illegal for him to bolt and that he had resisted nothing.

It was alleged he ran from a Taco Bill restaurant in March last year after an argument about an unpaid $136 bill.

Justice Kaye said that in the appeal against the magistrate's decision, the DPP argued that the Crimes Act imposes a duty on a person to state their name and address to an officer if it is believed on reasonable grounds they have committed an offence.

But the judge said it was conceded the police who tried to stop Mr Hamilton never got to the stage of asking for his name and address because he bolted.

"(The Crimes Act) does not contain any provision which expressly empowers police to detain a suspect, or take a suspect into custody, for the purposes of questioning the suspect," Justice Kaye said. "The conferring of such a power on a police officer would be a substantial, and indeed radical, detraction from the fundamental freedoms which have been guaranteed to the citizen by the common law for centuries."

The court heard that when approached by police in Collins St, Mr Hamilton, 24, ran and was chased on foot and in a squad car.

Ignoring police sirens and calls for him to stop, Mr Hamilton - who was later cleared of responsibility for the restaurant bill - was eventually arrested near Flinders St station.

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-11-24T14:29:00.001+10:00

British cop tries to destroy evidence

A veteran policeman is fighting to save his job after being sacked for trying to hide a dead colleague's affair from his family.

After Detective Constable Ian Morton died in a car crash, Sergeant Neil Salter asked another officer to destroy his phone in case it contained 'awkward' text messages, the High Court heard.

But that officer instead reported Sgt Salter to his superiors at the Dorset Police, and the long-serving sergeant was asked to resign.

A tribunal ordered that he should be reinstated at a lower rank, but the police force is now appealing that decision, arguing that Sgt Salter's 'operational dishonesty' made him unfit to continue his 22-year career.

Whilst investigating DC Morton’s death in October 2008, Sgt Salter uncovered evidence that he was, unbeknownst to his partner, having an affair with a female special constable from another force, with whom he had spent the night before his death.

He therefore instructed a junior officer to 'find and destroy' DC Morton’s mobile phone, which he feared would contain compromising texts.

After an internal disciplinary inquiry, Sgt Salter - who fully admitted a 'one-off aberration' - was 'required to resign' by the Dorset Chief Constable in November 2009, Mr Justice Burnett heard yesterday.

The independent Police Appeals Tribunal stepped in to save Sgt Salter’s career in July last year when it directed his reinstatement in the force, at the demoted rank of constable. But in court John Beggs QC, for the Chief Constable, argued that Sgt Salter had tried to 'suborn a junior officer' in 'a deliberate and premeditated attempt to destroy evidence' in the midst of a criminal investigation.

He told the judge: 'Put shortly, such operational dishonesty, from a supervising officer of many years’ standing, cannot be tolerated within the police service where honesty and integrity are of paramount importance'.

Due to his unblemished record of police service, Sgt Salter had been 'allowed the dignity of resignation rather than being dismissed', the barrister added.

However, Michael Ford, for Sgt Salter, said his motive 'was to protect another officer’s family' and he swiftly admitted 'a one-off aberration in an otherwise unblemished career'. He was 'genuinely sorry for what had happened'.

He had quickly apologised to other officers and the junior colleague he instructed to destroy the mobile phone had said Sgt Salter acted out of 'misguided loyalty towards the family of DC Morton to protect them from further upset'.

No evidence was in fact destroyed due to the junior officer’s 'courage' in informing his superiors and Sgt Salter 'accepted that he made a very bad decision', the court heard.

However, the chief constable's lawyer argued that to allow Sgt Salter back on the force could damage the public’s 'trust and confidence' in the police.

Mr Justice Burnett has reserved his decision on the Chief Constable’s appeal and will give his ruling at a later date.

Original report here

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2011-11-23T17:15:00.001+10:00

Extraordinary couple weds after each spent more than 15 years in prison on murder charges before being exonerated

Sonia Jacobs and Peter Pringle had something unique in common when they tied the knot at a star-studded ceremony in New York. Both served at least 15 years on Death Row, one in America and one in Ireland, after being convicted of killing police officers..

And both were finally freed after their murder convictions were overturned when they were able to prove they had been unjustly accused.

Their extraordinary story was revealed following the wedding attended by actresses Brooke Shields, Marlo Thomas and Amy Irving.

'We have each lived a nightmare,' said Ms Jacobs, 64, before the ceremony. 'Now it's time to live our fairy tale,' she added.

The couple met in Galway, Ireland, at an Amnesty International conference where Ms Jacobs was speaking out against capital punishment.

Ms Jacobs, known as 'Sunny', was a 28-year-old 'vegetarian hippie' when she was arrested after a 1976 shootout with two policemen in Florida in which the officers were killed.

She was a passenger in the car with her husband, Jesse Tafero, but the driver, Walter Rhodes Junior, struck a deal with prosecutors and blamed the married couple for the shootings. A jailhouse informant also told police that Ms Jacobs confessed she was involved.

It was only after her husband, who had a prior criminal record, was executed in a Florida electric chair in 1990 that the informant recanted and Rhodes admitted he had fired the fatal shots.

She was eventually released in 1992 nearly 17 years following her arrest, after the conviction was overturned on repeal.

When he first heard the mother-of-two's story, Mr Pringle, 74, said he was 'blown away by the horror of what happened to her. 'I knew I had to speak to her,' he told the New York Times.

The Irishman knew better than most what she had gone through. He was sentenced to death for the 1980 murder of two policemen during a bank raid in Ballaghaderreen, County Roscommon, said to have been carried out by a radical faction of the Irish Republican Army.

His June 8, 1981, hanging was commuted by the Irish president and the conviction was quashed after evidence emerged showing his 'confession' was written before he'd even been interviewed about the killings. By that time, he'd spent 15 years behind bars.

After their first meeting, the couple teamed up in the US and more than a dozen other countries to give speeches about human rights and campaign for abolishing the death penalty.

'Sure, Peter and I were also physically attracted to one another, but it was deeper than that,' Ms Jacobs told the Times. 'You know what happens to attractive, it becomes wrinkled and fat.'

The couple now lives at Mr Pringle's cottage home in Ireland.

'Sunny teaches yoga, I live on a pension. We have two hens, two ducks and eight goats. We both milk the goats and Sunny makes cheese. It's really a nice, simple life,' said Mr Pringle.

Original report here

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2011-11-22T16:26:00.000+10:00

WA: Perverted black cop pleads guilty in shooting case

Sounds like a plea bargain with minimal penalties

The Mount Rainier officer who allegedly lured a 20-year-old man to his home to be in a pornographic video, then shot him when he tried to flee, pleaded guilty Monday, according to the Washington Post.

Gene Gillette, a 3 and ½ year veteran with the police, pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder, attempted fourth-degree sex offense and use of a handgun, according to the Post.

A grand jury previously indicted the 27-year-old on multiple charges, including attempted murder and sexual offense, in connection with a July 2 shooting in Capitol Heights.

A victim in the shooting, a 20-year-old man, said he was lured over to Gillette's residence when he was told there would be women to shoot a pornographic film, sources earlier told ABC7.

Once the victim arrived, he found no women at the residence. Instead, sources say, Gillette wanted him to perform sexual acts with him. When the victim tried to flee in Gillette's personal car, the officer opened fire, hitting him four times and seriously wounding him.

Gillette originally said that he had shot the victim in self-defense while he was being carjacked. He later claimed that the relationship was consensual and he acted in self-defense because he was being robbed.

Sources earlier confirmed that at the time of the July 2 shooting Gillette was already being investigated for another incident where he allegedly discharged his weapon in his home.

In that case, the claim is that Gillette tussled with a man whom he'd lured to his home on the false pretense of a concert after-party.

The victim claims that when he realized Gillette wanted to perform oral sex on him he tried to get away, sources say.

A fight ensued, sources says, and the man discharged Gillette's weapon. Nobody was hit.

Original report here

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2011-11-21T22:01:00.001+10:00

New arrest in Texas wrongful conviction case

Norwood

Michael Morton spent nearly a quarter century in prison for his wife's murder before authorities realized they had the wrong man and set him free. Now police believe they have finally found the real killer.

The man suspected of beating Christine Morton to death in her bed in Austin in August 1986 — and linked to the slaying of another woman under chillingly similar circumstances while Morton was wrongly imprisoned — was arrested Wednesday, Morton's attorney, John Raley, told The Associated Press. It's the latest twist in a case that has prompted a separate investigation into the former prosecutor turned judge. Morton's attorneys claim the prosecutor withheld evidence at Morton's trial that could have led police to the suspect decades earlier and prevented him from striking again.

The man arrested Wednesday was Mark Alan Norwood, 57, who public records show worked as a carpet layer in the Austin area in 1986. He is being held on a capital murder charge in Williamson County, north of Austin, where the Morton slaying occurred, according to the Williamson County sheriff's office.

Jail records did not list an attorney for Norwood and the sheriff's office said it had no information on whether he had a lawyer.

Norwood has been charged in only the Morton slaying, but the daughter of the second victim said investigators also informed her of the arrest.

"After so many years, it kind of stops being sad and just becomes a happy moment," said Caitlin Baker, whose mother, Debra Masters Baker, was beaten to death in her bed in January 1988. She lived not far from the Mortons. At one point, Norwood lived closed to her. "We're just really happy and unbelievably thankful, and ready for the case to move forward," Baker said.

Authorities discovered a connection in the two cases after Raley, teamed up with the New York-based Innocence Project and spent years battling for additional testing of a bloody bandanna found near the Morton home using techniques not available in 1987. DNA from that bandanna matched that of a hair discovered at the scene of the Baker slaying.

But Morton's attorneys now allege their client may never have been convicted if the prosecutor who tried the case, Ken Anderson, hadn't concealed key evidence from the defense — potentially leaving the true killer free to kill Baker.

Morton has declined to be interviewed since his release Oct. 4. A ruling by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturning his murder conviction won't formally take effect until later this month.

Raley said he spoke to Morton after hearing about Wednesday's arrest. "Michael is happy and numb at the same time. He knows this is a good day for justice, but it comes at the end of a long tortuous route that has cost him dearly," Raley said.

Morton has always maintained his innocence, even when offered an early release if he expressed remorse for his crime. He said that on the morning of the slaying, he left his wife and the couple's 3-year-old son to head to work early at an Austin Safeway where he was an inventory manager. He said an intruder must have killed her.

The Baker case, meanwhile, languished unsolved for more than two decades. Morton's release brought some new hope, but Caitlin Baker continued to say that for her mother's case, nothing had changed.

On Wednesday, there was finally a major break — though she said that for her and her family, "closure's not even an option."

"We may get answers, but I don't think they'll be acceptable," Baker said. "They're never going to be enough."

Anderson, who was appointed as a state district judge in 2002 by Republican Gov. Rick Perry, recently spent more than six hours answering questions from Morton's attorneys during a closed-door deposition as part of an investigation into the allegations of concealed evidence. Anderson has not returned repeated calls from the AP about the Morton case.

Among the evidence Morton's lawyers say Anderson concealed from the defense was a statement that Christine Morton's mother gave to the lead investigator, police Sgt. Don Wood. She told Wood that her grandson said he watched his mother get killed and that her attacker was a "monster," not his father, as police suspected. She implored Wood to try to find this monster.

They say Anderson also didn't tell Morton's defense lawyers that Christine Morton's credit card was used in San Antonio two days after her death and that a forged check in her name was cashed several days later. Michael Morton testified during his trial that his wife's purse had been taken from the home.

The State Bar of Texas has also begun investigating allegations of wrongdoing by Anderson. It licenses attorneys in Texas and can discipline them, though most attorneys say investigations of judges are rare.

Original report here

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2011-11-20T17:27:00.002+10:00

MS: Massive brutality by jail officers

Charles Johnson (above) has just been acquitted of the offenses for which he was jailed

Facing allegations of inmate beatings at the Raymond Detention Center, Hinds County Sheriff Malcolm McMillin has fired 9 more detention officers.

The investigation into excessive force used on a handcuffed and shackled inmates remains on-going. This comes on the heels of the alleged jail-house beating of inmate Charles Johnson.

The photos were allegedly taken inside a Jackson hospital by 4 of the 9 jailers who were fired. They show Charles Johnson, 32, severely beaten. A cigarette was placed in his mouth allegedly by the guards who took the photo's. Johnson was jailed February 16 for murder and the armed carjacking of a Fed Ex truck driver.

Sheriff McMillin says his investigation is not over. "With the publicity given these two cases that there will be additional complaints and as they come in they will be verified as to the truthfulness of those reports." Sheriff Malcolm McMillin launched an internal investigation with the new round of firings. "If we have a violation of orders, if we have use of inappropriate force, we are going to take the appropriate action as a result of that."

17 jailers at the Raymond Detention Center were initially fired from their jobs. The sheriff says only one has been reinstated. Sheriff McMillin had previously fired 8 guards after a separate incident of alleged brutality at the jail. Both cases of allegedly brutality have been turned over to the FBI for a possible criminal investigation.

Original report here

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2011-11-19T12:40:00.000+10:00

Parents who named children 'Adolf Hitler' and 'Aryan Nation' have newborn baby Hons taken into custody

This is a travesty of justice. There is no evidence that the children have been harmed in any way

The newborn baby of parents who named their previous children 'Adolf Hitler' and 'Aryan Nation' has been taken into custody by welfare officials. Deborah Campbell was told to hand over her baby Hons immediately after she gave birth at Hunterdon Medical Center, New Jersey on Thursday.

Deborah and her husband Heath Campbell made headlines in January 2009 when a supermarket refused to decorate a birthday cake for their son Adolf Hitler, now five.

He and siblings Aryan Nation, four, and three-year-old Honszlynn Hinler Campbell - believed to be a reference to Nazi leader Heinrich Himmler - were also taken into care shortly afterwards.

Authorities maintained it was done because of violence, not their Nazi-inspired names.

Pasquale Giannetta, an attorney for the couple said state child services representatives took custody of the Hons at the hospital. Mr Giannetta said a court hearing has been scheduled for Monday to determine whether the agency will keep custody. Agency officials declined to comment.

In court filings, the agency says the children were in danger because of previous violence in the Campbell home.

Last month, the parents were found not guilty of child abuse but they have yet to receive their children from protective custody.
Children Adolf Hitler Campbell, 5, with sisters JoyceLynn Aryan Nation Campbell, 4, and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie Campbell, 3

The pair said they gave their children their names simply because they liked them and they were unique, not equating to child abuse.

Keith and Deborah Campbell get to see their children for two hours every week and contend that the only reason their children were removed was due to their children's names.

Mr Campbell has said that the names of his children will not be changed. 'I don’t sleep, I don’t eat much. I miss my kids. Miss their pitter patters on the floor,' their mother told NBC 10 in October. 'It’s hard. I fall asleep with their pictures.'

Following the judge's decision, the family were told the children may be home by early December.

'Can't wait for the decision,' Mr Campbell said after hearing the news. 'Can't wait for them to come home.'

Mrs Campbell says her children were removed after she requested a birthday cake for their son at a local grocery store to read, 'Happy Birthday Adolf Hitler.' While the first store refused the request, Mrs Campbell says a Walmart's bakery in Pennsylvania obliged.

But immediately following the boy's birthday the parents were summoned in reports of child abuse or neglect. In 2010 a New Jersey appeals court ruled that there was sufficient evidence of abuse or neglect in the home because of prior domestic violence - the Campbells have denied despite a gag order - causing the children's removal into foster care. The authorities had said it had nothing to do with their names.

'Actually, the judge and DYFS told us that there was no evidence of abuse and that it was the names!' Mr Campbell said after last month's hearing. 'They were taken over the children's names,' he insists.

But court records last year stated that both of the children's parents had been victims themselves of childhood abuse and while unemployed, were suffering from unspecified physical and psychological disabilities.

'They beg to come home all of the time,' Ms Campbell said to NBC10 last month. 'They beg to see their dad, they want to see their dad all the time.'

Original report here

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2011-11-17T16:34:00.001+10:00

Australia: Trigger-happy W.A. cop is REAL scum

And the police union is supporting him!

THE policeman under investigation for firing a warning shot at a car in Nollamara yesterday has been convicted of bashing his wife and is already facing another Internal Affairs Unit probe.

PerthNow can reveal that Niko Westergerling, 39, is under investigation by internal affairs officers amid claims he unlawfully accessed the WA Police database.

The revelation comes just months after the senior constable was convicted and fined $2000 for a brutal attack on his wife during a heated argument at their Innaloo home in February.

Subsequent claims then arose that he had misused the secure police database to access information unrelated to his police work.

Despite the conviction, Sen-Constable Westergerling was allowed to remain in the job.

Sen-Constable Westergerling has been stood aside from duty while internal affairs officers investigate the circumstances surrounding the Nollamara shooting.

It is understood both inquiries - yesterday's shooting and allegations of misusing the police database - will now be conducted simultaneously.

In March, Sen-Constable Westergerling narrowly avoided jail and was fined $2000 after admitting to repeatedly punching and kicking his wife during a heated argument on February 14 while he was off duty.

Defence lawyer Gabrielle Clarke said her client accepted full responsibility for his behaviour, which he had described as "unacceptable and disgusting".

Senior WA police say the officer did not appear to have any valid reason for firing two shots at a black station wagon in Nollamara in the city's northeast early yesterday afternoon.

The car sped off and police have today said there were no reports of injury to any of the five occupants, believed to be three adults, one 17-year-old and a three-year-old. The car was found by police at about 10am today and investigators from the IAU are interviewing two occupants of the vehicle.

Detective Superintendent Tony Flack told reporters the policeman was with two female officers carrying out a routine traffic stop of a driver who was not wearing a seatbelt. He said the driver gave a false name and when the officer asked her to accompany him to a police station, she wound up her window and sped off.

It was then that the officer drew his weapon and fired at the vehicle.

"The Internal Affairs Unit can't find at this time any valid reason for the discharge of this firearm," Det Supt Flack said. "WA Police do not condone the use of firearms to stop motor vehicles." "There are other methods of stopping and detaining motor vehicles and it would not be appropriate and the WA Police do not condone the use of firearms to stop motor vehicles."

Det Supt Flack said criminal charges against the officer were "more than a possibility".

Police are still searching for a second woman who was in the car, but police today revealed there were up to five people in the vehicle at the time of the shooting.

Supt Flack today told reporters the car was stopped because at least one of the passengers was not wearing a seatbelt. The driver then gave police a false name and attempted to flee at high speed.

"The officers had cause to stop a black Holden Zaphina station wagon. We now believe there were up to five persons in that motor vehicle and they pulled this vehicle over for a routine traffic stop. We believe this was for a simple seatbelt offence committed by the driver. "One of the officers who subsequently has been found to have discharged the firearm approached the vehicle, asked the driver for her details. It is believed the driver gave a false name.

"The male officer then did a check on the inboard police computer. It was subsequently found that the name was false and the officer requested the driver accompany him back to Mirrabooka to establish her identity. "The driver has refused this request, wound up the window and driven away. To this point our inquiries establish that the officer has drawn a firearm and discharged the firearm on two occasions.

"It's unknown if the two rounds struck the vehicle or whether they caused any injury to the occupants.

Supt Flack said the senor constable would be confined to administrative duties and stripped of his firearm pending the outcome of the internal investigation. “He will be office-bound and without access to firearms,” Supt Flack said.

He also revealed the officer had recently been disciplined over another case of "poor judgment" but refused to reveal details.

It is believed the latest incident could result in the Police Commissioner having to make a decision on the officer's suitability to remain in the job.

Supt Flack added: "He has a history that is not relevant to this particular incident, but he does have a history that we will assess in its totality, and then we will make a recommendation to the Commissioner of Police about things like judgment, practical intelligence, tolerance to stress."

He also said there was concern about the time it took the officer to notify the Police Operations Centre about the incident. "Our inquiries reveal that they were not immediately notified and this notification's occurred sometime after the event," he said.

"One would expect that there would have been a notification by the officers to POC and one of the things we'll be looking at is why the officers chose to notify their office, rather than getting on the radio. It's a concern to us, they manage operations on the road and we would have expected a radio call to POC."

Initial interviews with the officers indicated the occupants of the vehicle were not hit, however Superintendent Flack said "the potential for serious injury is high" if the two rounds struck the wagon. "That discharge was made in a suburban area, occupied by a number of houses and the potentiality and the danger will be assessed as part of the investigation," he said.

WA Police Union president Russell Armstrong said the union would continue to provide support to Sen-Constable Westergerling. "We will look after the officer and we will continue to support him into the future," he said. Mr Armstrong backed the senior constable saying he was was an experienced officer and he must have had good reason to draw and fire his weapon.

He said it was too early to draw conclusions and he was surprised Supt Flack had indicated so early in the investigation that the discharge of the firearm appeared to be unjustified.

Original report here. (Via Australian police news)

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2011-11-16T19:34:00.001+10:00

Australia: Third inquest opens into 20 year-old murder-suicide cold case

Atherton is a small town and police didn't want to rock the boat. Hence their absurd claims and utter negligence

JULIE-ANNE Leahy had her "bags packed" to escape an abusive marriage just days before she disappeared and was found dead with her best friend in a car up a disused bush track, an inquest heard.

Police almost immediately ruled Atherton accountant Vicki Arnold killed her friend and then shot herself in a bizarre murder-suicide pact in a 20-year-old north Queensland cold case that has baffled investigators.

State Coroner Michael Barnes opened an unprecedented third coronial inquest into the Arnold and Leahy deaths and will explore the possibility a third party killer may have escaped justice after police botched the crime scene.

Friends told the inquest how the two women were "chalk and cheese" with Arnold, 26, a depressed loner aching for a family life while Leahy, 27, was a "strong and outspoken" mum housewife trapped in an abusive relationship with financial problems. "She (Leahy) had her bags packed. She was leaving," friend and police sergeant Bernard Wilce said.

He said he was still astounded by the thought gentle-natured Vicki killed her friend and then herself.

He told of an anonymous call to police alleging a white van was spotted driving out of the Cherry Creek track murder scene about the time the women disappeared on a midnight fishing trip on July 26, 1991.

Ex-husband Alan Leahy, a carpet layer who was having an affair with his wife's 16-year-old sister at the time, has been subpoenaed and is due to give evidence in the second week of the inquest in December.

Leahy had been bashed with a rock the size of a grapefruit, her throat cut and was shot twice in the head. Arnold had a gunshot wound in the thigh and fatally another gunshot wound behind the right ear.

Atherton businessman, blacksmith and Australian representative target shooter John Wilkinson told how he obtained the .22 semi-automatic Ruger rifle for his former book-keeper two weeks before the women were found dead. He said Arnold told him she wanted it for a friend who lived on a cattle station but he vehemently denied cutting down the barrel.

"Sure, I've got the knowledge and the ability. But I absolutely deny I cut it down. "Whoever cut it off knew what they were doing. "I just hope you find whoever did it."

A video re-enactment shown to the court found it was physically possible to put the sawn-off gun behind the right ear and pull the trigger.

Officers used a white 1984 Nissan Patrol, same make and model, and a female police officer of the same build as Arnold holding a sawn-off .22 Ruger rifle sitting in the footwell of the passenger seat. Arnold's body was found slumped in the seat with her hand resting on the rifle.

Counsel assisting the coroner Ralph Devlin, SC, said the inquest would examine the possibility of any third party in the killing. But Mr Devlin admitted the odds are against them given the fog of time, faded memories of witnesses, a contaminated crime scene and an almost complete lack of scientific and physical evidence.

"It is hard to exaggerate the failures (in this case)," Mr Devlin told the inquest.

He said only two bloody fingerprints were taken from the butt of the rifle, none from the knife, none from inside the car, and critically, no tests for gunshot residue were done on the hands of Arnold. "It was a missed opportunity at the outset. "And it would have been determinative in this case."

Original report here. (Via Australian Politics)

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2011-11-15T23:13:00.001+10:00

Australia: Suing the NSW stormtroopers again, the lawyer of Middle Eastern appearance

ADAM HOUDA says he's had enough. The Sydney lawyer, who specialises in criminal law, has been wrongfully arrested, detained or questioned by NSW police six times in 11 years. Now he is suing the police - for the third time.

In the latest incident, Mr Houda says he was arrested as he walked along a footpath at about 7pm on September 13 in Woods Road, Yagoona. Police deny he was arrested but admit he was spoken to.

Why was he stopped? "Once again they said I was a suspect in a robbery," Mr Houda told The Sun-Herald. And he has no doubt it was because of his Middle Eastern background. Racism, he said, is alive among some police, particularly in the Bankstown area.

A senior lawyer who knows Mr Houda put it bluntly: "The cops don't like the clients he represents or the community he represents."

Mr Houda said he doesn't know whether he is being deliberately targeted. "I don't know what it is - but what are the chances of it happening six times?"

Mostly, he has been arrested in the street wearing casual clothes, sometimes walking with relatives and friends. Other times he has been going to, or returning from, morning or evening prayers. After one arrest he was subjected to a humiliating body search. Several times arresting police have said they thought he was a suspect in a robbery or that he might have been carrying a knife.

He was arrested by the police for the first time in 2000 at Burwood Local Court after an altercation with an officer inside the courthouse. A Supreme Court judge later awarded Mr Houda $145,000 in damages and described the police treatment of him as "shocking".

In an incident on September 16 last year, Mr Houda and two male relatives were walking in Yagoona, near the Sefton Golf Club, just after 8pm. Two plain-clothes constables were patrolling the area in an unmarked car.

As Burwood Local Court later heard, the two officers earlier that evening had been sent an email from a Detective Senior Constable from Bankstown. It stated in part: "Over the last five days there has been an increase in robbery offences in the Chester Hill area and surrounds."

It then detailed four robberies which involved offenders of Middle Eastern appearance between ages 15 and 20. Two of the offences involved knives. The email concluded by saying: "Any groups of young M.E. males numbering from two to five need to have their bona fides checked."

The court heard that the two constables both said simultaneously "that's them" and stopped Mr Houda and his relatives for the purpose of carrying out a knife search. For Mr Houda, this was the fifth time this had happened.

One of the police, Constable Bernard Underwood, told the court Mr Houda had said in an aggressive tone: "Let me guess, we look like the ones who did it." Constable Underwood said he replied: "Well, actually, you do, mate." Mr Houda was charged with two offences - refusing a frisk search and resisting arrest. His two relatives were also charged.

When the matter came before Burwood Local Court recently, Mr Houda was represented by one of Sydney's leading barristers, Phillip Boulten, SC. The court heard that Mr Houda did not look like any of the offenders and, at 35, was clearly not in the right age bracket. It also heard that one of his relatives had grey in his beard.

In a judgment delivered on October 7 and obtained by The Sun-Herald, the magistrate, Michael John Connell, threw out all the charges against the three men and was critical of the actions of the police. "The officers could not have had a reasonable suspicion that the three men were suspects in any of the robberies," he said.

Constable Underwood and a colleague had a "limited knowledge" and a "vague" understanding of the relevant legislation and had exceeded their powers. "When the police act, it is important that they do so in accordance with that legislation," the magistrate said. "Unfortunately, in this case, this did not happen."

Mr Connell said: "At the end of the day, here were three men of Middle Eastern appearance walking along a suburban street, for all the police knew, minding their own business at an unexceptional time of day, in unexceptional clothing, except two of the men had hooded jumpers.

"The place they were in could not have raised a reasonable suspicion they were involved in the robberies, given the distance from them. "There was just as high a probability that the men had done nothing wrong and, more importantly, were not carrying a knife or knives."

That matter, and the latest incident on September 13, form the basis of his coming lawsuit. (The second lawsuit was settled on a confidential basis.)

Mr Houda said on Friday he wanted to put a spotlight on what was happening to him and other members of the Middle Eastern community to try to stop it from taking place.

SOURCE. (Via Australian police news)

2011-11-13T20:59:00.000+10:00

Man sues Australian authorities over negligent DNA testing

A MAN who was charged with a double murder then had the charges withdrawn is suing over a DNA bungle. Russell John Gesah, 46, is claiming negligence and wants damages.

He is suing the State of Victoria, along with several current and former Victoria Police employees, including ex-chief commissioner Simon Overland. Mr Gesah says he suffered post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety, according to court documents.

He was charged in July 2008, with the 1984 murders of Ferntree Gully woman Margaret Tapp, 35, and her nine-year-old daughter Seana. The Herald Sun reported at the time that a sample from the murder scene, where Seana was sexually assaulted, was compared with 400,000 DNA profiles on the national database. Police alleged a match was found to Mr Gesah.

But the charges against him were withdrawn two weeks later.

The Herald Sun reported a double-check found an unrelated exhibit containing Mr Gesah's DNA was tested on the same day and in the same place as material from the Tapp crime scene, generating a risk of contamination.

The discovery sparked a review of every crime solved by DNA in Victoria in the 20 years since the technology had been introduced. In all, about 6000 cases were reviewed.

In a statement of claim filed in the Supreme Court at Geelong this year, Mr Gesah said police failed to adequately investigate possible contamination of his DNA sample with the sample obtained from clothing belonging to Seana Tapp.

According to court documents, Mr Gesah says he was a Torres Strait Islander living in Queensland at the time of the murders and had never been to Victoria.

Original report here.

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2011-11-12T23:24:00.000+10:00

Scotland Yard chief fired after boasting he took drugs while trawling web for women who wanted sex with a man in uniform

A Scotland Yard chief inspector was sacked today over claims he boasted of taking drugs on an interactive dating website, the Independent Police Complaints Commission said.

The watchdog said the 46-year-old - who has not been named - told website users he was a serving police officer who had committed criminal offences including drug-taking and a sexual offence.

He was also found to have used his position to advertise himself online in an attempt to meet sexual partners while in uniform.

His behaviour on the internet amounted to gross misconduct, the watchdog said.

An earlier investigation by Kent Police had found that there was insufficient evidence to pursue any criminal allegations.

IPCC commissioner Mike Franklin said: 'Police officers, by virtue of the powers vested in them, hold positions of authority and trust in our communities.

'Those who discredit their role cannot expect to continue to serve the public and, as in this case, they should be dismissed.'

Two days of evidence proved the officer committed 'gross and discreditable conduct', police said.

Commander Peter Spindler, director of professional standards at the Met, said: 'Officers and staff may believe that what they do online, whether on duty or off-duty, is either anonymous or doesn't have any impact on others.

'This is not the case. The Metropolitan Police Service will pursue any allegations regarding improper online activity as vigorously as any wrongdoing offline.

'We expect our employees to behave professionally, morally, ethically and with the utmost humility and integrity in all areas of their lives. Anything short of this will not be tolerated.'

Original report here

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2011-11-11T18:06:00.001+10:00

FORFEITURE REFORM

I always feel validated when I see my opponents on the defensive, even if I’m not necessarily the one who put them there. So I couldn’t help experiencing a twinge of gratification when I read Lt. Chris Piombo of the Lodi, California Police Department “setting the record straight on asset forfeiture laws” in the Lodi News-Sentinel. He doesn’t write anything false, but he only tells half the story, and here’s where he gives the game away:

"There seems to be a misconception that law enforcement as a whole seizes money, cars, homes, etc., and that we get to keep the money or profits from sale to supplement our budgets or that we get to use things such as seized vehicles for our own benefit. This is not necessarily the case."

True, it’s not necessarily the case. Piombo continues by detailing the requirements for forfeiture in California and how forfeiture funds must be spent under California law. What he doesn’t tell his readers is how the federal forfeiture law and its equitable sharing program work.

Under federal law, property can be forfeited with a preponderance of the evidence (as opposed to the beyond a reasonable doubt standard used in criminal trials) and without any criminal conviction. Also, up to 80 percent of the proceeds can be sent back to the local law enforcement agency that initiated the forfeiture.

Those funds are supposed to be spent on law enforcement purposes, but there is little oversight on equitable sharing funds. I wrote about the consequences of that lack of oversight just last week, pointing out that a prosecutor in Piombo’s own state was using her equitable sharing dollars as a de-facto campaign fund.

Furthermore, the lack of due process rights for property owners at the federal level and the relative generosity of the equitable sharing program towards local law enforcement agencies encourage police and prosecutors to work around their state laws. So, yes, California has a relatively stringent asset forfeiture law, but it doesn’t make much difference when local law enforcement can ignore those requirements by taking their cases federal.

Original report here

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2011-11-10T17:12:00.001+10:00

Breath test coverup

Amanda Culbertson has a conscience, which is another way of saying that she wasn’t well-suited to government “work.” Until recently she was employed by the Houston Police Department as a crime lab supervisor. In 2009, she became aware of serious problems with the reliability of the department’s roadside blood alcohol testing vehicles, more commonly known as BAT vans.

Over the past decade, hundreds of police departments nation-wide have purchased the vehicles with the help of federal grants. The testing device deployed in them, the Intoxilyzer, is considered infallible by law enforcement agencies and most trial judges. However, the Kentucky-based company that manufactures the the Intoxilyzer has refused to disclose its source code. Without access to the source code, the device's findings are unverifiable. As one defendant points out, the machine could simply be a gimmicky random number generator, rather than a finely calibrated scientific instrument.

In 2008, it was discovered that a supervisor for the Houston Police Department had falsified BAT van inspection records for at least the previous eighteen months, thereby calling into question test results in at least 2,600 cases. When Culbertson was appointed to supervise the inspections, she learned that indifferently trained police officers allowed the units to overheat, which would skew test results. In addition, a glitch in the system caused the much-heralded Intoxilyzer to reset every time the air conditioner was turned on.

Over the course of several months, Culbertson tried to get officials in the police department and the Harris County DA’s office to address her concerns. None of them was interested in disturbing what had become a very profitable scam.

In June, Culbertson and two of her colleagues quit their jobswith the HPD. “We could no longer choose between a paycheck and our integrity,” Culbertson explained. Not surprisingly, she was called to testify by attorneys representing some of the hundreds of people facing DUI charges as a result of BAT van tests.

In professional terms, Culbertson landed on her feet: She was hired by a laboratory at Lone Star College that had a contract to conduct breathalyzer analysis for the Harris County Sheriff’s Office. Shortly thereafter, the Harris County Commission – at the initiative of DA Pat Lykos – ended its contract with the Lone Star College lab. In effect, Lykos – in an act of vulgar retaliation-- arranged for Culbertson to be fired.

Harris County’s 185th criminal court grand jury, which had been investigating problems with the BAT vans, called Culbertson to testify, along with former Harris County Prosecutor Brent Mayr. Lykos dispatched two members of her flying monkey corps – assistant DAs Carl Hobbs and Steve Morris – to “monitor” the grand jury testimony.

Since Lykos and her office were suspected of covering up the use of tainted evidence and retaliating against a whistleblower, the DA and her underlings were barred from being present in any capacity other than as sworn witnesses. Accordingly, when Lykos’s minions materialized during Culbertson’s testimony, the Grand Jury Foreman ordered them to leave. When that directive was ignored, the Foreman instructed the Baliff to remove them or place them under arrest.

Lykos unsuccessfully sought a court order compelling the grand jury to grant access to her underlings. When that effort failed, the DA's office exploited a back-channel to obtain official transcripts of the grand jury testimony. That led to a summons from Judge Susan Brown to Hobbs and Morris, along with court reporters Javier Leal and Katherine Chagaris, who face the possibility of contempt citations and the prospect of six months in jail.

The Harris County grand jury's insurrection caused consternation in the DA's office, and astonishment in the local media. "All too often in the past, Harris County grand juries have functioned as rubber stamps providing prosecutors with indictments without impartial scrutiny of their substance," notes the Houston Chronicle. Of course, this is true of practically every grand jury since the enactment of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure in 1946....

What is happening in Harris County is not an example of a grand jury going "rogue," but rather one behaving exactly as it should. It is interposing itself on behalf of the public by investigating a federally subsidized revenue-collection racket, and the abusive prosecutor who presides over it. Hopefully its example will prove to be contagious.

More here

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2011-11-09T20:13:00.001+10:00

CA: Pomona cops kill again

Pomona Police Brutality, Racism? Family of Andres Avila, Beaten and Shot Dead by Cops, Calls for Federal Investigation

Looks as if the murder and manslaughter charges against Fullerton police officers for the fatal beating of homeless man Kelly Thomas may have inspired the family of another officer-involved-shooting victim to challenge the actions of local law enforcement in nearby Pomona.

Andres Avila, 26, a former student at Mt. San Antonio College, was gunned down on a Sunday morning in an alley outside the Super Inn on West Holt Avenue. According to the L.A. County Sheriff's Department, who is now handling the investigation (along with the District Attorney), Avila and his girlfriend had spent the night of October 15 in his car, as she was sharing a hotel room with her family. When two officers approached the vehicle at 8:40 a.m. ...

... they claim Avila got out of the car and became violent. So they shot him dead.

The victim was completely unarmed, according to Luis Carrillo, the attorney now representing his family in a lawsuit against the city of Pomona. Avila's relatives are asking for "unlimited damages." The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin outlines the allegations:

In the claim Carrillo alleges police have made false statements about Avila, violated his Fourth Amendment right to be free from excessive force, and subjected him to false arrest, false imprisonment, battery, negligence, state civil rights violations and wrongful death.
Avila's own history with Pomona police may have put him on defense the morning he was shot. Strangely, he's the same young man who filed a personnel complaint after friends videotaped him getting beat up by cops at a Fourth of July house party.

Today, at the 6:30 p.m. Pomona City Council meeting, Avila's family plans to take the weighty accusations on behalf of their lost loved one to an institutional level: They're asking that the city itself (who, remember, is already being sued for Avila's death) call in the feds to investigate the larger implications of the shooting/beating.

According to the Daily Bulletin, their attorney has already asked as much of the U.S. Department of Justice. From his letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder:

"A Federal investigation is needed into the Pomona Police Department 'pattern and practice' of excessive use of force against the minority communities, and the pattern and practice of 'racial profiling' of Latino residents, for the sole purpose of towing their vehicles."
In the immediate aftermath of Avila's death, nearly all crucial details of the October 16 incident -- like whether Avila was armed, or otherwise threatened the lives of the officers -- were concealed.

And in the weeks since, the Pomona Police Department has remained tight-lipped, saying only that the sheriff and D.A. "will make a determination as to the legality of the the shooting at the conclusion of their investigation."

We've contacted sheriff's homicide Detective Gene Okada for updates on that front. As for the D.A.'s office -- a recent ruling that Long Beach cops killed resident Douglas Zerby out of self defense isn't too encouraging. But in that case, both cops and neighbors mistook the water nozzle in Zerby's hand for a gun. Pomona police seem to have a less obvious argument for killing Avila.

Original report here

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2011-11-08T17:40:00.001+10:00

CA: Trigger-happy cops riddle man holding a water hose with bullets

Fatal shooting of man holding black nozzle was lawful, D.A. says. The two Long Beach police officers who mistook the pistol-grip water hose nozzle for a handgun acted in self-defense, an inquiry concludes. The victim's family vows to seek a federal investigation.

Two Long Beach police officers who shot and killed a 35-year-old man last December when they mistook a black water hose nozzle for a gun, acted lawfully in self-defense, the Los Angeles County district attorney's office said Thursday.

"The evidence examined in this investigation leads to the conclusion that this was a tragic mistake of fact," said Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley in a letter to Long Beach Police Chief Jim McDonnell.

The findings show that at the time of the shooting Douglas Zerby had an object believed by witnesses and responding officers to be a handgun, and that his position was consistent with someone having both arms extended straight out and pointing the object at an officer.

The findings identify the officers as Victor Ortiz, a 10-year veteran, and Jeffrey Shurtleff, a six-year veteran.

The shooting, which occurred Dec. 12, was investigated by the Long Beach Police Department, the district attorney's Justice System Integrity Division and the Los Angeles County coroner's office.

"The family is disappointed but not surprised that the district attorney didn't have the courage to prosecute these officers for negligent homicide," said Brian Claypool, attorney for the Zerby family.

"This is a joke, it's a joke," said Zerby's sister, Eden Marie Biele. "We're going to demand a federal investigation; we're going to demand justice."

The family plans to hold a news conference Friday to ask for a federal investigation into Zerby's death.

Claypool said Ortiz and Shurtleff should have been prosecuted because they failed to identify themselves as police officers and did not order Zerby to put down the nozzle. The attorney also said a third officer observing Zerby through a rifle scope should have been able to determine that the object in Zerby's hands was not a gun.

An autopsy showed that Zerby's blood-alcohol level was 0.42% and that he also had Valium and THC in his system at the time of his death. Claypool said that such a high blood-alcohol level would have made it hard for Zerby to be acting in an aggressive manner, as police maintained.

"So the million-dollar question is: What happened?" Claypool said. He said the family will push forward with a civil lawsuit against the Police Department.

According to the results of the investigation, officers arrived at the house in the Belmont Shore neighborhood around 4:40 p.m. after a neighbor reported a man with a handgun in his backyard. He was later identified as Douglas Zerby.

Zerby sat on a landing with his back to an apartment located behind the house. He was holding what police believed was a handgun, pointing it to his side and waving it around as Ortiz and Shurtleff took cover inside the house. The officers did not attempt to identify themselves to Zerby, nor did they order him to drop his weapon.

Ortiz, who was armed with a shotgun, stood near a sliding door, 38 feet from Zerby. Shurtleff stood behind a kitchen window, 23 feet away.

The officers observed Zerby and requested additional officers, a police helicopter and the Police Department's Mental Evaluation Team. But when Zerby pointed the object at Ortiz, Shurtleff opened fired multiple times. Ortiz fired after Shurtleff began shooting.

Zerby was pronounced dead at the scene. A black pistol-grip water nozzle with a metal tip was recovered.

Biele said that because the officers never identified themselves as police and never told her brother to drop what was in his hands, Zerby was deprived "of the most fundamental act of due process."

Original report here

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2011-11-07T16:42:00.001+10:00

Sixteen NYPD officers arraigned on ticket fixing scandal

This past Thursday evening and Friday morning 16 NYPD officers surrendered to prosecutors at the Bronx courthouse to face criminal charges stemming from a ticket fixing scandal. Meanwhile, hundreds of officers staged a rally in support of those arraigned.

Prosecutors have dropped the hammer on sixteen NYPD officers who were indicted this past Friday morning at the Bronx criminal courthouse in relation to their role in a massive ticket-fixing scandal that has rocked the police force.

The Bronx District Attorney's Office unsealed a sweeping indictment against the 16 officers who are charged with a barrage of felonies that include: conspiracy, larceny, forgery, tampering with public records, official misconduct, perjury and obstruction of justice.

Among those involved are two sergeants, a lieutenant and several police union delegates.

According to Bronx DA Robert Johnson, the officers utilized various methods to render tickets legally irrelevant or make them disappear altogether.

Officers would reportedly either physically remove tickets from the precinct stationhouse after they'd been written or doctor them so the tickets would be dismissed.

In other cases, the cops would call officers who had written the summonses and tell them to lie under oath so that the cases would be dismissed.

According to prosecutors, the cops reportedly cost the city between $1 million and $2 million in lost revenue from the tickets they fixed.

Most of the people the officers reportedly fixed tickets for were relatives and friends or friends of relatives and friends. In other cases the officers are alleged to have accepted bribes from wealthy businessmen and politically well-connected local figures to fix their tickets. The bribes typically included money, free meals and even Yankee tickets or other expensive gifts.

The charges against the officers are the culmination of a three-year investigation by the Bronx DA's office and the NYPD's Internal Affairs Bureau (IAB).

Officer Jose Ramos, the original target of the massive probe, was arrested this past Thursday evening as he left a parent-teacher conference for his stepdaughter.

Ramos and his purported relationship with a local Bronx drug dealer by the name of Lee King served as the catalyst for the sweeping probe.

While investigating the rouge officer's ties to the drug dealer, investigators caught Ramos on a wiretap talk about fixing tickets, thus sparking the larger probe.

Ramos, though an officer sworn to enforce the law showed no regard or respect for it and even displayed utter contempt. On one secret recording by authorities the rogue officer is heard telling a drug dealer, "I stopped caring about the law a long time ago."

Bronx prosecutor Omer Wiczyk noted that Ramos had even once boasted that, "he could carry a dead body in the back of his car and get away with it because he was a cop."

During Ramos' indictment, the Bronx DA's office revealed that the delinquent officer even offered his police patrol car to help a drug trafficker move a large stash of heroin out of Manhattan. Wicsyk told a judge and packed courtroom that Ramos sold his shield and violated his oath.

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