FL: Are police relying too much on stun guns?

A young graffiti artist in Miami Beach, Fla., died last week after police shot him with a Taser, reigniting a debate about whether police are using Tasers more than they need to.

What to Israel Hernandez-Bandera was "an act of barbarism" and an "assassination of a young artist and photographer" was, to many police departments nationwide, a common response to a mounting threat.

On Tuesday, Mr. Hernandez-Bandera's son, Israel Hernandez-Llach, died after being shot by Taser stun gun. According to police accounts, Mr. Hernandez-Llach was spray-painting an abandoned McDonald's and ran away when confronted, failing to heed officers' commands.

At a time when police departments say offenders are becoming more violent and officer injuries are on the rise, Tasers have become an invaluable tool, allowing officers to subdue suspects without deadly force. But critics say police have become too enamored of them, and they point to the incident in Miami Beach, Fla., as evidence that the use of electroshock weapons is too often replacing caution and common sense.

Most police departments do not publish data on Taser incidents, as they do on incidents that involve firearms. But statistics and police statements suggest Taser use is on the rise. A 2012 study by The Chicago Tribune found that Chicago police were involved in 197 Taser incidents in 2009. By 2011, the department was on a pace to hit 857 incidents.

In eight other cities across Illinois, the story was similar, with Taser use doubling overt the same time period. In Austin, Texas, police Taser use also doubled between 2009 and 2011, according to a 2012 Austin American-Statesman report.

The trend is "societal," Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo told the paper. "Lots of economic frustrations, lack of respect for authority. It's a byproduct of what is happening in our country."

In laying out its policy on Tasers, police in the small town of Norway, Maine, laid out the argument made by departments nationwide: "The law enforcement community has experienced a rise in the assaults on officers. Offenders have become more violent and officer injuries have risen throughout the United States," the police department paper said.

But Tasers are not always safe, critics say. A 2012 study by Amnesty International found that 500 people had died from being shot by police with Tasers since 2001.

For the most part, the debate is not primarily about using Tasers to subdue violent offenders. Rather, Amnesty targets the practice of using Tasers on nonviolent suspects, too.

"Of the hundreds who have died following police use of Tasers in the USA, dozens and possibly scores of deaths can be traced to unnecessary force being used," said Susan Lee, Americas program director at Amnesty International, in the study. "This is unacceptable, and stricter guidelines for their use are now imperative."

In Miami Beach, police are conducting an investigation into the death of 18-year-old Hernandez-Llach. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement, an independent state agency, will review the report, though it can only make recommendations.

But the family has questioned why Tasers were needed to subdue a graffiti artist.

A police spokesman told The New York Times Friday that "no crime has been committed here" and that there was "definitely no gross negligence" on the part of the officer who fired the Taser. The officer, Jorge Mercado, has been put on paid administrative leave, but could be restored any time the police chief decides, according to the Times.

Original report here




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Postmaster accused of stealing £85,000 wins five-year battle for justice claiming a 'computer glitch' caused cash shortfall

A sub-postmaster accused of stealing £85,000 by the Post Office has won a five-year battle to clear his name.

Tom Brown, 67, from South Stanley, County Durham, has been told he will face no further action after the company said it could not enter any evidence just months before he was due to appear in a civil court case.

Police launched an investigation when it emerged there was a £85,426 shortfall at North Kenton Post Office in 2007, but after four years looking into the claim, they told him he would not face criminal charges.

Mr Brown, who was given a certificate of valour by the Post Office in the mid-90s after fending off a knife-wielding robber, has always maintained the shortfall was the result of a glitch in the company's controversial Horizon computer system.

It is claimed more than 100 people across the country have been the subjects of false allegations by the Post Office as a result of a computer error.

A campaign group, the Justice For Sub-postmasters Alliance, run by Alan Bates, of Old Colwyn, Conwy, helped in Mr Brown's fight. A number have registered an interest in suing the Post Office over the false accusations.

Despite police dropping the case, lawyers acting for The Post Office Ltd pursued two charges of false accounting against Mr Brown through the civil courts. But the company has said it no longer pursuing the case because it is 'not in the public interest' and a judge has recorded not-guilty verdicts.

Mr Brown, a grandfather-of-three, says he is relieved but has criticised Post Office bosses for their 'relentless pursuit' over the past five years.

He said: 'I've lost nearly £300,000 in property, lost my home, been declared bankrupt and had my name dragged through the mud. I knew there was something wrong in the shop and I thought somebody was taking money but I kept it quiet for six months.

'That's the biggest mistake I made. When the Post Office did an audit they found all this missing money and I was suspended.

'Without my salary I couldn't afford to pay the staff and I couldn't afford to pay the bills. I was made bankrupt. They wanted to search my house and they went through my car. I said to them, 'You won't find £85,000 in there".'

Mr Brown lost his wife, Carole, to breast cancer in 2003 at the age of 57. The couple had worked together since 1981 when they bought the Chester Moor post office before taking control of a site on Colliery Row Post Office in Fence Houses.

Mr Brown said: 'Because my wife was ill - they said she only had 18 months to live, but she survived for three years - we gave up the branch and moved into a new house.

'After she died, I started working in Finlays in North Kenton and eventually bought the site.

'I had a three-bedroom detached house in West Pelton and a flat across the road, which I rented out.

'When I was suspended I lost all that and I lost £50,000 a year in Post Office salaries. All the staff I've ever worked with in Newcastle think I stole £85,000. They've dragged my reputation through the dirt.

'When I was told that it was all over I was over the moon, I was absolutely elated. But the hardest thing is knowing that my wife and I worked for so many years, doing so much to try to make sure my family was secure.'

Mr Brown has now entered into a 'mediation' period with Post Office bosses as he wants compensation for five years of 'torture'.

North Durham MP Kevan Jones has championed Mr Brown's fight and raised his plight in Parliament.

Last night Mr Jones told The Journal it was a 'scandal', stating: 'The way Tom has been treated is verging on cruel.

'Ministers must now act to ensure victims of these Post Office allegations get the compensation they deserve. I have written to ministers today and will be pursuing Tom's case very hard.'

Last year the Post Office instructed a firm of forensic accountants, 2nd Sight Limited, to conduct an independent review of 10 existing cases raised by a number of MPs and the law firm Shoosmiths.

About 100 sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses have registered an interest in suing Post Office Ltd over its Horizon computer system, which records financial transactions in branches across the UK. The Post Office has repeatedly denied there is a problem with the system, saying the claims have been made by a very small number of people.

But Mr Jones criticised Business Minister Jo Swinson during a Parliamentary debate last month, saying a report had found there was scope for the Post Office 'to improve aspects of its support and training for sub-postmasters'.

A Post Office Ltd spokeswoman said: 'Post Office Ltd has determined that in this case it is no longer in the public interest to prosecute.'

She added: 'The Post Office is committed to supporting its people and improving the way we do so. The interim review published recently by independent investigators Second Sight makes it clear that the Horizon computer system and its supporting processes function effectively across our network.

'As the review notes, it is used by around 68,000 people in more than 11,500 branches, successfully processing more than six million transactions every day. The review underlines our cause for confidence in the overall system.'

In relation to other cases, she said: 'We would not comment on other cases. However, cases are only prosecuted where they meet and continue to meet the requirements of the code for Crown Prosecutors. That code requires both an evidential test and a public interest test to be applied. The code also requires the prosecution to keep under review whether or not that test continues to be met.'

Original report here




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Waving while black is dangerous

A photo of police forcing an off-duty firefighter to the ground has gained national attention after it was revealed that the police action was taken after the man waved to the officers.

George Madison Jr., an African American firefighter and youth pastor in Evansville, Indiana was threatened with a taser by police when he committed no crime.

Madison says that he was riding his bike when he saw a police car approaching the same intersection.

Through his work on the local fire department, he is familiar with a number of the police officers in Evansville and he thought he recognized one of the men in the car so he waved. That is not how the police interpreted it, however, as they claim that they thought he was flicking them off.

The officers stopped Madison, and, according to Madison, they were getting confrontational.

He then took out his phone and went to call the police chief, Billy Bolin, who he is friends with. The officers told him to hang up the phone and get on the ground.

When he hesitated before listening to their order, The Courier Press reports that the officer took out his taser.

'It was literally maybe inches from my face. I immediately threw my hands in the air. What he asked me to do I was more than willing to do,' Madison told the paper. 'I said "Please don’t hurt me." The next thing I know I’m laying down the ground and they cuffed me.'

The officers only began to back off after they learned that Madison was a firefighter and youth pastor. 'Once they found out I was a fireman their attitude changed,' he said.

Now there is an internal investigation underway within the police department and Madison's friend Chief Bolin is involved.

'I know (Madison), I like him. I know the officers involved, I like the officers involved. So, my job is to try to figure out the truth no matter who you like,' he told local 14 News.

'Just because somebody says something, we can't automatically assume it's the truth. I'm not saying I'm doubting anything that George has said. We have to hear both sides and get to the bottom of it.'

Original report here




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British Detective jailed for three years after asking domestic violence victims to touch his groin and have sex with him

A police officer who preyed on two domestic violence victims to get his sexual kicks has been jailed for three years. Detective Jeffrey Howard Davies was a family liaison officer with South Wales Police when he touched a distressed woman and tried to get another to touch his groin.

The women say they now live in fear of the police - with one suffering panic attacks following her ordeal.

During his two-week trial, the court heard that Davies was supposed to help victims of domestic violence. He had been with the force since 2000.

He vehemently denied the two counts of sexual assault, both in 2010, calling the allegations 'nonsense'.

But the prosecution said he abused his position of authority to try to persuade his victims to have sex with him.

In the first attack, he rubbed the leg of a woman who had complained of domestic abuse while the two were travelling in a car discussing the case.

A victim impact statement read aloud by prosecutor John Hipkin said the woman had found it difficult to come to terms with what had happened. She said: 'What this man has done to me has traumatised me psychologically. 'I now panic if I see a male police officer in the street. I have even had to change doctors because I found out that my GP works at the police station.

'I always thought of myself as a strong person, but what this man did to me has shattered my confidence.' The woman also said she felt embarrassed and that no one would believe her.

In the second attack, Davies forced a woman's hand against his groin after he interviewed her, before asking her for oral sex. She too had come to him for help after suffering domestic abuse.

In her statement the woman said: 'I was angry and shocked after it happened. 'I did not think anybody would believe me because he was a policeman.I do not trust the police as fully as I used to. 'I've started having panic attacks again - I haven't had them in four years.'

Defending barrister Lucy Crowther said her client had accepted there was limited mitigation that could be made given his not guilty plea, which a judge said had put the victims through even more stress.

She had tried to argue that, in some respects, the extent of Davies' sexual relations had not been as serious as two police officers who had been convicted of having sex while on duty.

Former Greater Manchester Police officer Michael Fletcher was jailed for 32 months in 2011 after having penetrative sex with a vulnerable adult while on duty.

And ex-Avon and Somerset Officer Kenny Lewis, 26, was jailed for four years in 2009 after engaging in sexual activity with a number of 'vulnerable' women, also while on duty.

Ms Crowther asked the court to impose a sentence nearer the sentencing guidelines for an offence of sexual touching - which has a lower starting point.

However, while Judge Paul Thomas acknowledged that Davies had not engaged in 'more intimate' sexual activity, he argued there was a key difference in the case. 'The sentencing guidelines, if you excuse my inelegant phrase, fly straight out of the window,' he said.

He pointed out that the sexual activity engaged in by Davies, although of a less serious nature than in the Fletcher and Lewis cases, had no consent whatsoever.

He added: 'A long prison sentence must follow.' As well as imposing a three-year custodial term, Davies was placed on the sex offenders register indefinitely.

Wearing a blue and red checked shirt and trousers, he bowed his head in shame as he was taken down by two security guards.

Throughout the hearing, the disgraced officer could also not bring himself to look towards the public gallery where several of his former colleagues sat.

South Wales Police's Assistant Chief Constable Richard Lewis said now that sentence had been passed, gross misconduct proceedings against Davies would be taken forward.

He added: 'His actions were a gross abuse of position and power which will not be tolerated within policing.

'The thorough and determined investigation carried out by South Wales Police and managed by the IPCC, demonstrates our determination to tackle behaviour of this kind.'

Original report here




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Cameras aid justice

As the late Andrew Breitbart maintained, we have become a militia of journalists, armed with our cellphone cameras and ready at a moment's notice to protect the strangers around us by documenting many kinds of abuse.

Recently when I was picking my son up at the airport, I dutifully circled the terminal at least half a dozen times while waiting for him to arrive. Finally he called to say that he had his luggage and was ready to be picked up. As I pulled to the curb, however, the airport cop yelled at me, "Move along! This area is only for active loading!" I pointed toward my son and opened my door to get out. "Stay in your car and move along!" he yelled again. I pointed again at my son. "I could have you arrested,” he threatened.

"For what?" I demanded. "For picking up my son who is standing right there?"

The cop's arm twitched backward toward his holster. Seriously. For an alleged parking offense. (Maybe that's where he kept his citation pad . . .) At that point the officer noticed that my daughter was filming the whole event on her cellphone. And suddenly his whole demeanor changed. "I'm sorry Ma'am," he said. "It's been a long day. I'm at the end of a double shift." Smile, copper. You're on candid camera.

Original report here




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Forget the sex smears. The real crime is that Foxy Knoxy was EVER charged with murder

On the night of November 1, 2007, Meredith Kercher, a 21-year-old exchange student from South London, was murdered in a cottage on the Via della Pergola in the Italian university city of Perugia.

Her body was found by police the next day, locked in her ground-floor bedroom and covered in a blood-soaked quilt. She had deep stab wounds in her neck.

The only clothing on her body was a cotton shirt pulled up to the neck. Bruises indicated she had been held down, and there was male DNA in her body, indicating possible rape.

The post-mortem could establish only a broad time frame for her death — between 8.55pm and 12.50am. There was also evidence of a burglary, since house keys, money, mobile phones and credit cards were missing and a rock had been thrown through the window of the adjoining room.

Further investigation of the crime scene revealed fingerprints, palm prints and semen that did not match any of the residents of the cottage. There was also a footprint of a Nike trainer in blood. Two witnesses had seen a young black man running down Via della Pergola from the direction of the cottage at 10.30pm. They said he nearly collided with them.

The black man seen running away might have been sought as a suspect if the police believed that an outsider had killed Meredith.

But within hours of finding the body, they concluded that all the evidence of burglary — the broken window, strewn clothing, missing belongings — had been staged to mislead them.

It was an insider job, they decided, which narrowed the police investigation down to just seven suspects — four young Italian students who rented rooms in the basement of the house, where they grew cannabis plants; and, upstairs, Filomena Romanelli, Laura Mezzetti and Amanda Knox, who, along with the victim, shared the ground-floor flat.

As it then turned out, it was a holiday week in Italy, and all four of the Italian men had gone away to visit their families. Romanelli and Mezzetti, both legal trainees in their late twenties, were also away and had solid alibis.

That left only one other suspect, Amanda Knox, a beautiful 20-year-old American student from Seattle, who was at the house when the police arrived, kissing her boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito.

Her alibi was provided by Sollecito, whom she had met the previous week at a classical musical recital. The two told police they were together at Sollecito’s flat all night. Knox said they had smoked marijuana, watched a DVD of the French film Amelie and slept together.

She returned to the cottage at 11am the next day to change her clothing, and it was then that she noticed blood in the shower.

Initially, Sollecito fully supported her alibi, but during three days of questioning, he changed his story, saying Knox had left his flat at 9pm to go to a bar, Le Chic, where she worked, and that she did not return until after midnight.

Under intensive interrogation, in which Knox was threatened with jail — and without being given access to a lawyer — she also altered her story, suddenly implicating Patrick Lumumba, the Congo-born owner of the Le Chic bar, as the killer.

On November 6, police arrested Knox, Sollecito and Lumumba for the murder of Meredith Kercher.

Even though Knox subsequently retracted her accusation, claiming she had been traumatised by police threats, the theory of the prosecutors now was that the murder proceeded from an orgy that got out of control.

But a problem developed when a Swiss professor, who had been at Le Chic on the night in question, swore he’d had an extended conversation with Lumumba during the time the murder was committed. In light of this alibi, and Knox’s admission that she had falsely accused him, Lumumba had to be released.

Meanwhile, on November 15 — a fortnight after Kercher’s death — the prints in her room were identified as belonging to Rudy Guede, a 20-year-old unemployed gardener from Ivory Coast, who fitted the description of the man seen running away.

His palm print was on the bloodstained pillow under Kercher’s hips. His DNA was found on her clothes and inside her. Guede also wore Nike trainers that were consistent with the bloody footprint on the floor.

This hard evidence unambiguously established that he was in Kercher’s room, had sexual contact with her, and left after her blood was spilled. He also had knowledge of the cottage. A fortnight earlier he had met the Italian men living downstairs while playing basketball and, in the week of the murder, he went there to smoke hash with them. On that occasion, he met both Kercher and Knox.

Guede was also under suspicion for other recent break-ins in Perugia and for stealing credit cards.

Less than a week before the murder, he had been briefly detained by police in Milan for climbing into a nursery and stealing an 11inch kitchen knife.

Guede, who had fled to Germany, was extradited back to Italy. But by that time Knox had become such a focus of the media’s attention, and the putative sex games by an angel-faced killer such a cornerstone of the story, that the Italian prosecutors were not about to abandon their group murder theory, even though Patrick Lumumba was now out of the frame.

To maintain this, chief prosecutor Giuliano Mignini posited a conspiracy by teaming up the two insiders, Knox and Sollecito, with the outside burglar, Guede.

Mignini had previously achieved considerable notoriety in Italy in a case in 2001 when he unsuccessfully attempted to attribute the suicide of a doctor to a secret satanic cult.

Now, the prosecutor proposed a similar satanic scenario in which Guede, Sollecito and Knox went to the cottage together and then attempted to force Kercher to have sex with them.

When she refused, Guede and Sollecito took turns molesting her. Knox, whom he described as a ‘she-devil’, then stabbed her to death.

One stumbling block was the total absence of evidence that Guede was with either Knox or Sollecito, or that he had ever met Sollecito. While two witnesses had seen Guede running away, no one had seen Knox or Sollecito with him at the cottage.

Nor did Guede claim that either Knox or Sollecito were with him. His story was that Kercher herself had invited him to the cottage and they had consensual sexual contact. Lacking a condom, he left the room and went to the bathroom.

When he emerged, he saw an unknown man run out of the cottage and he found Meredith bleeding. So he ran away, too.

In light of the abundance of evidence against Guede, he was convicted of murder in a separate trial, while the investigation of Sollecito and Knox continued.

But this had trouble even placing Sollecito in the cottage. The police failed to find a single print in the room that was his or, for that matter, Knox’s.

In addition, speculation that the bloody footprint came from Sollecito’s Nike shoe proved wrong. It was from Guede’s Nike.

So until mid-December 2007, the police and prosecutors could not place either Knox or Sollecito at the murder scene. This gap was bridged by a belated DNA analysis of Kercher’s bra clasp (which had accidentally remained at the crime scene for 46 days). DNA on it matched Sollecito’s.

DNA analysis also identified both Knox’s and Kercher’s DNA on a kitchen knife in a cutlery drawer in Sollecito’s home. No blood was found on it — and, it later transpired, the blade was too long to be the murder weapon, which was never found.

Nonetheless, the trial proceeded, with the prosecutor painting a gory picture of a ‘she-devil’ who tortured her room-mate with a knife while Sollecito and Guede sexually abused her, then, when the orgy ended, slashed her throat and staged a burglary to dupe the police.

This story was based largely on the supposed DNA evidence of Sollecito’s presence at the scene.

Both Knox and Sollecito were convicted of murder and sexual violence. In December 2009, Knox was sentenced to 26 years’ imprisonment and Sollecito to 25.

The case then went to appeal, and an independent panel of forensic experts was appointed to review the crucial DNA evidence. It found in its 145-page report that the collection of the DNA evidence linking Sollecito to the crime scene was utterly flawed.

Not only were the police claims about the DNA not consistent with the actual lab reports, but a video showed the key items were picked up with a dirty glove that might have transferred DNA samples from the suspects. This meant cross-contamination was possible.

That left no credible evidence, and on October 3, 2011, the court threw out the murder and sexual violence convictions of Sollecito and Knox. Both were immediately released from prison and Knox flew back to America and signed a lucrative book contract.

The prosecutors are now appealing against the acquittal, so technically speaking the case remains unsolved. My assessment, however, is that Knox and Sollecito — despite all the poisonous character assassination directed at them — are both innocent of the murder, and the almost four years they spent in prison amounts to an extraordinary miscarriage of justice.

The police investigation was wedded from the outset to the wrong narrative. It assumed that the crime scene had been staged to look like a burglary and so focused on the only available insider, Knox.

In doing so, the police neglected eyewitness sightings of a possible burglar running from the direction of the house at the approximate time of the crime.

If they had investigated that obvious lead, it would have quickly led them to Guede. His fingerprints, palm prints, shoe print and DNA would have established him beyond doubt as a person at the scene, and it’s probable he would have been arrested before he had a chance to flee to Germany — meaning the spotlight would never have been left to fall on Knox.

The case against Guede is, quite simply, overwhelming. He was an experienced burglar, having broken into three other places that autumn, and his previous visit to the cottage would have been an opportunity to case the joint.

There are several ways he could have entered the building — not least through the empty basement apartment, where Kercher had agreed to water the cannabis plants.

After stumbling on Kercher, assaulting and robbing her, he may have smashed the window from the inside to create an expedient means of exit. His DNA was found in Kercher’s pocket-book and credit cards. Moreover, €300 (£258) were missing.

In truth, what’s astonishing is that Knox ever stood trial. The appeals court stated the murder and sexual violence charges against her and Sollecito were ‘not corroborated by any objective element of evidence’.

In short, there was no evidence at the murder scene to show this was not the work of a single home invader.

The lesson here is that denying a suspect a lawyer can result in terrible injustice. If Knox had been provided with one, she would not have been allowed to succumb to police pressure and give untrue statements that resulted in her arrest, as well as that of two other innocent people.

Meanwhile, forensic evidence would have unambiguously identified the perpetrator as Rudy Guede — and there would have been no need for a prosecutor to conjure up a non-existent orgy out of thin air.

Original report here




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Armed British cop who had sex with married woman while on duty KEPT his job - because he could still reach gun in holster round his ankles

An on-duty firearms officer who had sex with a married woman with his gun around his ankles kept his job because he could still reach his weapon, it was revealed today.

PC Shaun Jenkins, 36, was on armed patrol when he picked up his lover and took her to his house where they had sex while a colleague waited in a squad car outside.

The officer, who has two awards for bravery, enjoyed a 40-minute liaison with the woman in 2010.

The unnamed woman's husband found out about the afternoon tryst and reported PC Jenkins to his senior officers who later sacked him for gross misconduct.

PC Jenkins appealed and was reinstated because his gun was never out of his control and he could 'have been back in the police vehicle within a minute or two'.

But the Police Appeals Panel's decision to give the Gwent officer his job back was criticised by the Independent Police Complaints Commission today.

Tom Davies, the head of the IPCC in Wales, said he was 'bemused' by the panel's decision to let him off.

He said: 'The finding that the gun was never out of PC Jenkins' direct and immediate control because it was in a holster, attached to his trousers, which were attached to him, albeit around his ankles, is surprising.

'I am also bemused by the panel's conclusion that his conduct did not significantly downgrade the protection to the public because there was nothing to suggest he could not have been back in the police vehicle within a minute or two. 'These findings can only undermine public confidence in the credibility of the police discipline system.'

Mr Davies also said the way Gwent Police dealt with a complaint about PC Jenkins from the husband of the woman he had sex with was 'unacceptable'.

Despite this the officer will still keep his job.

Original report here




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British man locked up for murder may walk after stunning new evidence he was set up by bent cops and drug cartels

Across the table at the South Florida Reception Centre, a jail for elderly inmates on the outskirts of Miami, British businessman Krishna Maharaj grasps the armrests of his wheelchair.

‘My trial was a conspiracy to have me murdered,’ he says. ‘But now the truth is coming out, and those responsible are running for cover.’

Once a multi-millionaire food and property magnate whose horses raced the Queen’s at Royal Ascot, Mr Maharaj has been a prisoner for the past 27 years – the first 16 of them on Death Row, facing the electric chair.

Now 74, he’s serving life for the 1986 gangster-style slaying of a father and son, Derrick and Duane Moo Young, and his earliest possible parole date is 2040.

Last week, Mr Maharaj told of his ordeal in an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, the first that he has been able to give for many years.

The story he describes sounds like a far-fetched episode of the 1980s TV crime show Miami Vice. But thanks to an investigation by his lawyers which has lasted years, it is now the subject of a fresh appeal, supported by multiple witnesses and copious documentation.

According to papers reviewed by a Florida court last week, seen by this newspaper, Mr Maharaj was ‘victimised by the pervasive environment of corruption and drug traffic endemic at the time .  .  . the 1980s, when cocaine money entered the bloodstream of the city of Miami.’

The result, say these documents, was that a respectable businessman with an impeccable legal record found himself trapped by corrupt police officers and witnesses who lied in order to protect the real killers, hitmen from Colombia’s notorious Medellin drugs cartel.

‘God allowed me to be born British,’ says Mr Maharaj. ‘I have always been proud of my country, and I pray that what happened to me never happens to another British citizen. I worked hard all my life. I made a fortune, but I was never dishonest, let alone a murderer.

‘I pleaded not guilty from day one, and before my death sentence was commuted in 2002, I decided I would not seek clemency: clemency is for people who are guilty. Now at last the evidence is conclusive. I always told the truth, and I was framed.’

The Mail on Sunday has also spoken to Mr Maharaj’s wife Marita, who has stood by him. She too has not given an interview for years.

As the documents filed in Mr Maharaj’s appeal point out, in the 1980s, not only was corruption endemic throughout the Miami criminal justice system, the city was also America’s murder capital. Following an FBI probe, five criminal judges were indicted for taking huge bribes to ‘fix’ drugs cases.

Another inquiry that started a year before Mr Maharaj’s arrest resulted in 20 police officers jailed for racketeering and drug dealing. Several were convicted of murder.

The documents cite a body of fresh testimony stating that similar corruption was at work in the Maharaj case. Some of it comes from Pete Romero, a retired Miami policeman who was one of the main detectives on the Moo Young case.

Before he committed suicide last year, the documents say, he said explicitly that police had both committed further murders and framed Mr Maharaj. That claim, The Mail on Sunday has learned, is now supported by other Miami Police Department whistleblowers.

Before interviewing Mr Maharaj, I met a seasoned legal source who is close to one of these whistleblowers and who is co-operating with Mr Maharaj’s defence. There was a ‘pattern’ of criminal wrongdoing by officers, the legal source said, especially in its Narcotics Vice squad – the inspiration for the TV series.

‘This was about making certain people disappear. Teams of officers were directly involved in murders, in both carrying out hits and in an accessory role, framing others and allowing hits to occur.’

But should any of the whistleblowers’ identity become known, the source went on, ‘they’re dead. Maybe not now, maybe not in a year. But they will get them.

‘And the way the drugs business works, their families will also be seen as fair game.’ That, he admitted, did not make it easy for Mr Maharaj: ‘His lawyers are trying to vindicate him, but at the same time that’s putting others in mortal danger.’

Two years ago, Mr Maharaj – who was born in Trinidad when it was a British colony – fell prey to the flesh-eating bug, necrotising fasciitis. He shows me the resultant scar: a dark hollow where his calf muscle should be – the reason for his wheelchair.

For three months, he hovered close to death, but confounding the prison doctors’ expectations, he recovered.

As we talk, it’s obvious that this is a man of tremendous inner strength but he attributes his survival to Marita, also 74, who relinquished her own jet-set lifestyle when he was arrested in order to be near him, and has been living ever since in a humble rented house in Fort Lauderdale.

The couple speak by telephone twice a day, and she visits him every weekend, just as she has for the past 27 years. ‘As a young man, my great weakness was for lovely young ladies,’ says Mr Maharaj. ‘But Marita was sent to me by God. She’s the reason for my sanity, the heroine of this tragedy.’

‘I think we’ve helped each other’, Marita tells me later at her home, ‘because I need him as much as he needs me. I told him when he was arrested, “Don’t worry, I came here with you, and one day I will leave with you – I will take you home to Britain.” Even now, the most painful part for me is leaving the prison without him after each visit.’

Mr Maharaj’s talent for making money became apparent when he was just 18 and took his first job as a salesman for an Austin car dealership in Trinidad. He was on a two-month trial, being paid only commission. But by the end of this period, he had negotiated lucrative contracts to supply three of the island’s biggest firms with all their company cars, and was earning several times as much as his boss.

‘Austin tried to put me on a fixed salary,’ he says. ‘So I switched to Ford. I knew I could make more on commission. But I wanted more. ‘I saved enough money to come to England, and to pay my way through law school.’ He arrived in 1960, and settled in Peckham, South London.

Mr Maharaj studied hard, but a part-time job as a lorry driver allowed him to spot the opportunities which led to his first steps in the food business. He started by importing small consignments of yams from Nigeria, and exporting British beef. By the mid-1960s, he had paid off an initial £1,500 bank loan and become a millionaire, dealing in a wide range of what were then considered exotic fruits – such as bananas – and vegetables.

Around the same time, he acquired the first of the approximately 100 Rolls-Royce cars he has owned, usually four at a time.

He also built up a stable of 110 racehorses – Britain’s second biggest. One of his proudest moments came in 1974 when his horse King Levenstall came in at 11-2 to beat the Queen’s in the Queen Alexandra Stakes at Ascot. ‘She came over to congratulate me. I bowed. Her Majesty was very gracious,’ he recalls.

Kris, as he is known, met Marita, a glamorous, multi-lingual banker from a wealthy Portuguese family, at a party in Oxford in summer 1976. Five months later they were married and they had ten ‘wonderful years’ together.

It wasn’t only his evident Midas touch that convinced Mr Maharaj that he was born lucky. Early in his career, he had cheated death when a traffic jam on the road to Heathrow meant he missed a flight to Nigeria for a business trip. ‘The plane crashed. They had overbooked, and the guy who sat in what should have been my seat was killed.’

By the mid-1980s, he had new interests in publishing and real estate in Florida. He had started a venture with local businessman Derrick Moo Young, only to discover that Moo Young had been embezzling from the company.

At the time of the murders, Mr Maharaj had a pending civil lawsuit to recover the stolen money – around £300,000. ‘That alone ought to undermine my supposed motive,’ he says. ‘If I had wanted to kill him, surely I’d have waited until I’d got my money.’

The bullet-riddled bodies of Derrick and Duane were discovered in room 1215 at the five-star Dupont Plaza hotel in downtown Miami on the afternoon of October 16, 1986.

Mr Maharaj’s fingerprints were in the same room, and the following year he was convicted and sentenced to death. He says: ‘When I heard the verdict, I fainted.’

What followed was a 24 hours-a-day lockdown, except for three weekly visits to the showers, on Death Row at the state prison in Starke, in the far north of Florida.

‘I never went outside because I was scared,’ says Mr Maharaj. ‘I was not a criminal, and I’d never associated with criminals. Here were all these murderers and drug dealers, and I was frightened of what they might do.

‘Death Row was terrible in so many ways. I broke my arm when I slipped in the shower, and because it wasn’t treated for a long time, it got so badly infected I was lucky it wasn’t amputated.

‘While I was recovering and couldn’t use the arm, my one friend, who lived in the cell next door, used to write my letters for me. He got a stay of execution 45 minutes before he was scheduled to die. His head and leg had been shaved: prepped to take the electrodes.’

Nowadays, Mr Maharaj can at least wheel himself around the single-storey geriatric jail and its ring-fenced yards. But he sleeps in a dormitory with 91 others. ‘You could not say this is a good quality of life,’ he says.

The Mail on Sunday revealed in December some of the astonishing discoveries made about the case by his solicitor Clive Stafford Smith, of the human rights charity Reprieve, and his colleagues.

For example, the Moo Youngs – portrayed at Mr Maharaj’s trial as almost penniless – controlled funds worth billions of pounds, while their front company, Cargil SA, was registered in the Bahamas at the office of a notorious drug cartel lawyer.

The documents filed for Mr Maharaj’s appeal state that a new forensic analysis of the Moo Youngs’ secret accounts not only show they were involved in money laundering on an almost unimaginable scale, they were also skimming extra commissions worth many millions from their drug baron clients – so creating the strongest possible motive for their murder.

Only one room on the 12th floor of the Dupont Plaza besides 1215 was occupied on the day they were killed. Across the hall was Jaime Vallejo Mejia, a Colombian who was later convicted in Oklahoma of transporting and depositing vast sums in cash into Swiss bank accounts as a cartel courier.

Stafford Smith and his team have also established that six alibi witnesses who have always said they were having lunch with Mr Maharaj 30 miles away when the Moo Youngs were shot have stuck by their stories, although – inexplicably – his trial defence lawyer, Eric Hendon, failed to call them as witnesses.

So why were Mr Maharaj’s fingerprints at the murder scene? Because hours before the Moo Youngs got there, the real killers – planning to frame him – lured him to a business meeting with a man who never turned up.

Further inquiries have also disclosed that Mejia and other cartel members were at the Dupont and knew all about the extra ‘commissions’ stolen by the Moo Youngs, and that they were working for the infamous Medellin boss, the late Pablo Escobar.

Stafford Smith knows that however persuasive the evidence unearthed for Mr Maharaj’s appeal, the prosecution will continue to fight: when documents containing details of Romero’s testimony were filed earlier this year, it asked the court to rule them inadmissible because they were not typed in the correct format.

But Mr Maharaj is optimistic. ‘I’ve always had faith in God, and I am certain I will be exonerated. Even in the darkest times, I have never given in to despair.’

‘For so long now our lives have been a nightmare,’ Marita tells me later. ‘But this time, I truly believe we’re going to wake up.’

Original report here




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British police investigate 169 officers across the country in relation to sex-related offences including rape, sexual assault and voyeurism

Police forces across the country are investigating 169 officers and support staff in relation to sex-related offences, it has been revealed.

The investigations include allegations of rape, sexual assault and voyeurism at forces across the country, according to reports.

Britain's largest force, the Metropolitan Police, has now set up a working group to 'deter inappropriate relationships and the abuse of police powers to perpetrate sexual offending'.

Meanwhile, senior officers from each force in the country have also held a private meeting to address such issues, The Guardian has reported.

The newspaper obtained figures from 38 of the 43 forces in England and Wales which revealed 169 officers, police community support officers and support staff were under criminal and disciplinary investigations.

The Met is currently carrying out 42 Directorate of Professional Standards investigations, involving 47 allegations, which includes 36 allegations of sexual assault and 11 of inappropriate sexual conduct.

Of those 42 cases, 16 are awaiting trial, 12 are on-going investigations, eight are awaiting misconduct hearings, five are awaiting formal action and one has gone to a police appeal tribunal.

The force has said it is working with Nottinghamshire police, which has already developed a strategy to tackle sexual offences within the force.

Commander Allan Gibson, the Met's directorate of Professional Standards, who is in charge of the working group, said: 'This is a complex subject, which not only impacts on the police but others such as the teaching and medical professions.

'There are some important lessons that can be learned from others, we want to support our staff and stop them falling unwittingly into inappropriate relationships and to develop our own strategies to ensure that would be offenders are identified quickly and held to account.'

Nottinghamshire Police have also released a film to all the other forces which includes the comments of the former partner of a police officer jailed last year for having inappropriate relationships with vulnerable women.

A Nottinghamshire Police spokesman said: 'We are leading the way in ensuring our police officers and staff operate with the utmost integrity, not just in terms of their own behaviour but also in reporting any questionable actions of others.

'As a result we are currently looking into a number of cases, many of which are historic.

'Our zero-tolerance attitude, reflected by the film and supported by our integrity hotline, demonstrates our dedication to proactively seeking out anyone who has abused their position of authority, and allows us to deal with them quickly and appropriately.'

Debaleena Dasgupta, a lawyer who represents the victims of rape or sexual assault by officers, told The Guardian: 'If a woman reports rape or sexual assault by a police officer it is not just that the investigation has to be properly carried out, it has to be seen to be done properly in order for victims to have confidence in the system.'

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) is currently involved in 31 investigations into abuse of powers. But its chairman Dame Anne Owers has said it would look to investigate more cases if more resources became available.

She said: 'Police who abuse their position and exploit individuals for sexual gratification have no place in the police service. While these cases are rare, each of them is a fundamental abuse of power, and therefore seriously undermines public trust.

'It is clear that a small number of officers and staff continue to target vulnerable individuals, often women. The IPCC has 31 on-going investigations into abuse of powers cases, the majority of which are being supervised by our corruption team.

'We are encouraged by the positive responses of police forces to this issue and the fact that more referrals are coming to the IPCC demonstrates a willingness to root out this type of behaviour.

'We are currently awaiting the Home Secretary's proposals on the expansion of the IPCC and welcome the opportunity to extend and strengthen our work.

'As more resources become available the IPCC will aim to investigate more abuse of powers cases independently of the police service.'

Original report here




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Man Finally Gets Certificate Of Innocence After Wrongful Conviction For Arson

CHICAGO (CBS) — He’s been out of prison for fourteen months, but after Monday, James Kluppelberg finally feels free.

“It’s surreal,” Kluppelberg said to CBS 2 in his first interview. “It’s mind-blowing.”

Originally convicted of the 1984 Chicago fire that killed a mother and her five children, Kluppelberg’s record will now be cleared of the charges. Despite dropping the case against him and urging his release in May 2012, the Cook County State’s Attorney fought the issuance of a certificate of innocence. However, this Monday, Judge Michael McHale granted Kluppelberg the all-important certificate.

“[The Judge said] that a grave injustice had been done to me,” Kluppelberg reflects. “I did a lot of crying when the Judge was reading his ruling.”

Lawyer Karl Leonard was one of the team who worked to clear Kluppelberg. When asked about how many pro bono hours he donated to the case, he replies, “I don’t know exactly how many, but hundreds.”

Although out of prison, the past fourteen months were a struggle. Kluppelberg wasn’t able to find full-time employment with the 6 murder convictions on his record.

“Very much unemployed, very much unemployable because people don’t understand what the word exonerated means,” said Kluppelberg. “Maybe they will understand the word innocent better now.”

Original report here




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Shocking surveillance video captures cop brutally beating female shoplifter in front of her one-year-old child

An Iowa mother is being advised by a civil rights organization after surveillance video recently emerged of her being viciously beaten by a police officer, apparently without provocation.

Brandie Redell admits that she was trying to shoplift around $388 of women's clothing from the Von Maur department store in Davenport on February .

Yet when she was caught and questioned by police she says that Officer Scott Crow repeatedly punched her, leaving her hospitalized with an eye swollen shut and vision that is now 70 per cent impaired. Crow remains in his job and Redell is planning legal action.

The surveillance footage, released by the Better Government Association, shows Crow appear to lunge towards Redell and punch her several times in the head. Another officer holds down the women's legs.

A Von Maur worker runs from the room with Redell's one-year-old child at the start of the attack, which lasted for over a minute.

'I was asking him why was this happening and I was crying. I was screaming, begging for someone to help me,' Redell told WQAD.com.

Officer Crow wrote in his report that Redell bit him, something that the women admits she did, 'to try to get him off of me.'

But the policeman claims that she wouldn't let his finger go, while he can be seen in the video beating Redell with both hands.

David Bradford, executive director of Northwestern University Center for Public Safety, told the BGA: 'At some point his hand is free [from her mouth] and he continued to pummel her. He went overboard.'

Redell, who has two previous shoplifting convictions, is due in court on August 23.

She says the beating started when she was calling her boyfriend, James Gibson, to come and pick up her 14-month-old daughter.

Gibson is community activist who has previously done race sensitivity training with the police. Redell claims that when the officers heard his name they told her: 'This is going to get ugly, real quick.'

Redell told CBS that she believes Gibson's race has something to do with the incident.

'I don’t think the police were really thrilled that a white woman was calling a black man for help, especially one that they already weren’t fond of,' she said.

The woman is now working with Chicago civil rights group Living And Driving While Black Foundation. They are planning on a suit against the Davenport Police Department.

Davenport Police Chief Frank Donchez told CBS that internal investigations had not revealed a racial bias in the incident.

But Donchez did say: 'Our policy says you are to conduct yourself in a professional manner.' Was he within policy? No. Do we need to conduct an internal investigation? Yes.'

Original report here




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IL: Was police killing of 95-year-old necessary?

Common sense tells me that cops don't need a Taser or a shotgun to subdue a 95-year-old man

When John Wrana was a young man, fit and strong and fighting in World War II with the U.S. Army Air Corps, did he ever think he'd end this way?

Just a few weeks shy of his 96th birthday, in need of a walker to move about, cops coming through the door of his retirement home with a Taser and a shotgun.

The old man, described by a family member as "wobbly" on his feet, had refused medical attention. The paramedics were called. They brought in the Park Forest police.

First they tased him, but that didn't work. So they fired a shotgun, hitting him in the stomach with a bean-bag round. Wrana was struck with such force that he bled to death internally, according to the Cook County medical examiner.

"The Japanese military couldn't get him at the age he was touchable, in a uniform in the war. It took 70 years later for the Park Forest police to do the job," Wrana's family attorney, Nicholas Grapsas, a former prosecutor, said in an interview with me Thursday.

Wrana's family wants answers. The Illinois State Police are investigating the horrific incident but won't comment, and neither will the Park Forest police pending the outcome of the inquiry.

I wasn't at the scene, and maybe the police have a good explanation. But common sense tells me that cops don't need a Taser or a shotgun to subdue a 95-year-old man.

And after doing some digging, I found there are two versions of events: The police version, and a new picture that raises questions of whether John Wrana was killed unnecessarily.

The Park Forest police version is that on the night of July 26, John Wrana, a resident of the Victory Centre senior living facility, threatened staff and paramedics with a 2-foot-long metal shoehorn and a metal cane. The police statement neglects to mention that the old man also used a walker, at least according to photographs supplied by Grapsas.

"Attempts were made verbally to have the resident comply with demands to drop the articles, to no avail," the police statement reads. "The resident then armed himself with a 12-inch butcher type kitchen knife."

But lawyer Grapsas says that Wrana's family never saw a knife in his room and that staff also told him Wrana didn't have such a knife. "So where did the knife come from?" Grapsas asked.

The police statement leaves the impression that the staff was under threat, leaving police with no choice other than to shoot him.

But according to Maria Oliva, an executive with Pathway Senior Living, the staff was kept out of the room after police arrived. So there was no imminent threat to staff.

"The staff was not inside once the police were on the scene," Oliva told us. "At different times the staff were in there, but not when they were called. They (the police) were in charge at that point."

Police said there had been threats made against the staff. But Grapsas said he was told that staff begged to be allowed to try to calm down the old man.

"If there were threats to the staff, why did the staff want to intervene and say, 'Let us handle this; we'll get him calmed down'?" he asked.

Grapsas says he was told that police used a riot shield to come through the door before shooting bean-bag rounds at the old man as he sat in his chair.

Riot shields are used to push back mobs of angry young protesters in the streets, or against dangerous convicts in prison cells, not to subdue an old, old man in a chair.

"At some point, I'm told there were between five and seven police officers, they went back to the room with a riot shield in hand, entered the door and shot him with a shotgun that contained bean-bag rounds," Grapsas said.

If this is true and police had a riot shield, why on earth would they need a shotgun?

Most veteran cops I talked to suspect this is a case of unnecessary force. I've never met a police officer who couldn't handle a 95-year-old man in a walker. And John Wrana wasn't Jason Bourne. He was an old war veteran who didn't want to be pushed around.

But one senior police official who has trained police recruits in defensive tactics had a different take.

"When I first heard it, I was like, 'C'mon,'" he said. "Then I thought it through. We don't know what occurred. We don't know what information they had at that time. If you don't have all of the facts, it's hard to judge someone. … Anyone can be dangerous."

Sharon Mangerson, 74, doesn't see her stepfather as dangerous.

Wrana and Mangerson's mother, Helen, were married for more than 30 years. Helen died in 2005. So Wrana lived with Mangerson in the south suburbs until his health — and her health — began to fail.

She said he was a fiercely independent member of the greatest generation, honorably discharged as a sergeant after serving in India and Burma during the war.

"He was a very vital 95-year-old, let me tell you. He still played cards. He taught the 70-year-olds how to play gin rummy," she said in an interview. "I used to admire him so much because he was able to keep doing those type of things. As independent as they come, trust me."

On the night of the incident, he wound up at Advocate Christ Medical Center. The doctor was on the phone with Mangerson, telling her that even if Wrana survived surgery, he'd likely be on life support. Wrana wanted to talk to her. The doctor held the phone up to his ear, she said.

"He just said, 'Thank you for everything you've done for me. I love you and goodbye,'" Mangerson recalled, her voice cracking. "That was it."

Will the family ever get an explanation? "I want answers," she said. "I want someone held accountable."

Original report here




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Scotland Yard apologised yesterday to the family of Ian Tomlinson as it paid out a substantial sum in damages and legal costs

Senior officers apologised ‘unreservedly’ for the clash that led to the newspaper seller’s death during the G20 riots in 2009.

In an unusual move, they branded the actions of disgraced Pc Simon Harwood ‘excessive and unlawful’ despite his acquittal for manslaughter.

And they admitted ‘significant failings’ in vetting procedures which did not prevent the officer re-joining the ranks despite a history of misconduct.

Mr Tomlinson’s grieving family said the apology and compensation deal was ‘as close as we are ever going to get for justice’ after a four year fight.

It brings to an end another ignominious chapter in the history of Britain’s largest force which not only employed a thug but misled the public over the tragedy.

His widow, Julia Dawood, of the Isle of Dogs, East London, said it meant her family could ‘finally start looking to the future again’.

She attacked police for forcing them to take ‘apart untruthful accounts’ of what happened and labelled Harwood’s acquittal ‘unimaginable’.

She said: ‘We will never understand the verdict, but at least today’s public admission of unlawful killing by the Met is the final verdict, and it is as close as we are ever going to get for justice.’

She added: ‘It will always be painful for us that Ian died so violently, but at least he is at rest now, and the force has publicly acknowledged the truth.

‘We hope that lessons have been learned and that other families will be spared the tragedy and ordeal that we have had to face.’

Mr Tomlinson, 47, was caught up in the anti-capitalism demonstrations in the City as he walked home in April 2009. He died after being struck by a baton and pushed to the ground by Pc Harwood who was in a line of riot officers. He was also bitten by a police dog. Mr Tomlinson stood up and walked a short distance before collapsing and dying from internal bleeding.

Police did not admit their involvement until a shocking amateur video capturing his last moments was passed to a national newspaper. It triggered a firestorm of controversy that led to an inquest in which a jury returned a verdict of unlawful killing.

They found he died from a haemorrhage caused by blunt force trauma, to which Mr Tomlinson was particularly vulnerable due to his alcoholism.

Pc Harwood, a member of the Met’s controversial territorial support group, was charged with manslaughter but acquitted. Last September he was dismissed by a misconduct panel for using unnecessary and disproportionate force.

The Met said the size of the out-of-court settlement will remain secret and it brings to an end all litigation connected to the case.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner Maxine de Brunner said the actions of Pc Harwood ‘fell far below the standard we expect from our officers.’

She said: ‘I apologise unreservedly for Simon Harwood’s use of excessive and unlawful force, which caused Mr Tomlinson’s death, and for the suffering and distress caused to his family as a result.’

Speaking about Pc Harwood’s readmission to the Met in 2004, she said there were ‘insufficient’ checks, adding: ‘We got it wrong.’

Original report here




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Court Clerk Helps Free Innocent Man and Gets Fired For Her Effort

Jackson County Court Clerk Sharon Snyder, 70, was a mere nine months from retirement when she was unceremoniously fired for insubordination. Her rebellious act consisted of pointing someone to a publicly available document.

An inmate who was trying, and failing, to file a simple motion was given a successful motion to use as a model. His motion was granted, he was exonerated, and like the aging cop archetype of film — dramatically killed just before his scheduled retirement — Snyder got canned after 34 years of working in the courthouse.

Now the justice system is once more desperately trying to spin why it punishes people for being right…

Back in 1984, Robert Nelson was convicted of rape and given, for all intents and purposes, a life sentence. Except Nelson knew he didn’t do it. And not in that “everyone in jail is innocent” kind of way. At this point he began doing what countless inmates do with their time: filing poorly prepared motions protesting their innocence.

In August 2009, Nelson filed a motion seeking DNA testing that had not been available at his trial 25 years earlier, but Jackson County Circuit Judge David Byrn denied the request. Two years later Nelson asked the judge to reconsider, but again Byrn rejected the motion because it fell short of what was required under the statute Nelson had cited.

At this point Sharon Snyder gave Nelson’s sister a copy of a properly written motion that Robert could use as a model. Forget the fact that her actions wound up freeing an innocent man, Snyder deserves a commendation for saving the judicial system from one more terribly composed pro se motion.

After Robert Nelson prevailed on his motion, DNA testing confirmed that he did not commit the crime, to the shock of no one paying even a little bit of attention to how these things usually turn out. But the trouble was just beginning for Snyder:

Five days after Nelson was released, Court Administrator Jeffrey Eisenbeis took Snyder into Byrn’s office near closing time and told her the prosecutor and defense attorney “had a problem” with her involvement in the case. She was suspended without pay, ordered to stay out of the courthouse unless she had permission to be there and scheduled to meet with a human resources investigator June 20.

“At first I didn’t know if my pension was going to be intact, and all I could do was curl up in a fetal position and cry,” said Snyder, who had been planning to retire in March. She later found out her pension would be just fine.

Byrn fired her June 27, telling her she had violated several court rules by providing assistance to Nelson and talking about aspects of the case, even while under seal, to attorneys not involved in the matter.

The judge’s dismissal letter cites numerous recorded phone conversations between Dunnell and Nelson in which they discussed Snyder’s efforts, including the document she provided that Nelson used in his successful DNA motion.

“The document you chose was, in effect, your recommendation for a Motion for DNA testing that would likely be successful in this Division,” Byrn wrote. “But it was clearly improper and a violation of Canon Seven… which warns against the risk of offering an opinion or suggested course of action.”

At least she’s still getting her pension. Obviously a clerk shouldn’t be offering legal advice, but handing out a public document as a model is not really legal advice. Especially when the inmate has already demonstrated what legal action he means to take.

Judge David “Not From the Talking Heads” Byrn probably should have considered the optics of an old woman helping an innocent man, but he didn’t and is now the least popular judge in America.

Judge Byrn succeeded in highlighting the perversity of the criminal justice system by creating the most sympathetic fact pattern imaginable. Byrn himself denied multiple requests of an innocent man for stylistic reasons, and when finally forced to acknowledge the substance, he reacted by firing an old woman for having the gall to think that the system is about “guilt” or “innocence” rather than blowing off inmate requests and throwing around the word “Judge” to make dinner reservations. As Conor Friedersdorf points out:

"When an inmate is exonerated by DNA, the most important consequence is the release of an innocent man or woman from prison, but that isn’t all that happens. Taxpayers need no longer pay for room and board. Family members and friends stop suffering an absence. And in roughly half of DNA exonerations to date, the true perpetrator of the crime has been identified by the evidence. Everyone wins, save for the police, prosecutor, judge, and jury who put the innocent man away. They ought to admit their mistakes. Many do. But sometimes they keep fighting."

The cost of a DNA test is trivial compared to the possibility (and cost) of incarcerating an innocent person for years or even decades. A criminal justice system that lived up to its name wouldn’t force prisoners to fight for these tests, jumping through hoops that require a law degree to understand. A just system would automatically test DNA in any case where it could conclusively prove innocence or guilt.

Too often in our system, the adversarial nature of most proceedings obscure the fact that the end goal is to punish the guilt and exonerate the innocent. If prosecutors and judges who send innocents to prison face no consequences for doing so, even as a court clerk who helps to exonerate an innocent man is fired for insubordination, everyone may well be faithfully applying rules that were adopted with the best of intentions.

The adversarial system is supposed to aid justice, not obscure it. But when the system is too concerned with matching every crime with a body behind bars regardless of the consequences, it ends up looking like Judge Byrn’s courtroom.

Which is unfortunately not a unique look for an American courtroom. Hopefully there are more Sharon Snyders out there, too.

Original report here



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Home front: Vicious tyranny and fear

Three stories came across my desktop in the last 24 hours that share a common theme a lot of people have spoken about. It is not just the militarization of the police force that we must be aware of and take action against, it is the attitude and the actions of the police and the courts that we must be aware of and change.

That attitude has elements of superiority and paranoia (“us” versus “them”), but increasingly it is an attitude of FEAR on the part of the cops, the court officials, and the politicians for whom they work. They FEAR the people, each of us from the most elderly to very nearly the youngest. They fear us individually and they fear us in groups: families, churches, companies, crowds, and mobs. And their fear drives their actions. These three stories are perfect examples.


Arizona Court: Cops can take your guns

(CBS News) A new Arizona court ruling says police can take temporary custody of a person’s gun for officer-safety reasons even if the person’s contact with police was voluntary.

Nathan: “Temporarily” of course. This in Arizona where they assault the “wrong” house and kill an American Marine defending his family – by letting him bleed to death after they shot him full of lead. Where cops beat people up because the lights on their bicycle aren’t working. Where mayors use cops to intimidate their political opponents. Sure, “temporary.” Just until you are dead. Of course, there is a reason that the cops “have” to take your gun, even if you are contacting THEM for “aid” (which is, of course, an increasingly stupid idea): they are afraid that you will hate them and fear them as much as they hate and fear you, and will take advantage of the slightest opportunity to kill them.


California man claims he was attacked by LA cops for no lights on bike

(CBS Local, Los Angeles) A 34-year-old man is recovering Monday from several injuries he said he sustained from a violent encounter with Los Angeles Police Department officers late last week.

Nathan: The cops came to the scene seemingly loaded for bear: guns drawn, aggressive, hyped with fear and eager to ensure “officer safety” by attacking first.

There may be more to this story, but the photos are pretty gruesome, although we know that LAPD officers are incredibly careful to treat EVERY citizen (and especially EVERY border jumper) with proper respect, courtesy, and kid-gloves. (sarcasm here, folks!) It appears that the cops aren’t even worrying about offering the slightest justification for viciously attacking anyone; their report was that the contact with this man was a “routine traffic stop” and didn’t even try to claim that he resisted them, talked back to them or anything else. Of course, the Arizona case above just gives them more of an excuse: everyone knows that people who ride their bikes at night without lights are armed to the teeth (and probably Hells Angels). And if they hadn’t beat the guy, he might have escaped like the next guy.


Cops: Escaped Suspect Drives Home With Hands Cuffed Behind Back

(Breitbart, by Jon David Kahn 31 Jul 2013) BURIEN, Wash. – Police say a man in custody on suspicion of driving with a suspended license escaped from Burien District Court on Friday, and the proceeded to drive to his home in Renton with his hands cuffed behind his back.

Mama’s Note: Handcuffed for paperwork? A “suspended license?” Oh brother… I still can’t figure out how he drove that way. But why did he go home? Seems pretty obvious he’s no criminal, but then again, he doesn’t seem too bright either. Clever, I’ll grant you, but not too bright.

What IS it with the handcuffs? The same stupid knee jerk reaction to everything. Tiny children and elderly, even those in a coma… insane. It’s about humiliation and absolute control, not much else.

Nathan: Not only that, but apparently driving with a suspended license (or being suspected of it) now requires that you be taken into CUSTODY?

This ties in with the LAPD brutality. It IS about control, but I think that humiliation is third because the way that cops are trained/indoctrinated (in POST ["Peace Officer Standards and Training"] and other training) to fear ANYone that they come in contact with. They are taught and rehearsed to react as though EVERY person that they contact hates them and has both the means and desire to kill or injure them. Yeah, it doesn’t matter whether it is a “routine traffic” stop or a kid “illegally” selling lemonade or someone whose neighbor complained because their dog pooped in the yard: in the eyes of a “properly trained” cop, we are ALL vicious, psychopathic would-be homicidal maniacs. It is the same reason that they want us disarmed. Yeah, there is a minority (small minority of 49% or so) of cops who get off on humiliating and demeaning anyone that they can get away with humiliating, but the fear justifies the control.

And we are full-circle back to the Arizona case: the judges apparently have the same sort of training and fear that cops do: every person appearing in front of them, whether accused or witnesses or even plaintiff is assumed to be a vicious evil would-be judge killer. Or cop killer, or both.

In many ways, it is the fear that drives even the militarization of the police: there is safety in numbers, in the brotherhood of the gang, and of course, armor is a necessary “security blanket.” They see that (unlike the 1970s) the military are both honored and feared, and therefore, they want the trappings in the hope that they will be honored, and therefore less likely to be targeted by the normal citizens. Not only that, but they want to and do recruit as many veterans as possible, to get a little of the glow from them – but they also get the instincts honed in Mesopotamia and Afghanistan of treating everyone on the streets as an enemy. An enemy to be feared. It feeds on itself.

I don’t know what the solution is – but maybe the Founding Fathers had the answer: a prohibition on standing armies. What ARE the police today but a standing army? For every cop that actually does things like protect people and property or solve crimes, there are five or ten that “patrol” – the same thing as in Germany 1945-55 or Mesopotamia 2003-12. They are an occupation force, and the way occupation forces (usually outnumbered 100 to 1) keep themselves safe is by fearing the population and keeping them under control.

Original report here




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WA: Woodland man plans to sue state over wrongful conviction, imprisonment

Woodland's Alan Northrop is one of fewer than a dozen people who are eligible to seek compensation for wrongful conviction and imprisonment under a state law that took effect Sunday.

"It's not a lot of people who are going to qualify retroactively," said Jackie McMurtrie, director of the Innocence Project Northwest in Seattle.

Northrop, 49, spent 17 years in prison for rape before DNA evidence exonerated him and a Clark County judge vacated his conviction in 2010.

He said earlier this week that he plans to file a claim in Clark County Superior Court for compensation but hasn't yet done so.

Under the law — enacted through House Bill 1341 ‚ Northrop is eligible to receive $50,000 for each year of his imprisonment plus payment of his child support debt. The state reduced his child support debt from more than $111,000 to $53,000 after his exoneration, Northrop said. He testified repeatedly in favor of the bill.

"It's a major accomplishment," Northrop said of the new law. "It's cool, but then again, it's frustrating because it took so long."

About a dozen people in the state have been wrongfully convicted, imprisoned and then exonerated, but a few of them have already received settlements from the state, McMurtrie said. A settlement would disqualify them from seeking additional compensation under the new law.

Northrop was accused of attacking a housekeeper on Jan. 11, 1993, while she was cleaning a La Center home because he resembled a composite sketch. The victim didn't recognize him in a photo montage but later identified him in a live lineup, where he was the only familiar face. Larry Davis, a co-defendant in the case, also was convicted of the rape. DNA evidence examined years later cast doubt on their convictions.

Since Northrop was exonerated, he said he's been working to rebuild his life. He works at Sunlight Supply Inc. and is reconnecting with his three children. The new bill provides his children with free tuition at state universities until age 26.

He's also getting married soon to fiancée Shawna Smith.

Original report here




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Woman PC who leaked confidential intelligence tactics to alleged criminals is jailed for three years



A corrupt former police constable was today jailed for three years for leaking confidential information to four different criminals she was having sex with.

Rebecca Swanston, 28, who used to work for the Hampshire force, sabotaged her own force's investigations and stopped them catching offenders, Winchester Crown Court heard.

She pleaded guilty at Winchester Crown Court to three counts of misconduct in a public office between January and October 2012.

The woman officer allowed one dealer to leave a 'massive bag' of crack cocaine and heroin on a table at her house.

And she failed to report confessions made to her by the men, including details of a vicious machete attack and the kidnapping of a wealthy businessman.

The court also heard she told the men police were out looking for them and suggested to one that he get rid of his mobile phone.

In addition, she allowed one man to keep two of her police-issue T-shirts and may even have had sex with one while on duty, the court heard.

The constable was warned about her relationships with criminals after a photograph of her with one of them was spotted on a website.

Hampshire Constabulary launched an anti-corruption probe into her behaviour and installed a listening bug at her home in Southampton, Hants.

It recorded her discussing police operations with the criminals - and even having sex with some of them.

Text messages suggest she had sex with at least one dealer while on duty, the court heard.

In one recording she is heard to say: '(He) comes around here with a massive bag filled with crack and heroin and just leaves it on the table. 'That's mad, innit? That's how much he trusts me. I wouldn't ever say...'

And in another she says: 'While I've been with him, he's been wanted for a stabbing. He's told me everything the night it happened.'

Swanston, who was based at Southampton Central Police Station, was arrested during a raid on her house on October 18 last year. One of the dealers was even there at the time.

Prosecutor Zoe Martin said: 'Between January and October 2012, the defendant was involved in intimate relationships with a number of active criminals in the Southampton area, and passed confidential information to some of them.

'At least two of the men concerned confessed their participation in serious crime to her while they were wanted or on police bail for the offences in question.

'In due course, PC Swanston's conduct came to the attention of the Professional Standard's Anti-Corruption Unit and was investigated. As a result, she was arrested on October 18 and interviewed under caution.

'She made no comment in interview, but admitted gross misconduct in the fast-track disciplinary proceedings that then followed. 'She was dismissed from the force without notice on November 27, 2012.'

Swanston today admitted three counts of misconduct in a public office over ten months, between January and October last year. During this time she logged onto the police's Records Management System, which contained information about criminals and operations, over 250 times.

The court heard most of these 'appeared to be improper use'.

Swanston became a police officer in February 2009 and was dismissed in November 2012 after the misconduct hearing.

The court heard one case in which she was to be a significant witness was dropped because the CPS considered her tainted.

One of the defendants in that case later went on to supply drugs to a person who died as a result.

Matthew Jewell, defending, said Swanston was embarrassed officers had 'eavesdropped on her most intimate moments.' He added: 'The defendant is remorseful. She entered these relationships and found herself unable to bring them to an end. She was not doing this for financial gain.'

Jailing Swanston for three years, Judge Jane Miller QC said: 'You embarked on a course of self-destructive behaviour, starting relationships with not just one man known to be a criminal but four different men.

'All were heavily involved in hard, class A drug supply.

'Once in these relationships, you started on a course of criminal behaviour yourself. You knew what you were doing and you made your own choices.

'Your offences have damaged police operations and significantly so. 'You did not have to pass on police information as a result of your sexual relationships.'

Swanston - with black hair and a low-cut figure-hugging dress - shook her head continuously throughout the hearing.

She was originally arrested in October 2012 along with another female police constable, aged 29.

This officer was released with no further action in November but resigned after receiving a final written warning following misconduct proceedings in March.

Four men arrested at the same time last October in connection with the investigation were released with no further action.

Detective Superintendent Colin Smith, head of Hampshire Constabulary's Professional Standards Department, said: 'Rebecca Swanston's corrupt behaviour and reckless associations with known criminals went totally and utterly against the values of honesty and integrity required of her as a police officer.

'Former PC Swanston's behaviour is in no way typical of Hampshire Constabulary employees.'

Original report here




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Four British cops face inquiry after leaving clubber, 22, naked in a cell with CCTV cameras filming after strip-searching her

A woman in police custody should never have been strip searched by four male officers, a watchdog has said.

The 22-year-old was arrested outside Supperclub in west London and taken to Chelsea police station where she was left naked in a cell for half an hour.

While she was locked up, there were CCTV cameras broadcasting her movements to the custody desk.

There was a female officer present, but the Independent Police Complaints Commission said that all officers should be of the same gender for such a search and the watchdog has now called for six police officers to face misconduct proceedings.

The clubber was 'intoxicated, distressed and running in and out of a road' when she was arrested. Officers believed she was on drugs and might have illegal substances hidden in her clothing, the IPCC found.

IPCC Commissioner Derrick Campbell said: 'This incident caused a great deal of distress to the victim. 'I find it difficult to understand why police officers think they have the right to strip a young woman of all her clothes, leaving her naked for half an hour and then expose her to being filmed.

'I am sure, like the complainant, the public will want to understand how this was allowed to happen. I look forward to the misconduct process getting the answers that are needed.'

The woman was arrested outside Supperclub in March 2011.

The IPCC said that the police sergeant on duty should face a charge of gross misconduct for failing to make a written record of the strip search or make sure that it was carried out in line with the rules.

Five constables should face misconduct proceedings for breaching the guidelines for searches, while another two should face 'management action', an internal measure.

One is accused of potentially discouraging the woman from getting legal advice by implying that she would have to stay at the police station for longer if she did so.

It is claimed that the other failed to investigate her claim that her drink was spiked at the club.

The woman complained about her treatment to Scotland Yard, which carried out its own investigation, but she was unhappy with the findings and so went to the IPCC.

Scotland Yard said it will hold disciplinary proceedings against the sergeant and the five search officers, but it is reviewing whether the remaining two constables should face management action.

A spokesman said: 'We agree with the recommendations of the IPCC and will be holding a gross misconduct hearing for the sergeant involved in this incident in due course.

'The five officers involved in the search will now face misconduct proceedings and we are still reviewing the recommendations that the remaining two officers should face management action.'

Original report here




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British cop 'fired 50,000-volt Taser stun gun at suspect inside prison cell'

A police officer has been charged with firing a 50,000-volt Taser stun gun at a suspect inside a prison cell.

Pc Lee Birch, 29, allegedly fired the weapon at Daniel Dove after booking him into a police custody unit.

The officer appeared before a magistrates court yesterday accused of assaulting Mr Dove. Birch is also accused of misconduct in a public office. This charge relates to the way he handcuffed Mr Dove and strip-searched him in the cell.

Yesterday prosecutor Ann Ellery outlined the charges against Pc Birch at Swindon Magistrates Court.

‘The deployment of the Taser itself is covered by the assault,’ she said. ‘Thereafter there is the removal of the barbs from the chest.’

She said the misconduct charge related to ‘the twisting of the handcuffs while being booked in, the manner of the strip search and the putting to the knees in the cell.’

John Nutman, defending, said his client was in the ‘strange position’ of being prosecuted before an investigation by the police watchdog, the Independent Police Complaints Commission, had concluded.

District Judge Simon Cooper said he had issued a summons against Birch ‘on the strength of seeing video evidence from the police cell’.

He told the court: ‘Under the circumstances there is no alternative but to send Mr Birch to trial at Swindon Crown Court.’ The officer was granted unconditional bail and ordered to appear at Swindon Crown Court on August 16.

Wearing a grey suit, Birch was allowed to sit next to his solicitor, rather than in the dock. He spoke only to confirm his name and age and his address.

A spokesman for the IPCC confirmed that the case had been referred to them by Wiltshire Police on Thursday.

Original report here




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