White Plains, N.Y., cops gun down heart patient in his own home
Chamberlain, a 68-year-old African-American Marine veteran with a heart condition, wore a pendant that notified the LifeAid medical alert system if he was having heart problems. On Nov. 19, that pendant was accidentally triggered, presumably as Chamberlain was sleeping. When a LifeAid operator tried to contact Chamberlain to see if he was O.K. and received no response, the operator contacted the police and requested that they check on him at his apartment in a White Plains public housing project.
Perhaps Chamberlain’s experience as a 20-year veteran of the Westchester County Department of Corrections gave him some added insight as to how cops treat people of color. Whatever the case may be, when police arrived at his apartment, he refused to open the door, telling them that he was fine and that they should go away. The cops wouldn’t back off.
In the days following the incident, the police claimed that they heard banging in the apartment and were concerned that someone was being hurt. However, an audio recording device had been installed in Chamberlain’s home as part of the medical alert system, and the entire interaction between Chamberlain and the cops was recorded.
Cops taunt man before lynching him
Rather than show concern for anyone’s safety, the racist mob of cops can be heard taunting the 68-year-old man, laughing at his service in the Marines and joking that they had to get into his apartment to use the bathroom. When Chamberlain told cops that he was “a sick old man,” one cop responded, “We don’t give a f—k, n——-.”
As more police cars arrived at the housing complex and cops drew their guns in front of Chamberlain’s door, Chamberlain’s niece — who lives in an apartment in the same building as Chamberlain — offered to intervene. The LifeAid operator, who had called in the cops in the first place and was now listening to the exchange as it was happening, called the White Plains police and tried desperately to cancel the call for emergency help. Both requests were ignored.
A video recorded by a camera mounted on a Taser gun provides further documentation of the night. According to the family’s lawyer Mayo Bartlett, who viewed the recording at the Westchester County District Attorney’s Office, cops used a special device to tear down Chamberlain’s door. As the door falls, the video shows Chamberlain standing in the apartment, with his hands down and empty. He is wearing nothing but boxer shorts.
Bartlett recounted to reporters: “The minute they got into the house, they didn’t even give him one command. They never mentioned, ‘Put your hands up.’ They never told him to lay down on the bed. They never did any of that. The first thing they did, as soon as that door was finally broken off the hinges, you could see the Taser light up, and it was charged, and you could see it going directly toward him.” The tape ends with someone telling the cop holding the Taser to turn the camera off. (New York Daily News, April 4)
Cops claim at that point Chamberlain wielded a knife at them, requiring them to shoot in self-defense. That’s after the infirm Chamberlain had already been hit with a high-voltage Taser. Cops then fired and hit him with two 40-caliber rounds. Chamberlain died from his wounds several hours later.
After an initial cover-up, in which the White Plains public safety commissioner declared that all the police officers’ actions were justified, the city was forced to convene a grand jury investigation and reveal the names of the cops involved as outrage grew and a petition for justice garnered some 200,000 signatures. A New York grand jury is set to meet on April 11.
Progressive reporter Juan Gonzalez dug up the cops’ names, more than four months after the November killing, and exposed that one of them, named as the shooter, already faces charges over allegations of excessive force and Civil Rights violations. Officer Anthony Carelli is being sued, along with six other police officers, by twin brothers Jereis Hatter and Salameh Hatter, who assert that cops handcuffed them to a pole at a White Plains police station and savagely beat and kicked them. The twins, who are Jordanian immigrants, say Carelli was the most vicious of the cops and called them “ragheads.” (NY Daily News, April 6)
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Friday, April 13, 2012
Thursday, April 12, 2012
The hollow point men
I’ve often wondered why so many innocent people who are shot by police end up dead.
Granted that police officers spend a fair amount of time training with their service revolvers, and are thus likely to be better shots with a pistol than your average gun-owner. But even so, in so many cases where some unarmed person is shot by police, the result is death, and it makes you wonder how cops, often in the dark and on the run, manage with their notoriously hard-to-aim pistols to hit a vital organ with such depressing regularity.
The answer, I’ve learned, is that police in most jurisdictions these days routinely use hollow-point bullets, which are designed to do maximum damage to soft tissue targets. Because the tip of the projectile is composed of hollowed-out lead, it flattens on impact and spreads out, vastly enlarging the hole made upon entry into a body, causing catastrophic damage to vital organs, internal bleeding and wounds that are hard to repair even in an emergency room.
Just recently, we learned that the Department of Homeland Security, a super-agency established by Congress and the Bush-Cheney administration in the wake of the 9-11 attacks, had ordered 450 million rounds of .40 caliber hollow-point ammo, which will reportedly be used at a rate of 90 million shells a year over the five-year life of the contract. (That represents one bullet for every American citizen over the course of the next four years!)
The Department of Homeland Security told us that it has 135,000 personnel who are licensed to carry a weapon. That means the DHS is buying 667 bullets a year for every one of those people. Let’s say that each of those people runs through three gross of shells in annual training at a shooting range, which would represent a fair amount of target practice. That would still leave them with 235 deadly shells left to account for — and remember — this being the government, most of those licensed fire-arm carrying people are working desk jobs where most of their shooting involves their mouths or balled up paper fired at wastebaskets.
The justification given by the DHS and also by local police departments like the Philadelphia Police and the New York City Police for issuing law-enforcement personnel deadly hollow-point ammo is that it is “less likely” to cause collateral damage. That is, a hollow-point bullet, because it expends its energy by expanding and ripping its way through a body, is less likely to pass through an intended target and, perhaps, wound an innocent bystander. The less-discussed purpose, though, is that police want to do the maximum damage to a perp when they decide they need to shoot. Arguably that makes sense. Police are not supposed to shoot people unless they feel personally at risk or think others are in danger, and then the goal is to shoot to kill, not to wound.
The trouble, of course, is that police aren’t all that great at knowing when a fleeing person is guilty of a crime, or even armed, or even whether the target might be a kid with a toy gun, and when a hollow-point bullet hits an innocent target, as was the case with the bullet fired by an off-duty Chicago cop into the head of Rekia Boyd, a 22-year-old woman standing in a group of men the cop thought were being too noisy, she didn’t have a chance of survival. His hollow-point shell, fired wildly, instantly destroyed her brain.
There’s a reason that the US military is banned from using hollow-point bullets in war. Hollow-point bullets do incredible damage, cause more pain and suffering, and make it far less likely that a person who is wounded will survive, much less recover. This ban was put in place in the Hague Convention of 1899, making it one of the first rules of war aimed at limiting the atrocities of combat. (Ironically, the US military does allow hollow point bullets to be used by military police, just not for shooting at enemy combatants.)
This huge order by the Department of Homeland Security raises a number of questions that should be getting asked, but so far are not.
First of all, why does the DHS need so much deadly ammo? Are they anticipating a mass surge over the Mexican or Canadian border that would require ICE agents to slaughter the masses “yearning to breathe free”? Are there so many terror cells in America that they feel they need to be ready for a mass extermination campaign? Or are they worried that eventually the quiescent and submissive US population will finally decide it’s had it with the crooked banks and insurance companies, and are going to start taking the law into their own hands, so that the government will have to institute martial law and start gunning down masses of citizens?
If not any of the above, it seems to me that the order for 450 million rounds of ammunition, hollow-point or not, is pretty wildly excessive.
But secondly, I’d suggest we need to rethink this domestic obsession with killing. In the U.K., police are not routinely issued hollow-point rounds. Many other foreign police agencies also do not use them. Here in the US though, they are standard-issue for cops on the beat.
We need to have a national discussion about this American obsession with officially sanctioned killing. Sure cops need to defend themselves against criminals who would try and injure or kill them, but given both the potential for killing the wrong person or someone who is being falsely pursued — for example someone who thinks a plainclothes officer is actually a criminal — and the near certainty that the target of a police shooter will be horribly injured if he or she doesn’t die — do we really want to have police using bullets that soldiers are barred from using in combat?
Finally, when it comes to Homeland Security, the situation is really different. Most of the gun-toting officers working for Homeland Security are not in the business of chasing down vicious killers. They are ICE officers who are going after border crossers, TSA personnel who are patting down air travelers, and the Federal Protective Service, who are really glorified building guards tasked with protecting federal property.
The work these armed personnel do can on occasion be dangerous, I’ll grant, but for the most part their work does not require killing people or dodging bullets. Do we really want them shooting to kill with hollow-point bullets?
The question about hollow-point bullet use by police, and especially federal agents, becomes more critical as we see the nation becoming increasingly brutal totalitarian in its handling of dissent and protest. As University of Alabama law professor Ronald J. Krotosznski Jr. wrote in an op-ed article in the New York times yesterday, police and federal authorities are making plans to essentially crush protests planned for the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida, and the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C. this summer. Inevitably, of course, there will be protesters who will not take such repression lightly, and who will resist — perhaps with some degree of violence (fists, kicks, tossing back of tear-gas canisters, and perhaps even rocks, though on the basis of past evidence, probably not guns or other deadly weapons). Do we want such justifiably outraged citizens, who are simply reacting appropriately to the shredding of their First Amendment right to protest and to petition for redress, to be blown away by police firing hollow-point bullets?
Those who answer Yes! have basically abandoned their country and handed it over to the fascists and crypto -fascists who have been gradually dismantling the Constitution. Those who answer No! need to demand that this obsession with up-arming the nation’s police be halted in its tracks.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
I’ve often wondered why so many innocent people who are shot by police end up dead.
Granted that police officers spend a fair amount of time training with their service revolvers, and are thus likely to be better shots with a pistol than your average gun-owner. But even so, in so many cases where some unarmed person is shot by police, the result is death, and it makes you wonder how cops, often in the dark and on the run, manage with their notoriously hard-to-aim pistols to hit a vital organ with such depressing regularity.
The answer, I’ve learned, is that police in most jurisdictions these days routinely use hollow-point bullets, which are designed to do maximum damage to soft tissue targets. Because the tip of the projectile is composed of hollowed-out lead, it flattens on impact and spreads out, vastly enlarging the hole made upon entry into a body, causing catastrophic damage to vital organs, internal bleeding and wounds that are hard to repair even in an emergency room.
Just recently, we learned that the Department of Homeland Security, a super-agency established by Congress and the Bush-Cheney administration in the wake of the 9-11 attacks, had ordered 450 million rounds of .40 caliber hollow-point ammo, which will reportedly be used at a rate of 90 million shells a year over the five-year life of the contract. (That represents one bullet for every American citizen over the course of the next four years!)
The Department of Homeland Security told us that it has 135,000 personnel who are licensed to carry a weapon. That means the DHS is buying 667 bullets a year for every one of those people. Let’s say that each of those people runs through three gross of shells in annual training at a shooting range, which would represent a fair amount of target practice. That would still leave them with 235 deadly shells left to account for — and remember — this being the government, most of those licensed fire-arm carrying people are working desk jobs where most of their shooting involves their mouths or balled up paper fired at wastebaskets.
The justification given by the DHS and also by local police departments like the Philadelphia Police and the New York City Police for issuing law-enforcement personnel deadly hollow-point ammo is that it is “less likely” to cause collateral damage. That is, a hollow-point bullet, because it expends its energy by expanding and ripping its way through a body, is less likely to pass through an intended target and, perhaps, wound an innocent bystander. The less-discussed purpose, though, is that police want to do the maximum damage to a perp when they decide they need to shoot. Arguably that makes sense. Police are not supposed to shoot people unless they feel personally at risk or think others are in danger, and then the goal is to shoot to kill, not to wound.
The trouble, of course, is that police aren’t all that great at knowing when a fleeing person is guilty of a crime, or even armed, or even whether the target might be a kid with a toy gun, and when a hollow-point bullet hits an innocent target, as was the case with the bullet fired by an off-duty Chicago cop into the head of Rekia Boyd, a 22-year-old woman standing in a group of men the cop thought were being too noisy, she didn’t have a chance of survival. His hollow-point shell, fired wildly, instantly destroyed her brain.
There’s a reason that the US military is banned from using hollow-point bullets in war. Hollow-point bullets do incredible damage, cause more pain and suffering, and make it far less likely that a person who is wounded will survive, much less recover. This ban was put in place in the Hague Convention of 1899, making it one of the first rules of war aimed at limiting the atrocities of combat. (Ironically, the US military does allow hollow point bullets to be used by military police, just not for shooting at enemy combatants.)
This huge order by the Department of Homeland Security raises a number of questions that should be getting asked, but so far are not.
First of all, why does the DHS need so much deadly ammo? Are they anticipating a mass surge over the Mexican or Canadian border that would require ICE agents to slaughter the masses “yearning to breathe free”? Are there so many terror cells in America that they feel they need to be ready for a mass extermination campaign? Or are they worried that eventually the quiescent and submissive US population will finally decide it’s had it with the crooked banks and insurance companies, and are going to start taking the law into their own hands, so that the government will have to institute martial law and start gunning down masses of citizens?
If not any of the above, it seems to me that the order for 450 million rounds of ammunition, hollow-point or not, is pretty wildly excessive.
But secondly, I’d suggest we need to rethink this domestic obsession with killing. In the U.K., police are not routinely issued hollow-point rounds. Many other foreign police agencies also do not use them. Here in the US though, they are standard-issue for cops on the beat.
We need to have a national discussion about this American obsession with officially sanctioned killing. Sure cops need to defend themselves against criminals who would try and injure or kill them, but given both the potential for killing the wrong person or someone who is being falsely pursued — for example someone who thinks a plainclothes officer is actually a criminal — and the near certainty that the target of a police shooter will be horribly injured if he or she doesn’t die — do we really want to have police using bullets that soldiers are barred from using in combat?
Finally, when it comes to Homeland Security, the situation is really different. Most of the gun-toting officers working for Homeland Security are not in the business of chasing down vicious killers. They are ICE officers who are going after border crossers, TSA personnel who are patting down air travelers, and the Federal Protective Service, who are really glorified building guards tasked with protecting federal property.
The work these armed personnel do can on occasion be dangerous, I’ll grant, but for the most part their work does not require killing people or dodging bullets. Do we really want them shooting to kill with hollow-point bullets?
The question about hollow-point bullet use by police, and especially federal agents, becomes more critical as we see the nation becoming increasingly brutal totalitarian in its handling of dissent and protest. As University of Alabama law professor Ronald J. Krotosznski Jr. wrote in an op-ed article in the New York times yesterday, police and federal authorities are making plans to essentially crush protests planned for the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida, and the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C. this summer. Inevitably, of course, there will be protesters who will not take such repression lightly, and who will resist — perhaps with some degree of violence (fists, kicks, tossing back of tear-gas canisters, and perhaps even rocks, though on the basis of past evidence, probably not guns or other deadly weapons). Do we want such justifiably outraged citizens, who are simply reacting appropriately to the shredding of their First Amendment right to protest and to petition for redress, to be blown away by police firing hollow-point bullets?
Those who answer Yes! have basically abandoned their country and handed it over to the fascists and crypto -fascists who have been gradually dismantling the Constitution. Those who answer No! need to demand that this obsession with up-arming the nation’s police be halted in its tracks.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Unarmed Black Woman Shot and Killed by Chicago Police Officer
"Her death certificate says killed by police, but I feel like my sister was murdered," says Martinez Sutton, whose 22-year-old little sister, Rekia Boyd, was shot in the head by an off-duty Chicago detective on Wednesday, March 21. She died the following day at Mount Sinai Hospital.
Boyd's death comes less than a month after the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, leaving many troubled by the regularity with which unarmed people of color are shot, particularly by individuals claiming self-defense. And for those left grieving, the failure of authorities to hold the shooter accountable is the greatest injustice of all.
In the case of Boyd, Chicago police almost immediately echoed the account of the off-duty detective responsible for her death. Police say the officer in question drove up to a group of people in Chicago's Douglas Park around 1 AM on Wednesday, March 21, to investigate a disturbance near his home. He rolled down his window and asked them to quiet down at which point police say 39-year-old Antonio Cross pulled out a gun forcing the detective to open fire in self-defense, hitting Cross in the hand and striking Boyd in the head.
But neighbors, witnesses and Cross paint a vastly different picture. Cross told WGN News that he was unarmed and on his cell phone at the time of the shooting. When Cross asked why the officer shot him, he says the officer's response was, "I thought your phone was a gun." Cross has since been charged with a misdemeanor of aggravated assault.
Local news outlets initially reported that police failed to recover Cross' alleged weapon. However, Police would not confirm or deny this to Truthout and referred all further questions to the Chicago Independent Police Review Authority (IRPA), the outside body tasked with handling the investigation. The IPRA's Deputy Chief Administrator William Weeden declined to comment on any details as well, saying, "We cannot comment on an open and ongoing investigation."
Rekia Boyd's older brothers, Martinez Sutton and Darian Boyd, told Truthout that their family has received no explanation or even condolences from the Chicago Police Department. "We've made multiple attempts to contact them and even asked news stations to please contact them since they won't talk to us," said Darian Boyd, adding, "It just makes it that much harder to deal with the grief."
Darian Boyd said it was both maddening and heartbreaking to hear Police Superintendent Gary McCarthy call the shooting "justified" in an interview with WGN without any mention of his sister on the very day she died in the hospital from a gunshot wound to the head.
According to Sutton, the only encounter the family has had with police since the shooting was when they came to his home, where Rekia lived, to notify him that his sister was injured. "The police came to my house and told me 'Your sister has been involved in a crime. She's been shot in the head and she's in critical condition.' They gave me no information besides the name and number of the hospital and said 'we're sorry' and walked away."
Alderman Michael Chandler of the 24th Ward, where the incident took place, has added his voice to the growing concerns over police handling of the investigation, calling the police officer's account "thin and weak". According to Chicago's WBEZ, Chandler says residents who witnessed the shooting have complained to him that authorities have not bothered to contact them for eyewitness testimony. "A young person's life [has been] taken away and there is not one person that has been out on these streets to canvass the area to talk to any of these witnesses," Chandler told WBEZ. Furthermore, Chandler has requested that police properly examine neighbors' claims that they heard the officer tell a crowd, "What do I have to do around here to get some peace, quiet and respect? Shoot someone?" the day before the shooting.
As a result, Sutton and Boyd have been independently canvassing the neighborhood where the shooting took place to hear what witnesses and neighbors have to say. According to Sutton, witnesses say the officer appeared intoxicated that night and was known by neighbors to have been drunk most of the time. Witnesses also say the off-duty officer approached the park in an unmarked car dressed in plain clothes while yelling belligerently at the crowd to "shut up." More importantly, they say he never identified himself as a police officer.
Sutton was most upset to hear from witnesses that his sister was left lying on the ground for a half an hour before she was taken to the hospital. "They even told her friends, 'get away from her or we'll lock you up' and they told Antonio Cross to 'shut up and sit down' and he was handcuffed to a pole while his hand was still bleeding from a gunshot wound," Sutton said.
Although police refuse to release the name of the officer, after speaking with neighbors, Sutton and Boyd have identified him as Dante Servin. According to Sutton, "He's Latino, but looks white." On Tuesday, March 27, around 200 people gathered to protest in front of his house. Among them were Rekia Boyd's family and friends, who have teamed up to build a campaign that calls for justice for their slain daughter, sister, cousin, aunt and friend.
While Sutton empathizes strongly with Trayvon Martin's family, he feels that the Martins have a better chance of getting justice since the shooter was a private citizen, whereas his sister's killer, an officer of the law, is far more difficult to hold accountable. "They hide behind the badge," argued Sutton. "If I was in a crime where I was armed and shot someone in the head I'd be in jail right now. But if a cop does it, they get a slap on the hand."
Sutton feels as though the police are more interested in protecting their fellow officer than getting justice for his little sister. Nevertheless, he insists, "We are going to keep seeking the truth and justice."
Rekia's brothers recently launched a web site, Journey for Justice, where they post updates about the investigation as well as information about upcoming events.
"My only objective out of this entire thing is to see that the police officer responsible receives some type of charges for his negligence," says Darian Boyd, who described his sister as "a light hearted, free spirit."
"My sister would still been here if he [the officer] wasn't outside playing Rambo. I just want them to look deeper into this and in the meantime take this guy off the force," argued Sutton. "She'd light up a whole room with the way she was. She loved life and her family. I miss her. I'm still waiting for her to come home and walk through the door."
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
"Her death certificate says killed by police, but I feel like my sister was murdered," says Martinez Sutton, whose 22-year-old little sister, Rekia Boyd, was shot in the head by an off-duty Chicago detective on Wednesday, March 21. She died the following day at Mount Sinai Hospital.
Boyd's death comes less than a month after the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, leaving many troubled by the regularity with which unarmed people of color are shot, particularly by individuals claiming self-defense. And for those left grieving, the failure of authorities to hold the shooter accountable is the greatest injustice of all.
In the case of Boyd, Chicago police almost immediately echoed the account of the off-duty detective responsible for her death. Police say the officer in question drove up to a group of people in Chicago's Douglas Park around 1 AM on Wednesday, March 21, to investigate a disturbance near his home. He rolled down his window and asked them to quiet down at which point police say 39-year-old Antonio Cross pulled out a gun forcing the detective to open fire in self-defense, hitting Cross in the hand and striking Boyd in the head.
But neighbors, witnesses and Cross paint a vastly different picture. Cross told WGN News that he was unarmed and on his cell phone at the time of the shooting. When Cross asked why the officer shot him, he says the officer's response was, "I thought your phone was a gun." Cross has since been charged with a misdemeanor of aggravated assault.
Local news outlets initially reported that police failed to recover Cross' alleged weapon. However, Police would not confirm or deny this to Truthout and referred all further questions to the Chicago Independent Police Review Authority (IRPA), the outside body tasked with handling the investigation. The IPRA's Deputy Chief Administrator William Weeden declined to comment on any details as well, saying, "We cannot comment on an open and ongoing investigation."
Rekia Boyd's older brothers, Martinez Sutton and Darian Boyd, told Truthout that their family has received no explanation or even condolences from the Chicago Police Department. "We've made multiple attempts to contact them and even asked news stations to please contact them since they won't talk to us," said Darian Boyd, adding, "It just makes it that much harder to deal with the grief."
Darian Boyd said it was both maddening and heartbreaking to hear Police Superintendent Gary McCarthy call the shooting "justified" in an interview with WGN without any mention of his sister on the very day she died in the hospital from a gunshot wound to the head.
According to Sutton, the only encounter the family has had with police since the shooting was when they came to his home, where Rekia lived, to notify him that his sister was injured. "The police came to my house and told me 'Your sister has been involved in a crime. She's been shot in the head and she's in critical condition.' They gave me no information besides the name and number of the hospital and said 'we're sorry' and walked away."
Alderman Michael Chandler of the 24th Ward, where the incident took place, has added his voice to the growing concerns over police handling of the investigation, calling the police officer's account "thin and weak". According to Chicago's WBEZ, Chandler says residents who witnessed the shooting have complained to him that authorities have not bothered to contact them for eyewitness testimony. "A young person's life [has been] taken away and there is not one person that has been out on these streets to canvass the area to talk to any of these witnesses," Chandler told WBEZ. Furthermore, Chandler has requested that police properly examine neighbors' claims that they heard the officer tell a crowd, "What do I have to do around here to get some peace, quiet and respect? Shoot someone?" the day before the shooting.
As a result, Sutton and Boyd have been independently canvassing the neighborhood where the shooting took place to hear what witnesses and neighbors have to say. According to Sutton, witnesses say the officer appeared intoxicated that night and was known by neighbors to have been drunk most of the time. Witnesses also say the off-duty officer approached the park in an unmarked car dressed in plain clothes while yelling belligerently at the crowd to "shut up." More importantly, they say he never identified himself as a police officer.
Sutton was most upset to hear from witnesses that his sister was left lying on the ground for a half an hour before she was taken to the hospital. "They even told her friends, 'get away from her or we'll lock you up' and they told Antonio Cross to 'shut up and sit down' and he was handcuffed to a pole while his hand was still bleeding from a gunshot wound," Sutton said.
Although police refuse to release the name of the officer, after speaking with neighbors, Sutton and Boyd have identified him as Dante Servin. According to Sutton, "He's Latino, but looks white." On Tuesday, March 27, around 200 people gathered to protest in front of his house. Among them were Rekia Boyd's family and friends, who have teamed up to build a campaign that calls for justice for their slain daughter, sister, cousin, aunt and friend.
While Sutton empathizes strongly with Trayvon Martin's family, he feels that the Martins have a better chance of getting justice since the shooter was a private citizen, whereas his sister's killer, an officer of the law, is far more difficult to hold accountable. "They hide behind the badge," argued Sutton. "If I was in a crime where I was armed and shot someone in the head I'd be in jail right now. But if a cop does it, they get a slap on the hand."
Sutton feels as though the police are more interested in protecting their fellow officer than getting justice for his little sister. Nevertheless, he insists, "We are going to keep seeking the truth and justice."
Rekia's brothers recently launched a web site, Journey for Justice, where they post updates about the investigation as well as information about upcoming events.
"My only objective out of this entire thing is to see that the police officer responsible receives some type of charges for his negligence," says Darian Boyd, who described his sister as "a light hearted, free spirit."
"My sister would still been here if he [the officer] wasn't outside playing Rambo. I just want them to look deeper into this and in the meantime take this guy off the force," argued Sutton. "She'd light up a whole room with the way she was. She loved life and her family. I miss her. I'm still waiting for her to come home and walk through the door."
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
CA: Pasadena police invite FBI to investigate killing of student
Pasadena's police chief is inviting the FBI to investigate the death of a college student who was shot and killed by officers last month.
Chief Phillip Sanchez says the FBI would add another independent review to the investigation of 19-year-old Kendrec McDade's March 24 death.
Sanchez's invitation comes days after McDade's parents sued police, saying his death was part of a pattern of Pasadena police killing black people.
Officers say a 911 caller led them to believe McDade was an armed robbery suspect when they opened fire. He was unarmed.
FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller says the federal law enforcement agency is investigating to determine whether a violation of federal civil rights was a factor.
Eimiller says the FBI routinely assesses incidents where questions of civil rights violations are raised.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Pasadena's police chief is inviting the FBI to investigate the death of a college student who was shot and killed by officers last month.
Chief Phillip Sanchez says the FBI would add another independent review to the investigation of 19-year-old Kendrec McDade's March 24 death.
Sanchez's invitation comes days after McDade's parents sued police, saying his death was part of a pattern of Pasadena police killing black people.
Officers say a 911 caller led them to believe McDade was an armed robbery suspect when they opened fire. He was unarmed.
FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller says the federal law enforcement agency is investigating to determine whether a violation of federal civil rights was a factor.
Eimiller says the FBI routinely assesses incidents where questions of civil rights violations are raised.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Monday, April 09, 2012
LA: Five former cops sentenced in Katrina shootings
Five former New Orleans police officers were sentenced Wednesday to prison terms ranging from six to 65 years for their roles in deadly shootings of unarmed residents in the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina, with the judge lashing out at prosecutors for two hours on their handling of the case.
Police shot six people at a bridge on Sept. 4, 2005, killing two, less than a week after Katrina made landfall. To make the shootings appear justified, officers conspired to plant a gun, fabricate witnesses and falsify reports. The case became the centerpiece of the Justice Department's push to clean up the troubled New Orleans Police Department.
Kenneth Bowen, Robert Gisevius, Anthony Villavaso and Robert Faulcon were convicted of federal firearms charges that carried mandatory minimum prison sentences of at least 35 years. Retired Sgt. Arthur "Archie" Kaufman, who was assigned to investigate the shootings, was convicted of helping orchestrate the cover-up.
Faulcon, who was convicted on charges in both fatal shootings, faces the stiffest sentence of 65 years. Bowen and Gisevius each face 40 years, while Villavaso was sentenced to 38. Kaufman received the lightest sentence at six years.
Afterward, U.S. District Judge Kurt Engelhardt accused prosecutors of cutting overly lenient plea deals with five other officers who cooperated with the civil rights investigation. The former officers pleaded guilty to helping cover up the shooting and are already serving prison terms ranging from three to eight years.
"These through-the-looking-glass plea deals that tied the hands of this court ... are an affront to the court and a disservice to the community," Engelhardt said.
The judge also questioned the credibility of the officers who pleaded guilty and testified against those who went to trial.
In particular, the judge criticized prosecutors for seeking a 20-year prison sentence for Kaufman, yet Michael Lohman, who was the highest-ranking officer at the scene of the shooting, received four years under his deal for pleading guilty to participating in the cover-up.
One of Kaufman's attorneys, Steve London, said his client was pleased the judge sentenced him to a few years less than the guidelines, which had called for about eight to 10. "This judge recognized that the government put liars on the stand to testify and convict other people," London said.
Engelhardt heard several hours of arguments and testimony earlier Wednesday from prosecutors, defense attorneys, relatives of shooting victims and the officers. Ronald Madison and 17-year-old James Brissette died in the shootings.
"This has been a long and painful six-and-a-half years," said Lance Madison, whose 40-year-old, mentally disabled brother, Ronald, was killed at the bridge. "The people of New Orleans and my family are ready for justice."
Madison individually addressed each defendant, including Faulcon, who shot his brother: "When I look at you, my pain becomes unbearable. You took the life of an angel and basically ripped my heart out."
Madison also said he was horrified by Kaufman's actions in the cover-up: "You tried to frame me, a man you knew was innocent, and send me to prison for the rest of my life."
Lance Madison was arrested on attempted murder charges after police falsely accused him of shooting at the officers on the bridge. He was jailed for three weeks before a judge freed him.
The Rev. Robert Faulcon Sr. told the judge his son "didn't go looking for trouble." "He was on duty and he was called to do a job, and that's what he did to the best of his ability," the elder Faulcon said.
None of the officers addressed the court before they were sentenced.
Katrina struck on Aug. 29, 2005, leading to the collapse of levees and flooding an estimated 80 percent of the city. New Orleans was plunged into chaos as residents who hadn't evacuated were driven from their homes to whatever high places they could find.
Officers who worked in the city at the time but were not charged in the bridge case on Wednesday told Engelhardt of the lawlessness that followed the flood, and that they feared for their lives.
On the morning of Sept. 4, one group of residents was crossing the Danziger Bridge in the city's Gentilly area in search of food and supplies when police arrived.
The officers had received calls that shots were being fired. Gunfire reports were common after Katrina.
Faulcon was convicted of fatally shooting Madison, but the jury decided the killing didn't amount to murder. He, Gisevius, Bowen and Villavaso were convicted in Brissette's killing, but jurors didn't hold any of them individually responsible for causing his death.
All five officers were convicted of participating in a cover-up.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Five former New Orleans police officers were sentenced Wednesday to prison terms ranging from six to 65 years for their roles in deadly shootings of unarmed residents in the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina, with the judge lashing out at prosecutors for two hours on their handling of the case.
Police shot six people at a bridge on Sept. 4, 2005, killing two, less than a week after Katrina made landfall. To make the shootings appear justified, officers conspired to plant a gun, fabricate witnesses and falsify reports. The case became the centerpiece of the Justice Department's push to clean up the troubled New Orleans Police Department.
Kenneth Bowen, Robert Gisevius, Anthony Villavaso and Robert Faulcon were convicted of federal firearms charges that carried mandatory minimum prison sentences of at least 35 years. Retired Sgt. Arthur "Archie" Kaufman, who was assigned to investigate the shootings, was convicted of helping orchestrate the cover-up.
Faulcon, who was convicted on charges in both fatal shootings, faces the stiffest sentence of 65 years. Bowen and Gisevius each face 40 years, while Villavaso was sentenced to 38. Kaufman received the lightest sentence at six years.
Afterward, U.S. District Judge Kurt Engelhardt accused prosecutors of cutting overly lenient plea deals with five other officers who cooperated with the civil rights investigation. The former officers pleaded guilty to helping cover up the shooting and are already serving prison terms ranging from three to eight years.
"These through-the-looking-glass plea deals that tied the hands of this court ... are an affront to the court and a disservice to the community," Engelhardt said.
The judge also questioned the credibility of the officers who pleaded guilty and testified against those who went to trial.
In particular, the judge criticized prosecutors for seeking a 20-year prison sentence for Kaufman, yet Michael Lohman, who was the highest-ranking officer at the scene of the shooting, received four years under his deal for pleading guilty to participating in the cover-up.
One of Kaufman's attorneys, Steve London, said his client was pleased the judge sentenced him to a few years less than the guidelines, which had called for about eight to 10. "This judge recognized that the government put liars on the stand to testify and convict other people," London said.
Engelhardt heard several hours of arguments and testimony earlier Wednesday from prosecutors, defense attorneys, relatives of shooting victims and the officers. Ronald Madison and 17-year-old James Brissette died in the shootings.
"This has been a long and painful six-and-a-half years," said Lance Madison, whose 40-year-old, mentally disabled brother, Ronald, was killed at the bridge. "The people of New Orleans and my family are ready for justice."
Madison individually addressed each defendant, including Faulcon, who shot his brother: "When I look at you, my pain becomes unbearable. You took the life of an angel and basically ripped my heart out."
Madison also said he was horrified by Kaufman's actions in the cover-up: "You tried to frame me, a man you knew was innocent, and send me to prison for the rest of my life."
Lance Madison was arrested on attempted murder charges after police falsely accused him of shooting at the officers on the bridge. He was jailed for three weeks before a judge freed him.
The Rev. Robert Faulcon Sr. told the judge his son "didn't go looking for trouble." "He was on duty and he was called to do a job, and that's what he did to the best of his ability," the elder Faulcon said.
None of the officers addressed the court before they were sentenced.
Katrina struck on Aug. 29, 2005, leading to the collapse of levees and flooding an estimated 80 percent of the city. New Orleans was plunged into chaos as residents who hadn't evacuated were driven from their homes to whatever high places they could find.
Officers who worked in the city at the time but were not charged in the bridge case on Wednesday told Engelhardt of the lawlessness that followed the flood, and that they feared for their lives.
On the morning of Sept. 4, one group of residents was crossing the Danziger Bridge in the city's Gentilly area in search of food and supplies when police arrived.
The officers had received calls that shots were being fired. Gunfire reports were common after Katrina.
Faulcon was convicted of fatally shooting Madison, but the jury decided the killing didn't amount to murder. He, Gisevius, Bowen and Villavaso were convicted in Brissette's killing, but jurors didn't hold any of them individually responsible for causing his death.
All five officers were convicted of participating in a cover-up.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Sunday, April 08, 2012
British cop who shot unarmed suspect may face murder charge
A firearms officer who shot an unarmed man dead in a car park may face a murder charge, the police watchdog says. Anthony Paul Grainger, 36, died after being stopped in a stolen Audi in a planned operation last month.
The Mail on Sunday last week disclosed an official police document detailing the background to the shooting by a Greater Manchester officer in the village of Culcheth, Cheshire, on March 3.
It revealed that the police apparently had little evidence to conclude that Mr Grainger and the two men with him – who cannot be named for legal reasons – might be armed.
The document, an official ‘summary of evidence’, stated that officers saw one of the men putting a hacksaw in another car a few days earlier and had separately observed the three individuals driving around the village. But they apparently had no direct information they were carrying weapons, raising serious doubts as to whether the shooting was justified.
Sources close to the Independent Police Complaints Commission inquiry said investigators were previously unaware of the document’s contents.
Officers are governed by the criminal law and police rules that state they may open fire only if there is an imminent and extreme danger to innocent life.
Father-of-two Mr Grainger was killed by a single bullet from a police sub-machine gun.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
A firearms officer who shot an unarmed man dead in a car park may face a murder charge, the police watchdog says. Anthony Paul Grainger, 36, died after being stopped in a stolen Audi in a planned operation last month.
The Mail on Sunday last week disclosed an official police document detailing the background to the shooting by a Greater Manchester officer in the village of Culcheth, Cheshire, on March 3.
It revealed that the police apparently had little evidence to conclude that Mr Grainger and the two men with him – who cannot be named for legal reasons – might be armed.
The document, an official ‘summary of evidence’, stated that officers saw one of the men putting a hacksaw in another car a few days earlier and had separately observed the three individuals driving around the village. But they apparently had no direct information they were carrying weapons, raising serious doubts as to whether the shooting was justified.
Sources close to the Independent Police Complaints Commission inquiry said investigators were previously unaware of the document’s contents.
Officers are governed by the criminal law and police rules that state they may open fire only if there is an imminent and extreme danger to innocent life.
Father-of-two Mr Grainger was killed by a single bullet from a police sub-machine gun.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Saturday, April 07, 2012
Further claims of racism among London police as officer faces firing for racially aggravated abuse
A police officer abused an Asian takeaway manager who refused to sell him half-priced food, telling him to “go back to your ****** country”, it has been claimed.
The PC, named as 31-year-old Philip Juhasz, allegedly told the Pakistani worker to “you are wasting our food in this country” and exposed him to a barrage of expletives while off-duty and drunk.
He now faces the sack for gross misconduct after being convicted of a racially aggravated public order offence.
The case is the latest in a string of revelations relating to racism within Scotland Yard, as it was revealed just two officers out of 2,270 accused of racist behaviour have been dismissed in the last seven years.
New figures showed 572 of the complaints made by staff and the public were "locally resolved" and only 42 were "substantiated".
Just two officers lost their jobs, and were required to resign rather than being dismissed, meaning they kept any pension entitlements.
The highest number of complaints was in 2008, when 500 were lodged.
Ten new cases have been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission, bringing the total to 20 officers and one police worker.
To compound the allegations, it has also been claimed a police report warning Met chiefs they must take tougher action to stop discrimination was “buried” in 2004.
The report, by then-commander Brian Paddick, said African-Caribbean people were being stopped too often by officers and added it could result in alienating and causing discontent in minority communities.
Met Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe has now stressed his determination to stamp out racism in the force, and urged officers to report any colleagues who made inappropriate remarks.
The victim of the latest case, 23-year-old Umer Nazir, has now told how he suffered abuse while working late at the Delice de France snack kiosk at King’s Cross station last September.
He said the drunken officer demanded to be sold half price food that was about to be thrown away.
When he refused, he claimed, the officer pulled out his warrant card and said: ‘Do you know who I am? I’m a police officer’.
After asking where he was from, Mr Nazir reportedly said: ‘He said, “Oh, I’ll tell you where you’re from – you’re from Pakistan, and your ******g family are dying from lack of food over there.
“You are wasting our food in this country, you ******g w*****r. Go back to your ******g country”.”
Mr Nazir claimed two uniformed officers who were passing by let the suspect go after he showed them his warrant card, while others gave good character witnesses in court.
Officers from British Transport Police responded to a 999 call and retrieved CCTV footage of the officer gesticulating.
Juhasz was arrested and appeared in court, where he was convicted and fined £1,000.
He is now suspended from duties and will face further disciplinary proceedings within the next few weeks where he could be dismissed.
A spokesman for the Met said: “An officer was convicted at court on 23 March 2012 of racially aggravated public order offences that were investigated by British Transport Police.
“This is a mandatory referral to the IPCC. The officer is suspended.”
Senior black officers in the Metropolitan police have said warnings about growing prejudice have been ignored, even 13 years after the Stephen Lawrence case led to accusations of institutional racism.
Leroy Logan, who founded the Met Black Police Association, said: “Like so many things, it lands on deaf ears until such a time as a free press – the media – get hold of it and forces people into action.’
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
A police officer abused an Asian takeaway manager who refused to sell him half-priced food, telling him to “go back to your ****** country”, it has been claimed.
The PC, named as 31-year-old Philip Juhasz, allegedly told the Pakistani worker to “you are wasting our food in this country” and exposed him to a barrage of expletives while off-duty and drunk.
He now faces the sack for gross misconduct after being convicted of a racially aggravated public order offence.
The case is the latest in a string of revelations relating to racism within Scotland Yard, as it was revealed just two officers out of 2,270 accused of racist behaviour have been dismissed in the last seven years.
New figures showed 572 of the complaints made by staff and the public were "locally resolved" and only 42 were "substantiated".
Just two officers lost their jobs, and were required to resign rather than being dismissed, meaning they kept any pension entitlements.
The highest number of complaints was in 2008, when 500 were lodged.
Ten new cases have been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission, bringing the total to 20 officers and one police worker.
To compound the allegations, it has also been claimed a police report warning Met chiefs they must take tougher action to stop discrimination was “buried” in 2004.
The report, by then-commander Brian Paddick, said African-Caribbean people were being stopped too often by officers and added it could result in alienating and causing discontent in minority communities.
Met Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe has now stressed his determination to stamp out racism in the force, and urged officers to report any colleagues who made inappropriate remarks.
The victim of the latest case, 23-year-old Umer Nazir, has now told how he suffered abuse while working late at the Delice de France snack kiosk at King’s Cross station last September.
He said the drunken officer demanded to be sold half price food that was about to be thrown away.
When he refused, he claimed, the officer pulled out his warrant card and said: ‘Do you know who I am? I’m a police officer’.
After asking where he was from, Mr Nazir reportedly said: ‘He said, “Oh, I’ll tell you where you’re from – you’re from Pakistan, and your ******g family are dying from lack of food over there.
“You are wasting our food in this country, you ******g w*****r. Go back to your ******g country”.”
Mr Nazir claimed two uniformed officers who were passing by let the suspect go after he showed them his warrant card, while others gave good character witnesses in court.
Officers from British Transport Police responded to a 999 call and retrieved CCTV footage of the officer gesticulating.
Juhasz was arrested and appeared in court, where he was convicted and fined £1,000.
He is now suspended from duties and will face further disciplinary proceedings within the next few weeks where he could be dismissed.
A spokesman for the Met said: “An officer was convicted at court on 23 March 2012 of racially aggravated public order offences that were investigated by British Transport Police.
“This is a mandatory referral to the IPCC. The officer is suspended.”
Senior black officers in the Metropolitan police have said warnings about growing prejudice have been ignored, even 13 years after the Stephen Lawrence case led to accusations of institutional racism.
Leroy Logan, who founded the Met Black Police Association, said: “Like so many things, it lands on deaf ears until such a time as a free press – the media – get hold of it and forces people into action.’
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Friday, April 06, 2012
The gutless bullies of London police
They were too gutless to take on the rioters but in the dark of night with no-one watching they're really aggressive. The British police used to be a fine body of men beloved of their communities. They are now only a shadow of their former selves
Scotland Yard was last night plunged into its most serious racism crisis since the death of Stephen Lawrence. Ten serious complaints of racist behaviour by officers have been passed to the independent police watchdog, the Metropolitan Police revealed.
In total, 20 officers are being investigated in relation to the ten claims. The Met’s under-fire leaders are braced for further revelations after commissioning a wholesale review of all similar complaints.
They were forced to reveal the full shocking scale of the scandal following a public outcry over the treatment of a young black man in the back of a police van.
Eight officers and one civilian employee of the London force are now suspended from duty as a result of an internal inquiry into several incidents.
The latest allegations include a sergeant and two constables accused of using racist language in the Olympic borough of Newham.
The claim is particularly damaging because the borough in East London was also the scene of the incident involving Mr Demetrio. He has also complained that he witnessed a 15-year-old black boy being kicked and taunted while he was being held at Forest Gate police station.
The Met revealed two officers have been suspended in Wandsworth, South-West London, over claims they subjected a colleague to racist bullying.
And an inquiry continues into allegations that five riot squad officers subjected several children to a racist attack in Hyde Park last year.
A constable and civilian employee based in Islington are accused of using racist language and another officer was recently convicted of a racist public order offence on a train.
Another case involves a constable accused of mishandling calls from ethnic minority victims of crime. Bevan Powell, chairman of the Met’s Black Police Association, said the crisis is a ‘wake-up call for the entire criminal justice system’.
He called on senior officers to carry out an urgent review of the recommendations of the Macpherson report into the murder of Stephen Lawrence in a racist attack in Eltham, South-East London, in 1993.
It accused the Met of ‘institutional racism’ that undermined the original murder inquiry.
Mr Powell added: ‘There can be no room for any form of racism within the Met or any other force. The spotlight is on the entire criminal justice system and it must examine itself in terms of where it is and how robust it is at stamping out any racism.’
The Met has been on the back foot all week over allegations of racism following the publication of the damning recording exposing Mr Demetrio’s treatment.
He went public after a junior Crown Prosecution Service lawyer ruled no offence had taken place. A review of that decision is now under way.
Police raided his home the day after he made the racism complaint and seized a plasma TV claiming it was stolen in the riots last summer. He later produced a receipt. [They should all be fired]
Deputy Commissioner Craig Mackey said: ‘Earlier this week I commissioned a review of complaints relating to alleged racism to check the progress of ongoing cases.
‘We have been working closely with the Independent Police Complaints Commission on this. We have referred seven cases to the IPCC, in addition to the three cases already reported.
‘As the review continues there may be further referrals. The Met does not tolerate racism.’
Two of the PCs and an Acting Police Sergeant based in Newham, have been placed on restricted duties after being referred to the IPCC following allegations - alleged to have happened between January 6 and March 15 - of racist comments being made within a group of officers.
Commander Peter Spindler said: 'These are serious allegations that are being thoroughly investigated so that robust action can be taken if proven.
'The Commissioner has already stated there is no place for racist behaviour in the MPS and we will work with the IPCC to identify any wrongdoing.'
The complaint was made to the force’s internal conduct body before Mr Hogan-Howe said: 'I will not stand for any racism or racists'.
The police chief had been forced to speak out after incidents on August 11 last year as police officers in London dealt with the fallout of the riots sweeping the capital.
Commissioner Mike Franklin said: 'Naturally members of the public are going to have concerns that this again involves officers based in Newham Borough and I have asked the Metropolitan Police Service what measures they have in place to ensure allegations of this nature are not more widespread.
'It is right that allegations of racism provoke public outcry which is why I have determined these allegations will receive the full independent scrutiny of the IPCC.
'Undoubtedly, these are very serious allegations and I would like to reassure the Newham community and wider public, that we are conducting a full, thorough and independent investigation to establish the facts behind these allegations.'
This is the third independent investigation the IPCC is currently conducting involving officers from Newham Borough.
The other investigations involve a 15-year-old boy who was allegedly assaulted by an officer at Forest Gate Police Station and an allegation a 21-year-old man was the victim of racist remarks and assault by MPS officers.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe held a crisis meeting of his top team today as he seeks to defuse a growing scandal.
The case has angered anti-racism campaigners, who claim it is ‘by no means unusual’ and praised Mr Demetrio’s ‘foresight and courage’ in recording it.
PC MacFarlane was suspended from duty as the Independent Police Complaints Commission examined his actions and those of two colleagues.
Prosecutors originally ruled no charges should be brought because the remarks did not cause Mr Demetrio harassment, distress or alarm. But a senior CPS lawyer is now reconsidering the evidence and Mr Demetrio has been told a decision will be made within three weeks.
He declined to comment last night, saying: ‘I’m not interested in taking this any further.’ Mr Demetrio’s lawyer Michael Oswald said: ‘We welcome their agreement to review that decision and we now await the outcome of that review.’
Anti-racism campaigner Estelle du Boulay said: ‘Sadly, the treatment of this young man at the hands of police officers... [is] by no means unusual.’
A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: ‘These are serious allegations. Any use of racist language or excessive use of force is not acceptable.’
Labour MP Keith Vaz, chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, said prosecutors were close to deciding whether to charge PC MacFarlane.
'I have today heard from the Director of Public Prosecutions who has confirmed to me that his investigation into Mauro Demetrio's treatment will be decided shortly and the chairman of the IPCC who has confirmed to me that they are still investigating this matter irrespective of what the Crown Prosecution Service does,' he said.
'This is positive information. All agencies should be involved in rooting out racism wherever it is.'
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
They were too gutless to take on the rioters but in the dark of night with no-one watching they're really aggressive. The British police used to be a fine body of men beloved of their communities. They are now only a shadow of their former selves
Scotland Yard was last night plunged into its most serious racism crisis since the death of Stephen Lawrence. Ten serious complaints of racist behaviour by officers have been passed to the independent police watchdog, the Metropolitan Police revealed.
In total, 20 officers are being investigated in relation to the ten claims. The Met’s under-fire leaders are braced for further revelations after commissioning a wholesale review of all similar complaints.
They were forced to reveal the full shocking scale of the scandal following a public outcry over the treatment of a young black man in the back of a police van.
Eight officers and one civilian employee of the London force are now suspended from duty as a result of an internal inquiry into several incidents.
The latest allegations include a sergeant and two constables accused of using racist language in the Olympic borough of Newham.
The claim is particularly damaging because the borough in East London was also the scene of the incident involving Mr Demetrio. He has also complained that he witnessed a 15-year-old black boy being kicked and taunted while he was being held at Forest Gate police station.
The Met revealed two officers have been suspended in Wandsworth, South-West London, over claims they subjected a colleague to racist bullying.
And an inquiry continues into allegations that five riot squad officers subjected several children to a racist attack in Hyde Park last year.
A constable and civilian employee based in Islington are accused of using racist language and another officer was recently convicted of a racist public order offence on a train.
Another case involves a constable accused of mishandling calls from ethnic minority victims of crime. Bevan Powell, chairman of the Met’s Black Police Association, said the crisis is a ‘wake-up call for the entire criminal justice system’.
He called on senior officers to carry out an urgent review of the recommendations of the Macpherson report into the murder of Stephen Lawrence in a racist attack in Eltham, South-East London, in 1993.
It accused the Met of ‘institutional racism’ that undermined the original murder inquiry.
Mr Powell added: ‘There can be no room for any form of racism within the Met or any other force. The spotlight is on the entire criminal justice system and it must examine itself in terms of where it is and how robust it is at stamping out any racism.’
The Met has been on the back foot all week over allegations of racism following the publication of the damning recording exposing Mr Demetrio’s treatment.
He went public after a junior Crown Prosecution Service lawyer ruled no offence had taken place. A review of that decision is now under way.
Police raided his home the day after he made the racism complaint and seized a plasma TV claiming it was stolen in the riots last summer. He later produced a receipt. [They should all be fired]
Deputy Commissioner Craig Mackey said: ‘Earlier this week I commissioned a review of complaints relating to alleged racism to check the progress of ongoing cases.
‘We have been working closely with the Independent Police Complaints Commission on this. We have referred seven cases to the IPCC, in addition to the three cases already reported.
‘As the review continues there may be further referrals. The Met does not tolerate racism.’
Two of the PCs and an Acting Police Sergeant based in Newham, have been placed on restricted duties after being referred to the IPCC following allegations - alleged to have happened between January 6 and March 15 - of racist comments being made within a group of officers.
Commander Peter Spindler said: 'These are serious allegations that are being thoroughly investigated so that robust action can be taken if proven.
'The Commissioner has already stated there is no place for racist behaviour in the MPS and we will work with the IPCC to identify any wrongdoing.'
The complaint was made to the force’s internal conduct body before Mr Hogan-Howe said: 'I will not stand for any racism or racists'.
The police chief had been forced to speak out after incidents on August 11 last year as police officers in London dealt with the fallout of the riots sweeping the capital.
Commissioner Mike Franklin said: 'Naturally members of the public are going to have concerns that this again involves officers based in Newham Borough and I have asked the Metropolitan Police Service what measures they have in place to ensure allegations of this nature are not more widespread.
'It is right that allegations of racism provoke public outcry which is why I have determined these allegations will receive the full independent scrutiny of the IPCC.
'Undoubtedly, these are very serious allegations and I would like to reassure the Newham community and wider public, that we are conducting a full, thorough and independent investigation to establish the facts behind these allegations.'
This is the third independent investigation the IPCC is currently conducting involving officers from Newham Borough.
The other investigations involve a 15-year-old boy who was allegedly assaulted by an officer at Forest Gate Police Station and an allegation a 21-year-old man was the victim of racist remarks and assault by MPS officers.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe held a crisis meeting of his top team today as he seeks to defuse a growing scandal.
The case has angered anti-racism campaigners, who claim it is ‘by no means unusual’ and praised Mr Demetrio’s ‘foresight and courage’ in recording it.
PC MacFarlane was suspended from duty as the Independent Police Complaints Commission examined his actions and those of two colleagues.
Prosecutors originally ruled no charges should be brought because the remarks did not cause Mr Demetrio harassment, distress or alarm. But a senior CPS lawyer is now reconsidering the evidence and Mr Demetrio has been told a decision will be made within three weeks.
He declined to comment last night, saying: ‘I’m not interested in taking this any further.’ Mr Demetrio’s lawyer Michael Oswald said: ‘We welcome their agreement to review that decision and we now await the outcome of that review.’
Anti-racism campaigner Estelle du Boulay said: ‘Sadly, the treatment of this young man at the hands of police officers... [is] by no means unusual.’
A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: ‘These are serious allegations. Any use of racist language or excessive use of force is not acceptable.’
Labour MP Keith Vaz, chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, said prosecutors were close to deciding whether to charge PC MacFarlane.
'I have today heard from the Director of Public Prosecutions who has confirmed to me that his investigation into Mauro Demetrio's treatment will be decided shortly and the chairman of the IPCC who has confirmed to me that they are still investigating this matter irrespective of what the Crown Prosecution Service does,' he said.
'This is positive information. All agencies should be involved in rooting out racism wherever it is.'
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Thursday, April 05, 2012
MD: Father of young man cleared in armed robbery wants police to apologize
Julien Rosaly’s father does not accept that Baltimore police did the best investigation they could with the information they had. He wants them to apologize for arresting his son and friend and charging him with robbing a couple at gunpoint in South Baltimore.
But police and prosecutors will mostly likely not say they’re sorry, despite dropping all charges against the two men on Friday after reviewing a videotape that shows Rosaly eating in a restaurant at the time of the attack.
A police spokesman has defended the arrests as done with legal probable cause. The spokesman for the Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office called the arrests “appropriate given the information police had at the time.”
But Rosaly and his friend, Nicholes Maultsby, and now Rosaly’s father, says police arrested them too fast, before they searched the men’s rowhouse and found nothing — no gun, no rings worth $22,300, no wallet, no cell phones, and before they checked Rosaly’s alibi.
“I’m a little upset about what when down,” the father, Anthony Rosaly, told me on Monday when he called from Brooklyn, N.Y. “It’s hard for us to deal with it. The ruined my son’s life and his friend’s. He called me from jail, ‘Daddy, you have got to get me out of here. It’s wasn’t me. I told them where I was. They didn’t check.’”
Said the elder Rosaly: “If we didn’t have a videotape, my son would still be locked up.
Original report here
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Julien Rosaly’s father does not accept that Baltimore police did the best investigation they could with the information they had. He wants them to apologize for arresting his son and friend and charging him with robbing a couple at gunpoint in South Baltimore.
But police and prosecutors will mostly likely not say they’re sorry, despite dropping all charges against the two men on Friday after reviewing a videotape that shows Rosaly eating in a restaurant at the time of the attack.
A police spokesman has defended the arrests as done with legal probable cause. The spokesman for the Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office called the arrests “appropriate given the information police had at the time.”
But Rosaly and his friend, Nicholes Maultsby, and now Rosaly’s father, says police arrested them too fast, before they searched the men’s rowhouse and found nothing — no gun, no rings worth $22,300, no wallet, no cell phones, and before they checked Rosaly’s alibi.
“I’m a little upset about what when down,” the father, Anthony Rosaly, told me on Monday when he called from Brooklyn, N.Y. “It’s hard for us to deal with it. The ruined my son’s life and his friend’s. He called me from jail, ‘Daddy, you have got to get me out of here. It’s wasn’t me. I told them where I was. They didn’t check.’”
Said the elder Rosaly: “If we didn’t have a videotape, my son would still be locked up.
Original report here
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Wednesday, April 04, 2012
Should Scotland Yard be renamed "Goon Yard"?
Both cops mentioned below should be dismissed. They are not fit to be police officers. But it was only publicity that got them investigated at all
A police officer allegedly assaulted a 15-year-old black teenager hours after his colleague was recorded racially abusing another man.
PC Joe Harrington was reportedly seen on CCTV kicking and kneeing the young man in a London police station’s custody area.
An independent investigation finished last week and the report advises the Metropolitan Police to take disciplinary action against the officer, reported The Guardian.
Now the force is deciding whether to take any further action against PC Harrington, who is currently on restricted duties.
The alleged assault came just hours after PC Alex MacFarlane, 52, was recorded on a mobile phone telling another black man that he ‘will always be a n****r’.
Mauro Demetrio, 21, secretly used his mobile phone as he was subjected to a torrent of abuse while handcuffed in the back of a police van.
Both incidents, which happened soon after last summer’s riots that brought chaos to London, could be hugely damaging to the Metropolitan Police.
PC Harrington was not heard making any racist comments on the recording, reported The Guardian.
A Metropolitan Police spokesman acknowledged that there was an allegation of an officer using ‘excessive force on a prisoner in the custody suite’.
‘This matter was referred to the IPCC and the officer placed on restricted duties pending the outcome of their independent investigation,’ the spokesman told the Daily Mail.
‘We have now received their findings and recommendations which we will consider and respond to.’
Original report here
An exceprt from the report by The Guardian
A policeman has been captured on tape allegedly assaulting a young black teenager just hours after a colleague of his was recorded abusing another man with a serious racial slur.
PC Joe Harrington has been placed on restricted duties after he was allegedly seen kicking the 15-year-old to the ground and kneeing him, in the custody area of an east London police station. Part of the incident was recorded on CCTV.
An independent investigation into the alleged assault on the 15-year-old concluded last week and a report, understood to recommend disciplinary action, was submitted to the Metropolitan police on Monday. The force will now consider what action if any to take against Harrington.
Hours earlier, Harrington was present when another officer, PC Alex MacFarlane, was recorded on a mobile phone telling Mauro Demetrio, 21, a black man from Beckton in east London, that "the problem with you is you will always be a nigger". Growing controversy over the two incidents, which occurred shortly after the riots last summer, have triggered urgent reviews by the Crown Prosecution Service into initial legal advice that neither officer should be charged.
The recording was made by Demetrio, who alleges he was strangled and racially abused after being arrested and placed in the back of a police van on 11 August – the day after the end of rioting in London last summer.
The mobile phone recording captured one officer saying that he strangled him because he was "a cunt". Moments later, PC MacFarlane abuses Demetrio and adds: "You'll always have black skin colour".
Harrington was not heard making any racist remarks on the recording, but was one of three officers initially investigated over the alleged mistreatment of Demetrio. MacFarlane, who can also be heard telling Demetrio "don't hide behind your black skin", has been suspended.
Demetrio has spoken about how the racist abuse he suffered has left him feeling traumatised. Shortly after being driven to Forest Gate police station, he told police in the custody suite that he had been abused by police officers and urged them to listen to his mobile phone.
It was while he in the custody area that Demetrio witnessed Harrington allegedly assault the 15-year-old, who was handcuffed. Demetrio told investigators he saw Harrington kick the young teenager in the back of the leg and, once he was on the floor, knee him in the back.
He said the alleged assault made an "echoing" sound and the teenager cried out: "I am on the floor now – you can't do anything to me. I am handcuffed and I am on the floor."
Demetrio said that medical staff were called to the scene after the teenager, whose identity is not known, began making "strange" breathing noises for several minutes.
After Demetrio reported what he had seen, a separate IPCC investigation was launched into the case of the 15-year-old and CCTV of the incident was obtained – although the quality of the footage has been described as poor.
Original report here
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Both cops mentioned below should be dismissed. They are not fit to be police officers. But it was only publicity that got them investigated at all
A police officer allegedly assaulted a 15-year-old black teenager hours after his colleague was recorded racially abusing another man.
PC Joe Harrington was reportedly seen on CCTV kicking and kneeing the young man in a London police station’s custody area.
An independent investigation finished last week and the report advises the Metropolitan Police to take disciplinary action against the officer, reported The Guardian.
Now the force is deciding whether to take any further action against PC Harrington, who is currently on restricted duties.
The alleged assault came just hours after PC Alex MacFarlane, 52, was recorded on a mobile phone telling another black man that he ‘will always be a n****r’.
Mauro Demetrio, 21, secretly used his mobile phone as he was subjected to a torrent of abuse while handcuffed in the back of a police van.
Both incidents, which happened soon after last summer’s riots that brought chaos to London, could be hugely damaging to the Metropolitan Police.
PC Harrington was not heard making any racist comments on the recording, reported The Guardian.
A Metropolitan Police spokesman acknowledged that there was an allegation of an officer using ‘excessive force on a prisoner in the custody suite’.
‘This matter was referred to the IPCC and the officer placed on restricted duties pending the outcome of their independent investigation,’ the spokesman told the Daily Mail.
‘We have now received their findings and recommendations which we will consider and respond to.’
Original report here
An exceprt from the report by The Guardian
A policeman has been captured on tape allegedly assaulting a young black teenager just hours after a colleague of his was recorded abusing another man with a serious racial slur.
PC Joe Harrington has been placed on restricted duties after he was allegedly seen kicking the 15-year-old to the ground and kneeing him, in the custody area of an east London police station. Part of the incident was recorded on CCTV.
An independent investigation into the alleged assault on the 15-year-old concluded last week and a report, understood to recommend disciplinary action, was submitted to the Metropolitan police on Monday. The force will now consider what action if any to take against Harrington.
Hours earlier, Harrington was present when another officer, PC Alex MacFarlane, was recorded on a mobile phone telling Mauro Demetrio, 21, a black man from Beckton in east London, that "the problem with you is you will always be a nigger". Growing controversy over the two incidents, which occurred shortly after the riots last summer, have triggered urgent reviews by the Crown Prosecution Service into initial legal advice that neither officer should be charged.
The recording was made by Demetrio, who alleges he was strangled and racially abused after being arrested and placed in the back of a police van on 11 August – the day after the end of rioting in London last summer.
The mobile phone recording captured one officer saying that he strangled him because he was "a cunt". Moments later, PC MacFarlane abuses Demetrio and adds: "You'll always have black skin colour".
Harrington was not heard making any racist remarks on the recording, but was one of three officers initially investigated over the alleged mistreatment of Demetrio. MacFarlane, who can also be heard telling Demetrio "don't hide behind your black skin", has been suspended.
Demetrio has spoken about how the racist abuse he suffered has left him feeling traumatised. Shortly after being driven to Forest Gate police station, he told police in the custody suite that he had been abused by police officers and urged them to listen to his mobile phone.
It was while he in the custody area that Demetrio witnessed Harrington allegedly assault the 15-year-old, who was handcuffed. Demetrio told investigators he saw Harrington kick the young teenager in the back of the leg and, once he was on the floor, knee him in the back.
He said the alleged assault made an "echoing" sound and the teenager cried out: "I am on the floor now – you can't do anything to me. I am handcuffed and I am on the floor."
Demetrio said that medical staff were called to the scene after the teenager, whose identity is not known, began making "strange" breathing noises for several minutes.
After Demetrio reported what he had seen, a separate IPCC investigation was launched into the case of the 15-year-old and CCTV of the incident was obtained – although the quality of the footage has been described as poor.
Original report here
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Tuesday, April 03, 2012
Thug British cop gets off with a slap on the wrist
A police officer who headbutted a 14-year-old schoolboy, leaving him with ‘unquantifiable’ emotional damage has been spared jail today.
PC Karl Bartlett, had pulled over Lee Rosier, on suspicion of driving while using his mobile phone, near Hanger Lane, in west London. But rather than arrest the Mr Rosier, he attacked the youngster, opening the passenger door before lunging at the teenager.
Bartlett was convicted of common assault last month and sentenced to three months jail, a sentence that was suspended for 12 months at Westminster Magistrates Court.
Judge Daphne Wickham said: ‘You engaged in a process which when dealing with those situations, is flawed. ‘It would be wrong to say you put yourself onto the tarmac , firstly to set your sights on the front passenger and that you deliberately intended to assault that passenger.
‘By the time you got the front door you engaged in something that should have never happened. ‘It was unlawful, on a young school boy, who had never been involved with the police. ‘The physical injuries of the complainant are light, but the emotional injuries are quite unquantifiable. ‘The momentary abuse of power is an aggravating feature.’
Prosecuting Piers Von Berg, said the schoolboy suffered facial injuries and has been anxious since the attack. ‘He is worried about the officers in the case finding out his address where he lives and doing something terrible to him,’ Mr Von Berg said.
Ben Brandan, defending, said Bartlett did not take the time to assess the situation when he approached the car - but his actions had not been deliberate. ‘When he left the police van, he did not assess the situation in front of him,’ said Mr Brandan. ‘He goes in a gung-ho fashion. This was accidental reckless contact due to removing him from the vehicle, swinging him around him making contact with a car. ‘It is a consequence of using too much force, he is a big strong man on a lighter, smaller teenager.’
He added that the former soldier, Bartlett was a man of exemplary previous character. ‘In relation to costs and compensation, he would be able to pay some amounts but his employment may be in doubt due to the judgements of this court.’
The former soldier was sentenced to 18 hours community service and ordered to pay £500 costs with £500 compensation to the victim.
Original report here
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A police officer who headbutted a 14-year-old schoolboy, leaving him with ‘unquantifiable’ emotional damage has been spared jail today.
PC Karl Bartlett, had pulled over Lee Rosier, on suspicion of driving while using his mobile phone, near Hanger Lane, in west London. But rather than arrest the Mr Rosier, he attacked the youngster, opening the passenger door before lunging at the teenager.
Bartlett was convicted of common assault last month and sentenced to three months jail, a sentence that was suspended for 12 months at Westminster Magistrates Court.
Judge Daphne Wickham said: ‘You engaged in a process which when dealing with those situations, is flawed. ‘It would be wrong to say you put yourself onto the tarmac , firstly to set your sights on the front passenger and that you deliberately intended to assault that passenger.
‘By the time you got the front door you engaged in something that should have never happened. ‘It was unlawful, on a young school boy, who had never been involved with the police. ‘The physical injuries of the complainant are light, but the emotional injuries are quite unquantifiable. ‘The momentary abuse of power is an aggravating feature.’
Prosecuting Piers Von Berg, said the schoolboy suffered facial injuries and has been anxious since the attack. ‘He is worried about the officers in the case finding out his address where he lives and doing something terrible to him,’ Mr Von Berg said.
Ben Brandan, defending, said Bartlett did not take the time to assess the situation when he approached the car - but his actions had not been deliberate. ‘When he left the police van, he did not assess the situation in front of him,’ said Mr Brandan. ‘He goes in a gung-ho fashion. This was accidental reckless contact due to removing him from the vehicle, swinging him around him making contact with a car. ‘It is a consequence of using too much force, he is a big strong man on a lighter, smaller teenager.’
He added that the former soldier, Bartlett was a man of exemplary previous character. ‘In relation to costs and compensation, he would be able to pay some amounts but his employment may be in doubt due to the judgements of this court.’
The former soldier was sentenced to 18 hours community service and ordered to pay £500 costs with £500 compensation to the victim.
Original report here
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Monday, April 02, 2012
British cops caught out by secret recording
Scotland Yard is facing a racism scandal after officers were recorded boasting of strangling a black man and calling him a “n*****”.
The exchange, which was captured by the 21-year-old on his mobile phone, reveals a stream of expletives from Metropolitan Police officers, with one branding him a “c***”.
Another admitted strangling him while he was in handcuffs and one told him: “"The problem with you is you will always be a nigger, yeah?”
The recording has now been made public by the alleged victim, after the Crown Prosecution Service initially decided not to charge an officer involved, named as PC Alex MacFarlane.
The CPS has now reconsidered the decision, after the young man’s lawyer threatened to take the case to High Court judicial review.
The recording was made by the young man, from Beckton, east London, after he was pulled over by police in his car and arrested for alleged driving offences after last summer’s riots.
He told the Guardian newspaper he was made to feel “like an animal” by the police, and accused one of kneeling on his chest and strangling him.
The tape, now placed online, captures one officer admitting: “No, I did strangle you… 'cause you're a c***."
A second, identified as PC Alex MacFarlane, then repeatedly racially abuses him, adding: “You’ll always have black skin. Don’t hide behind your colour.”
The arrested man is then heard telling him: “I get this all the time. We'll definitely speak again about this. It's going to go all the way.”
The young man told the newspaper he was originally stopped by a van containing eight police officers and arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence of drugs.
Once handcuffed, he claimed he was assaulted by a police officer and said he decided to turn on the recording facility on his phone after one made explicit sexual references about his mother.
These, along with an allegation the same officer told him he would be “dead within five years” have not been recorded.
Once he had been released, he took the phone into Forest Gate police station and reported what had happened.
The case, which involved three officers, was referred to the CPS by the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which feared they could have committed criminal offences.
The CPS initially said charges should not be brought against Mr MacFarlane because the remarks did not cause the man harassment, distress or alarm.
It has now agreed to re-open the file after the man’s lawyer threatened to take the case to the High Court judicial review.
The man's lawyer, Michael Oswald, said: "By his own efforts our client has put before the CPS exceptionally strong evidence and we share his astonishment that the CPS have reached a decision that no police officer should be prosecuted on the basis of that evidence. We do welcome their agreement to review that decision and we now await the outcome of that review."
A spokesman for the Met confirmed the complaint had been referred to the IPCC and said one officer had been suspended over the incident, one was on restricted duties and one remained on full duties.
He added: "These are serious allegations; any use of racist language or excessive use of force is not acceptable."
Grace Ononiwu, deputy chief crown prosecutor for CPS London, said: "Lawyers for the complainant have written to the CPS and asked us to review our decision.
"I have considered the matter personally and directed that all the evidence should be reconsidered and a fresh decision taken by a senior lawyer with no previous involvement in this matter."
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Scotland Yard is facing a racism scandal after officers were recorded boasting of strangling a black man and calling him a “n*****”.
The exchange, which was captured by the 21-year-old on his mobile phone, reveals a stream of expletives from Metropolitan Police officers, with one branding him a “c***”.
Another admitted strangling him while he was in handcuffs and one told him: “"The problem with you is you will always be a nigger, yeah?”
The recording has now been made public by the alleged victim, after the Crown Prosecution Service initially decided not to charge an officer involved, named as PC Alex MacFarlane.
The CPS has now reconsidered the decision, after the young man’s lawyer threatened to take the case to High Court judicial review.
The recording was made by the young man, from Beckton, east London, after he was pulled over by police in his car and arrested for alleged driving offences after last summer’s riots.
He told the Guardian newspaper he was made to feel “like an animal” by the police, and accused one of kneeling on his chest and strangling him.
The tape, now placed online, captures one officer admitting: “No, I did strangle you… 'cause you're a c***."
A second, identified as PC Alex MacFarlane, then repeatedly racially abuses him, adding: “You’ll always have black skin. Don’t hide behind your colour.”
The arrested man is then heard telling him: “I get this all the time. We'll definitely speak again about this. It's going to go all the way.”
The young man told the newspaper he was originally stopped by a van containing eight police officers and arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence of drugs.
Once handcuffed, he claimed he was assaulted by a police officer and said he decided to turn on the recording facility on his phone after one made explicit sexual references about his mother.
These, along with an allegation the same officer told him he would be “dead within five years” have not been recorded.
Once he had been released, he took the phone into Forest Gate police station and reported what had happened.
The case, which involved three officers, was referred to the CPS by the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which feared they could have committed criminal offences.
The CPS initially said charges should not be brought against Mr MacFarlane because the remarks did not cause the man harassment, distress or alarm.
It has now agreed to re-open the file after the man’s lawyer threatened to take the case to the High Court judicial review.
The man's lawyer, Michael Oswald, said: "By his own efforts our client has put before the CPS exceptionally strong evidence and we share his astonishment that the CPS have reached a decision that no police officer should be prosecuted on the basis of that evidence. We do welcome their agreement to review that decision and we now await the outcome of that review."
A spokesman for the Met confirmed the complaint had been referred to the IPCC and said one officer had been suspended over the incident, one was on restricted duties and one remained on full duties.
He added: "These are serious allegations; any use of racist language or excessive use of force is not acceptable."
Grace Ononiwu, deputy chief crown prosecutor for CPS London, said: "Lawyers for the complainant have written to the CPS and asked us to review our decision.
"I have considered the matter personally and directed that all the evidence should be reconsidered and a fresh decision taken by a senior lawyer with no previous involvement in this matter."
Original report here
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Sunday, April 01, 2012
Is the body responsible for looking into serious complaints against British cops fit for purpose?
At nine minutes past seven on the evening of March 3, Anthony Grainger was sitting in a car park in the Cheshire village of Culcheth at the wheel of a stolen red Audi, together with two friends. They had been there for 24 minutes when a second Audi, a grey estate model, screeched to a halt in front of them.
One of its occupants fired a single bullet from a Heckler & Koch sub-machine gun. It made a neat hole in Grainger’s windscreen, and then, because he had turned sideways in a futile attempt to protect himself, passed through both of his lungs and his heart.
Aged 36, and the father of two children, Grainger became the first person to be shot dead by police in Britain since Mark Duggan died in Tottenham, North London, on August 4 last year, triggering widespread riots.
The men in the grey Audi were specialist armed officers from Greater Manchester, bound by strict rules stating they may open fire only when the threat to innocent life is ‘imminent and extreme’.
However, neither Grainger nor his friends, who cannot be named for legal reasons, were carrying weapons, and none were found in their vehicle. There was no one else in the car park.
The Mail on Sunday has obtained a police document that raises grave doubts as to whether the shooting was justified. Officers, it reveals, had spent the previous six weeks watching Grainger and his associates – but had few apparent reasons to suspect they were armed.
The document, an official ‘Summary of Evidence’ drawn up soon after the shooting, states that Grainger’s death was the culmination of Operation Shire, a ‘proactive investigation into an organised crime group’ believed to be planning to commit robberies. But it also suggests the only evidence police had that the men might have weapons was worryingly flimsy.
According to the document, it consisted of the fact that four days before the shooting, officers had seen one of Grainger’s friends putting a hacksaw in the boot of a different vehicle. On another occasion, the men were observed with a black bin liner containing ‘a large round object’, as well as a ‘lanyard type object and a small red-coloured bag’.
On this basis, the document adds, the police concluded that ‘they have been in possession of items which may be used either as weapons or tools to gain access to potential target premises’.
They had also ‘made numerous circular routes around the village that would allow them to observe a number of commercial premises, financial businesses and banks. The suspects have spent extended periods of time within a car park which would give them the view and the time to discuss planning potential robberies in that immediate area’.
It is indeed the case that like other large villages, Culcheth, a busy commuter dormitory settlement 15 miles west of Manchester, has a number of shops, banks and restaurants.
Finally, says the document, Grainger and his friends were wearing rolled-up balaclavas, which could have been ‘pulled down over their faces’.
This was the background to what the document terms the ‘arrest situation in the car park’, when ‘Anthony Grainger was shot by an authorised firearms officer, of which [sic] injuries sustained proved to be fatal’.
Grainger’s mother, Marina, said yesterday: ‘My son was a dedicated, loving father, and I want answers as to why he was killed.
‘Even if the police had evidence that he was up to no good, why did they shoot him dead when he was doing nothing more than sitting in a car park without a weapon?’
Disclosure of the Grainger document comes amid mounting concern that the body responsible for investigating fatal police shootings, the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), is not fit for purpose.
‘As an idea, the IPCC is important,’ said Keith Vaz, chairman of the Commons Select Committee on Home Affairs. ‘The committee has investigated its work several times, and unfortunately we have always found it wanting. It seems to have lost its way.’
Last week, Mark Duggan’s family were dismayed to discover there will never be an inquest into his death without a change to the law, because the police operation that led to his being stopped while riding as a passenger in a taxi arose from intelligence gathered from phone taps.
Under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, phone-tap transcripts cannot be disclosed to coroners.
Like inquiries into previous shootings, such as that of Jean Charles de Menezes, who was wrongly identified as a suicide bomber and killed at Stockwell Tube station in July 2005, the IPCC investigation into Duggan’s death has become marred by severe delays.
The Mail on Sunday has established that eight months after Duggan was shot, IPCC investigators have not interviewed any of the 31 officers involved in the incident and its aftermath – something Mr Vaz found ‘astonishing’.
In fact, the officers, represented by the Police Federation, have declined to be interviewed, although, as is usual in shooting cases, they wrote brief statements at an early stage. The Commission has no legal powers to compel such interviews, unless an officer has been formally placed under investigation.
Steve Evans, secretary of the Federation’s professional standards committee, said this ban would only be lifted ‘if we get categorical assurances that they are being interviewed as witnesses, not as possible suspects.
‘While they will want to co-operate, they also need to be able to control what is said. The bottom line here is that we have to feel comfortable.’
Such assurances, he added, could be given only after the IPCC had submitted a report to the Crown Prosecution Service – whose deliberations in similar cases have taken many months.
Further delays have been caused by the fact that when the IPCC interviewed the most critical non-police witness, the Urdu-speaking taxi driver, it used an incompetent interpreter. The result was that his statement was riddled with obvious errors and had to be taken again.
Former Metropolitan Police commissioner Ian Blair – now Lord Blair – said the IPCC had not remedied two crucial failings highlighted by the de Menezes case, which blighted his tenure. He said: ‘The first is the length of time it takes to carry out investigations. The second, which both the de Menezes and the Duggan cases have at their heart, is to make clear to the public and the families some of the salient facts.’
With Duggan, he added, this applied especially to the vital issue of whether he had a gun when he was shot. A weapon – which did not bear his DNA or his fingerprints – was found on the other side of a fence 14ft from his body. However, its provenance has never been disclosed.
The IPCC’s problems are not all of its own making. Its annual budget of £34 million allows it to employ just 120 investigators for the whole of England and Wales, who must somehow cope with 170 major inquiries each year – not just deaths, but also allegations of serious assault and corruption.
For comparison, the current police inquiry into newspaper phone hacking will spend £40 million this year and has employed 150 detectives.
The upshot is that the families of police shooting victims feel powerless and abused. ‘Imagine what would happen if a group of armed men who weren’t police officers shot a member of your family dead,’ said John Schofield, Anthony Grainger’s stepfather. ‘There would be an incident room, a huge team of detectives.
‘But if you have the misfortune to have a family member shot by police, you’re in a totally different ball game, with totally different rules. ‘The team working on Anthony’s death is tiny. The way it feels to us is that the cover-up starts on day one.’
In both the Duggan and Grainger cases, early media reports of the incident were totally misleading. For example, the IPCC wrongly told reporters that Duggan had fired at the officers who killed him.
After the death of Grainger, reports claimed that the police had told the men in the vehicle three times to put their hands up, but that he failed to do so.
Yet at the time he died, the car park was completely dark, and as The Mail on Sunday established one night last week, it would have been impossible to see whether he was putting his hands up.
In addition to the single shot that killed Grainger, the police fired a CS gas grenade into the car, and burst its tyres with a shotgun.
‘But what was the order in which these things happened?’ asked his girlfriend, Gail Hadfield. ‘We still have not been given the autopsy report. Was there CS gas in his lungs? If there wasn’t, that would mean he’d already been shot when they threw that grenade. The IPCC hasn’t given us any answers.’
Grainger had a criminal record, a long string of motoring, insurance and car theft offences, all but one of which were committed at least 11 years ago.
He had also been cleared in 2010 of serious drug charges, in a case described by the family solicitor, Keith Dyson, as ‘murky’: the jury acquitted him after hearing evidence of police corruption.
Last August, Grainger was arrested on suspicion of stealing a computer memory stick, said to contain highly sensitive information, from a police officer’s car. It was only in January, a few days before Operation Shire began, that the police told him that this case was closed and he would not be facing charges.
However, like Duggan, he had never been arrested or convicted for any crime of violence.
‘You meet the IPCC and it quickly becomes obvious there’s a total inadequacy of resources,’ Mr Dyson said. ‘As for the fact that they won’t be able to conduct interviews, it’s hopeless. How else can they begin to establish what was going through the officers’ minds?’
Delays, underfunding and incompetence have a further consequence. Seven years after her son Azelle Rodney was shot eight times by police in North London, apparently because of false intelligence that he had some kind of machine gun, Susan Alexander is still fighting to discover what happened.
Like the Duggan family, she has been denied an inquest because of the phone-tap law, although a public inquiry, conducted by a judge without a jury, is finally set to open later this year. ‘I never imagined it would take this long,’ she said. ‘But I just have to keep going. I need to know the truth.’
Her solicitor Daniel Machover said that the delay was ‘unforgivable’. But what makes him ‘nauseous’ is his belief that if the Rodney case had been properly examined in public, ‘there may well be lessons learnt that could have led to other operations being run differently. It’s possible that others who have also been shot might still be alive’.
Because it doesn’t involve phone taps, an inquest will be held into Grainger’s death.
A Greater Manchester Police spokesman said the force could not comment on any aspect of the shooting because the IPCC was investigating it.
An IPCC spokeswoman said the body is to conduct a ‘review’ of its handling of shootings. She added: ‘We are particularly keen to invite families and those affected by our investigation to help us look at our approach to these cases, and what we can do to improve both the system and the way we work.’
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
At nine minutes past seven on the evening of March 3, Anthony Grainger was sitting in a car park in the Cheshire village of Culcheth at the wheel of a stolen red Audi, together with two friends. They had been there for 24 minutes when a second Audi, a grey estate model, screeched to a halt in front of them.
One of its occupants fired a single bullet from a Heckler & Koch sub-machine gun. It made a neat hole in Grainger’s windscreen, and then, because he had turned sideways in a futile attempt to protect himself, passed through both of his lungs and his heart.
Aged 36, and the father of two children, Grainger became the first person to be shot dead by police in Britain since Mark Duggan died in Tottenham, North London, on August 4 last year, triggering widespread riots.
The men in the grey Audi were specialist armed officers from Greater Manchester, bound by strict rules stating they may open fire only when the threat to innocent life is ‘imminent and extreme’.
However, neither Grainger nor his friends, who cannot be named for legal reasons, were carrying weapons, and none were found in their vehicle. There was no one else in the car park.
The Mail on Sunday has obtained a police document that raises grave doubts as to whether the shooting was justified. Officers, it reveals, had spent the previous six weeks watching Grainger and his associates – but had few apparent reasons to suspect they were armed.
The document, an official ‘Summary of Evidence’ drawn up soon after the shooting, states that Grainger’s death was the culmination of Operation Shire, a ‘proactive investigation into an organised crime group’ believed to be planning to commit robberies. But it also suggests the only evidence police had that the men might have weapons was worryingly flimsy.
According to the document, it consisted of the fact that four days before the shooting, officers had seen one of Grainger’s friends putting a hacksaw in the boot of a different vehicle. On another occasion, the men were observed with a black bin liner containing ‘a large round object’, as well as a ‘lanyard type object and a small red-coloured bag’.
On this basis, the document adds, the police concluded that ‘they have been in possession of items which may be used either as weapons or tools to gain access to potential target premises’.
They had also ‘made numerous circular routes around the village that would allow them to observe a number of commercial premises, financial businesses and banks. The suspects have spent extended periods of time within a car park which would give them the view and the time to discuss planning potential robberies in that immediate area’.
It is indeed the case that like other large villages, Culcheth, a busy commuter dormitory settlement 15 miles west of Manchester, has a number of shops, banks and restaurants.
Finally, says the document, Grainger and his friends were wearing rolled-up balaclavas, which could have been ‘pulled down over their faces’.
This was the background to what the document terms the ‘arrest situation in the car park’, when ‘Anthony Grainger was shot by an authorised firearms officer, of which [sic] injuries sustained proved to be fatal’.
Grainger’s mother, Marina, said yesterday: ‘My son was a dedicated, loving father, and I want answers as to why he was killed.
‘Even if the police had evidence that he was up to no good, why did they shoot him dead when he was doing nothing more than sitting in a car park without a weapon?’
Disclosure of the Grainger document comes amid mounting concern that the body responsible for investigating fatal police shootings, the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), is not fit for purpose.
‘As an idea, the IPCC is important,’ said Keith Vaz, chairman of the Commons Select Committee on Home Affairs. ‘The committee has investigated its work several times, and unfortunately we have always found it wanting. It seems to have lost its way.’
Last week, Mark Duggan’s family were dismayed to discover there will never be an inquest into his death without a change to the law, because the police operation that led to his being stopped while riding as a passenger in a taxi arose from intelligence gathered from phone taps.
Under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, phone-tap transcripts cannot be disclosed to coroners.
Like inquiries into previous shootings, such as that of Jean Charles de Menezes, who was wrongly identified as a suicide bomber and killed at Stockwell Tube station in July 2005, the IPCC investigation into Duggan’s death has become marred by severe delays.
The Mail on Sunday has established that eight months after Duggan was shot, IPCC investigators have not interviewed any of the 31 officers involved in the incident and its aftermath – something Mr Vaz found ‘astonishing’.
In fact, the officers, represented by the Police Federation, have declined to be interviewed, although, as is usual in shooting cases, they wrote brief statements at an early stage. The Commission has no legal powers to compel such interviews, unless an officer has been formally placed under investigation.
Steve Evans, secretary of the Federation’s professional standards committee, said this ban would only be lifted ‘if we get categorical assurances that they are being interviewed as witnesses, not as possible suspects.
‘While they will want to co-operate, they also need to be able to control what is said. The bottom line here is that we have to feel comfortable.’
Such assurances, he added, could be given only after the IPCC had submitted a report to the Crown Prosecution Service – whose deliberations in similar cases have taken many months.
Further delays have been caused by the fact that when the IPCC interviewed the most critical non-police witness, the Urdu-speaking taxi driver, it used an incompetent interpreter. The result was that his statement was riddled with obvious errors and had to be taken again.
Former Metropolitan Police commissioner Ian Blair – now Lord Blair – said the IPCC had not remedied two crucial failings highlighted by the de Menezes case, which blighted his tenure. He said: ‘The first is the length of time it takes to carry out investigations. The second, which both the de Menezes and the Duggan cases have at their heart, is to make clear to the public and the families some of the salient facts.’
With Duggan, he added, this applied especially to the vital issue of whether he had a gun when he was shot. A weapon – which did not bear his DNA or his fingerprints – was found on the other side of a fence 14ft from his body. However, its provenance has never been disclosed.
The IPCC’s problems are not all of its own making. Its annual budget of £34 million allows it to employ just 120 investigators for the whole of England and Wales, who must somehow cope with 170 major inquiries each year – not just deaths, but also allegations of serious assault and corruption.
For comparison, the current police inquiry into newspaper phone hacking will spend £40 million this year and has employed 150 detectives.
The upshot is that the families of police shooting victims feel powerless and abused. ‘Imagine what would happen if a group of armed men who weren’t police officers shot a member of your family dead,’ said John Schofield, Anthony Grainger’s stepfather. ‘There would be an incident room, a huge team of detectives.
‘But if you have the misfortune to have a family member shot by police, you’re in a totally different ball game, with totally different rules. ‘The team working on Anthony’s death is tiny. The way it feels to us is that the cover-up starts on day one.’
In both the Duggan and Grainger cases, early media reports of the incident were totally misleading. For example, the IPCC wrongly told reporters that Duggan had fired at the officers who killed him.
After the death of Grainger, reports claimed that the police had told the men in the vehicle three times to put their hands up, but that he failed to do so.
Yet at the time he died, the car park was completely dark, and as The Mail on Sunday established one night last week, it would have been impossible to see whether he was putting his hands up.
In addition to the single shot that killed Grainger, the police fired a CS gas grenade into the car, and burst its tyres with a shotgun.
‘But what was the order in which these things happened?’ asked his girlfriend, Gail Hadfield. ‘We still have not been given the autopsy report. Was there CS gas in his lungs? If there wasn’t, that would mean he’d already been shot when they threw that grenade. The IPCC hasn’t given us any answers.’
Grainger had a criminal record, a long string of motoring, insurance and car theft offences, all but one of which were committed at least 11 years ago.
He had also been cleared in 2010 of serious drug charges, in a case described by the family solicitor, Keith Dyson, as ‘murky’: the jury acquitted him after hearing evidence of police corruption.
Last August, Grainger was arrested on suspicion of stealing a computer memory stick, said to contain highly sensitive information, from a police officer’s car. It was only in January, a few days before Operation Shire began, that the police told him that this case was closed and he would not be facing charges.
However, like Duggan, he had never been arrested or convicted for any crime of violence.
‘You meet the IPCC and it quickly becomes obvious there’s a total inadequacy of resources,’ Mr Dyson said. ‘As for the fact that they won’t be able to conduct interviews, it’s hopeless. How else can they begin to establish what was going through the officers’ minds?’
Delays, underfunding and incompetence have a further consequence. Seven years after her son Azelle Rodney was shot eight times by police in North London, apparently because of false intelligence that he had some kind of machine gun, Susan Alexander is still fighting to discover what happened.
Like the Duggan family, she has been denied an inquest because of the phone-tap law, although a public inquiry, conducted by a judge without a jury, is finally set to open later this year. ‘I never imagined it would take this long,’ she said. ‘But I just have to keep going. I need to know the truth.’
Her solicitor Daniel Machover said that the delay was ‘unforgivable’. But what makes him ‘nauseous’ is his belief that if the Rodney case had been properly examined in public, ‘there may well be lessons learnt that could have led to other operations being run differently. It’s possible that others who have also been shot might still be alive’.
Because it doesn’t involve phone taps, an inquest will be held into Grainger’s death.
A Greater Manchester Police spokesman said the force could not comment on any aspect of the shooting because the IPCC was investigating it.
An IPCC spokeswoman said the body is to conduct a ‘review’ of its handling of shootings. She added: ‘We are particularly keen to invite families and those affected by our investigation to help us look at our approach to these cases, and what we can do to improve both the system and the way we work.’
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Meet Officer Michael Reichert: Professional liar, pride of the Collinsville PD
“Cops lie. Most of them lie a couple of times per shift, at least.”
This assessment was offered not by an embittered critic of the police, but by Norm Stamper, former Chief of the Seattle Police Department,in his 2005 memoir Breaking Rank (page 129, to be precise). Stamper supports the use of tactical dishonesty in dealing with certain kinds of violent suspects, but he has no tolerance for the casual mendacity that is ubiquitous in the profession of law enforcement.
Police consultant and former prosecutor Val Van Brocklin offers a similarly blunt perspective. “Police lie. It’s part of their job,” she wrote Val Van Brocklin in an essay entitled “Training Cops to Lie,” which was published in the November 16, 2009 edition of the online journal Officer.com.
Habitual lying cost Officer Michael Reichert of the Collinsville, Illinois Police Department his job nearly a decade ago. With the help of the police union, he was able to get it back -- at which point he resumed his career of officially sanctioned perjury. In January 2011, Reichert, who is now assigned to K-9 patrol, was one of four Collinsville officers given the “Chief’s Award of Merit” for performance “exceptional in nature or above and beyond normal performance.”
In April, Reichert was singled out again for his exceptional work by being named “Officer of the Month.” The department lauded Reichert for reflecting “the proactive and innovative philosophy of law enforcement prescribed to [sic] by the Collinsville Police Department. He has demonstrated this by his aggressive approach to drug trafficking in the area.”
“Officer Reichert had 166 total incidents with 6 arrests and 7 citations in 13 working days,” continued the department’s report. “In addition to this he had 3 self initiated significant incidents that is very worthy of praise [sic.]”
To someone who doesn’t belong to the coercive caste, a total of 6 arrests out of 166 “total incidents” isn’t an impressive ratio. The concept of a “self-initiated significant incident” seems downright ominous. This is the portrait of a government-licensed bully bent on manufacturing cases, rather than a peace officer devoted to protection of persons and property. A brief examination of Reichert’s past supplies that portrait with additional detail.
In 2006, Reichert was fired by the Collinsville PD “after a federal judge ruled he lied during a drug trial,” reported the April 19, 2009 edition of StLtoday.com. “They also cited a conviction on federal charges that he sold knockoff designer sunglasses." Irrespective of the merits of the federal case, Reichart was consciously defrauding consumers.
With the help of his union, Reichert appealed that ruling, and was he was reinstated in March 2009. However, about a month later the Collinsville Police and Fire Board suspended him without pay after “federal prosecutors … raised new concerns against Reichert again questioning his trustworthiness.”
Despite his track record as a proven perjurer and con artist, Reichert was re-hired by the Collinsville PD. He was promptly assigned to counter-narcotics duty once again – and he immediately resumed the same tactics that had resulted in his well-deserved but tragically temporary unemployment.
Officer Reichert’s routine is described at length in a November 2005 ruling by U.S. District Judge Michael J. Reagan in the case U.S. v. Zambrana. The defendant was one of two suspects arrested on narcotics charges by Reichert during a traffic stop in 2002. Zambrana filed a motion to suppress the results of a canine-assisted narcotics search, insisting that Reichert didn’t have probable cause to conduct the search.
Judge Reagan keyed on “Reichert’s lack of credibility as a witness,” describing him as a “polished performer” – a term not intended as a compliment.
“One reason this Court rejected Reichert’s testimony as not credible was because it was so rehearsed, coached and robotic as to be rote,” observed Judge Reagan. “It was a generic, almost default performance not dependent upon the facts of this case, but suitable for any case in which Reichert might testify to having found `reasonable suspicion. When questioning required him to temporarily stray from this rehearsed script, away from the security of his default testimony, he was caught off-guard.”
When required to deal with “objective verifiable facts” – events captured in audio or video recordings, for instance – Reichert was equivocal and self-contradictory. He was clear and emphatic, however, regarding matters that “were not objectively verifiable” – such as his “conclusions from reading body language `thrown off’ involuntarily from people `trafficking in narcotics.’” Judge Reagan astringently referred to this as Reichert’s conceit that he could behave as a “human polygraph” – an approach that “is wholly subjective and fraught with potential for guess, speculation, conjecture, and even deceit.”
“Reichert made clear that he understands what a Judge might find persuasive in making a reasonable suspicion determination,” Reagan continued, noting that “he teaches this principle in his classes.” That’s right: Reichert is not only a professional liar, he also tutors other police officers in his methods of mendacity.
At this point, it’s useful to remember Ms. Van Brocklin’s observation: “Cops lie. It’s part of their job.”
“By simply adding up `suspicious’ factors while ignoring non-suspicious or mitigating factors [in the Zambrana traffic stop], Reichert misused the `totality of circumstances’ principle as a sword to unjustly pierce Zambrana’s cloak of Fourth Amendment protection,” concluded Judge Reagan.
Reichert claimed that Zambrana came to his attention when he noticed the driver’s rental car – with out-of-state plates – “crossing the white divider line.” However, he also used the expression “hit” to describe this entirely trivial infraction. He claimed to have become suspicious when Zambrana “continued down the highway in a completely normal manner,” not bothering even to make eye contact with Reichert after the officer pulled alongside him in a police cruiser. This prompted him to pull Zambrana over.
Once the pretext stop was made, Reichert claimed that Zambrana and his passenger appeared “nervous” – which is an entirely understandable reaction to the presence of an armed stranger who considers himself entitled to kill you at his discretion. He then barraged them with what Judge Reagan called a series of “rolling no” questions. This is a tactic designed to elicit permission to search the vehicle. After inquiring about drugs, weapons, or cash, and getting negative responses, the officer will pose some variation of this question: “Hey, this will only take a minute – do you mind if I just take a look before letting you go?”
Regardless of Reichert’s perception “that Zambrana’s replies and lack of eye contact during this questioning were `suspicious,’ Reichert’s subsequent actions indicate that he knew that he still had no `reasonable suspicion’ to search Zambrana’s car,” notes Judge Reagan. “At that point, rather than simply informing Zambrana that he would be searching his car, Reichert requested Zambrana’s permission to conduct a search. Inexplicably (yet, not surprising to this Court, Reichert viewed Zambrana’s denial as `suspicious’ and advised Zambrana that he was detaining his car for a canine search.”
Narcotics were found, and both Zambrana and his passenger, a man named Babar Shah, were maneuvered into a plea bargain. Despite Reichert’s obvious and documented dishonesty, those convictions stuck.
Last December, Reichert followed exactly the same modus operandi in conducting a pretext stop – and illegal search – of a vehicle driven by Terrence Huff and John Seaton of Hamilton, Ohio. Huff and Seton had traveled to the St. Louis Science Center to attend a Star Trek exhibit. Their return trip, unfortunately, included a stretch along I-70 that was polluted by Officer Reichert, who was loitering in the median at taxpayer expense awaiting his next victim. The sight of two men in an SUV with out-of-state plates proved irresistible, so Reichert pulled out behind them and paced them for a few miles before pulling them over.
Once the pretext stop was made, Reichert – following exactly the same script described by Judge Reagan – claimed to have noticed an otherwise undetectable traffic infraction. He obtained Huff’s driver’s license and asked the passenger for ID. When he ran Huff’s license, he found a record of a previous arrest (without conviction).
“That mother****r,” sneered Reichert as he reviewed the information on his computer terminal. After calling for backup and resuming his pretense of professionalism, Reichert told Huff that he would let him off with a “warning” – and then began the “rolling no” routine.
“This highway, we have a major problem with people running guns and drugs and illegal stuff up and down the highway,” Reichert told Huff. “You guys don’t have anything like that in your car, do you?
“No,” replied Huff, adding, “I could show you the photos we took at the Star Trek convention. We’re not drug runners. It’s my birthday.”
“There wouldn’t be any marijuana in there right now?” Reichert persisted.
“No,” Huff responded.
“No cocaine in there?”
“No.”
“Any heroin?”
“No.”
“Any guns in there?”
“No.”
“How about any large amounts of U.S. currency?” Reichert probed, thereby revealing the true purpose of the stop: He was trawling for assets subject to confiscation in the name of “asset forfeiture.” If Huff or his friend had been carrying cash, Reichert – assisted by the second officer who had materialized during the questioning – would have stolen it, and most likely the car, as well.
When Huff pointed out that all he was carrying was a credit card, Reichert moved to close the deal:
“Would you have any objection to us searching the car real quick to make sure that there’s nothing illegal inside the car?”
Reichert had neither probable cause nor “reasonable suspicion” to conduct a search. If Huff and objected, however, Reichert would have arrested him – and then stolen his car.
When Huff briefly hesitated, Reichert deployed yet another lie:
“Now, let me tell you something, OK? I’m not overly concerned about personal amounts or stuff like that. If you have a little bit … I’m not worried about that, OK?”
Remember that line; we’ll revisit it shortly.
“There are no drugs in the car, and I’d just like to go on my way, if I could,” Huff said in the forlorn hope that he would be set free.
“Well, I don’t have a problem with that,” Reichert lied once again. “I’m just a little apprehensive about how your buddy’s acting, he’s a little bit nervous.”
“I’ve got a canine in the car,” Reichert continued. “What I’m going to do is detain the car long enough to run the dog around it.” He made that announcement in a tone intended to convey the impression that this was a mere formality – if not an actual favor he was doing on Huff’s behalf.
“That’s fine,” Huff – an unarmed man confronting two armed and thoroughly amoral strangers – conceded.
“If the dog alerts, I will search your car,” Reichert admitted, now that Huff had been manipulated into consenting. “And anything illegal I find I will charge you with.”
“Anything” would include the “personal amounts of marijuana or cocaine” to which Reichert had referred so dismissively just seconds earlier.
When Huff pointed out that Reichert had lied about the reason for the traffic stop Рa point he did not contest - -the uniformed liar abandoned the fa̤ade of professionalism:
“I’m asking for your consent to search the car,” he told Huff. “If your answer is `no,’ I’m going to detain the car long enough to run the dog around it. I can get you a ride” – an invitation that, in context, has to be considered an ill-disguised threat to arrest Huff and his friend (vide the foregoing business about “personal amounts”).
“If I’m free to go, can I go?” Huff asked.
“Not in the car,” Reichert curtly replied.
In other words: Huff was under arrest. He was entirely at the mercy of a cynical, impenitent liar armed with a gun and clothed in impunity.
Reichert retrieved his dog, and – with the practiced guile of a veteran con artist – went through his charade, tapping and prompting the animal to “alert” as if the vehicle were containing contraband. Once at the front of Huff’s car – which concealed his actions from the dashcam – Reichert claimed that the dog had “indicated” that there was something in the vehicle.
He informed Huff that the dog – which “is trained to smell marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and meth” – had “started scratching” at the front of the car. “I am going to search your car,” he continued. That search was utterly futile. Reichert, who appears to be a mucosal personality composed of unctuous malicet, emitted one last lie to cover up his criminal misconduct.
“Inside your car, under your seat and under the back seat, there’s shake – marijuana shake,” lied Collinsville, Illinois’s April 2011 Officer of the Month. “A little bit all over the car. That’s probably what the dog’s alerting to.”
Of course, there was nothing of the sort to be found – in fact, Huff’s vehicle didn’t even have a back seat.
Despite the devoted obstruction of the Collinsville PD, Huff -- who owns a small, independent film production company called T-Minus Entertainment-- obtained the dashcam video of the episode. He used it to produce "Breakfast in Collinsville," a brief and thoroughly infuriating documentary of Reichert’s attempted carjacking and extortion:
“I am usually rather suspicious of authority, and this was something of a reality check,” Huff told Pro Libertate in a telephone interview. “It’s pretty clear that what Reichert is doing is generating revenue for his department. This kind of thing is happening all over the place – federal, state, county, or city, they’re all using asset forfeiture to collect revenue.”
Although he has been contacted by lawyers and civil liberties activists who want to help him mount legal action against Reichert and his department, Huff simply wants to use the video to “expose this abuse and get people to look at what’s happening in this country.”
Huff is too busy doing work for paying clients to invest the time, money, and frustration that a legal battle with Reichert and the police union would require. Unless the officer’s superiors can be shamed into firing him permanently – an unlikely outcome, given previous performance – Officer Michael “Third” Reichert will continue to prey on the innocent and perjure himself, and teach the relevant skills to other cops. After all, as his awards and commendations attest, Reichert is the pride of the Collinsville PD.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
“Cops lie. Most of them lie a couple of times per shift, at least.”
This assessment was offered not by an embittered critic of the police, but by Norm Stamper, former Chief of the Seattle Police Department,in his 2005 memoir Breaking Rank (page 129, to be precise). Stamper supports the use of tactical dishonesty in dealing with certain kinds of violent suspects, but he has no tolerance for the casual mendacity that is ubiquitous in the profession of law enforcement.
Police consultant and former prosecutor Val Van Brocklin offers a similarly blunt perspective. “Police lie. It’s part of their job,” she wrote Val Van Brocklin in an essay entitled “Training Cops to Lie,” which was published in the November 16, 2009 edition of the online journal Officer.com.
Habitual lying cost Officer Michael Reichert of the Collinsville, Illinois Police Department his job nearly a decade ago. With the help of the police union, he was able to get it back -- at which point he resumed his career of officially sanctioned perjury. In January 2011, Reichert, who is now assigned to K-9 patrol, was one of four Collinsville officers given the “Chief’s Award of Merit” for performance “exceptional in nature or above and beyond normal performance.”
In April, Reichert was singled out again for his exceptional work by being named “Officer of the Month.” The department lauded Reichert for reflecting “the proactive and innovative philosophy of law enforcement prescribed to [sic] by the Collinsville Police Department. He has demonstrated this by his aggressive approach to drug trafficking in the area.”
“Officer Reichert had 166 total incidents with 6 arrests and 7 citations in 13 working days,” continued the department’s report. “In addition to this he had 3 self initiated significant incidents that is very worthy of praise [sic.]”
To someone who doesn’t belong to the coercive caste, a total of 6 arrests out of 166 “total incidents” isn’t an impressive ratio. The concept of a “self-initiated significant incident” seems downright ominous. This is the portrait of a government-licensed bully bent on manufacturing cases, rather than a peace officer devoted to protection of persons and property. A brief examination of Reichert’s past supplies that portrait with additional detail.
In 2006, Reichert was fired by the Collinsville PD “after a federal judge ruled he lied during a drug trial,” reported the April 19, 2009 edition of StLtoday.com. “They also cited a conviction on federal charges that he sold knockoff designer sunglasses." Irrespective of the merits of the federal case, Reichart was consciously defrauding consumers.
With the help of his union, Reichert appealed that ruling, and was he was reinstated in March 2009. However, about a month later the Collinsville Police and Fire Board suspended him without pay after “federal prosecutors … raised new concerns against Reichert again questioning his trustworthiness.”
Despite his track record as a proven perjurer and con artist, Reichert was re-hired by the Collinsville PD. He was promptly assigned to counter-narcotics duty once again – and he immediately resumed the same tactics that had resulted in his well-deserved but tragically temporary unemployment.
Officer Reichert’s routine is described at length in a November 2005 ruling by U.S. District Judge Michael J. Reagan in the case U.S. v. Zambrana. The defendant was one of two suspects arrested on narcotics charges by Reichert during a traffic stop in 2002. Zambrana filed a motion to suppress the results of a canine-assisted narcotics search, insisting that Reichert didn’t have probable cause to conduct the search.
Judge Reagan keyed on “Reichert’s lack of credibility as a witness,” describing him as a “polished performer” – a term not intended as a compliment.
“One reason this Court rejected Reichert’s testimony as not credible was because it was so rehearsed, coached and robotic as to be rote,” observed Judge Reagan. “It was a generic, almost default performance not dependent upon the facts of this case, but suitable for any case in which Reichert might testify to having found `reasonable suspicion. When questioning required him to temporarily stray from this rehearsed script, away from the security of his default testimony, he was caught off-guard.”
When required to deal with “objective verifiable facts” – events captured in audio or video recordings, for instance – Reichert was equivocal and self-contradictory. He was clear and emphatic, however, regarding matters that “were not objectively verifiable” – such as his “conclusions from reading body language `thrown off’ involuntarily from people `trafficking in narcotics.’” Judge Reagan astringently referred to this as Reichert’s conceit that he could behave as a “human polygraph” – an approach that “is wholly subjective and fraught with potential for guess, speculation, conjecture, and even deceit.”
“Reichert made clear that he understands what a Judge might find persuasive in making a reasonable suspicion determination,” Reagan continued, noting that “he teaches this principle in his classes.” That’s right: Reichert is not only a professional liar, he also tutors other police officers in his methods of mendacity.
At this point, it’s useful to remember Ms. Van Brocklin’s observation: “Cops lie. It’s part of their job.”
“By simply adding up `suspicious’ factors while ignoring non-suspicious or mitigating factors [in the Zambrana traffic stop], Reichert misused the `totality of circumstances’ principle as a sword to unjustly pierce Zambrana’s cloak of Fourth Amendment protection,” concluded Judge Reagan.
Reichert claimed that Zambrana came to his attention when he noticed the driver’s rental car – with out-of-state plates – “crossing the white divider line.” However, he also used the expression “hit” to describe this entirely trivial infraction. He claimed to have become suspicious when Zambrana “continued down the highway in a completely normal manner,” not bothering even to make eye contact with Reichert after the officer pulled alongside him in a police cruiser. This prompted him to pull Zambrana over.
Once the pretext stop was made, Reichert claimed that Zambrana and his passenger appeared “nervous” – which is an entirely understandable reaction to the presence of an armed stranger who considers himself entitled to kill you at his discretion. He then barraged them with what Judge Reagan called a series of “rolling no” questions. This is a tactic designed to elicit permission to search the vehicle. After inquiring about drugs, weapons, or cash, and getting negative responses, the officer will pose some variation of this question: “Hey, this will only take a minute – do you mind if I just take a look before letting you go?”
Regardless of Reichert’s perception “that Zambrana’s replies and lack of eye contact during this questioning were `suspicious,’ Reichert’s subsequent actions indicate that he knew that he still had no `reasonable suspicion’ to search Zambrana’s car,” notes Judge Reagan. “At that point, rather than simply informing Zambrana that he would be searching his car, Reichert requested Zambrana’s permission to conduct a search. Inexplicably (yet, not surprising to this Court, Reichert viewed Zambrana’s denial as `suspicious’ and advised Zambrana that he was detaining his car for a canine search.”
Narcotics were found, and both Zambrana and his passenger, a man named Babar Shah, were maneuvered into a plea bargain. Despite Reichert’s obvious and documented dishonesty, those convictions stuck.
Last December, Reichert followed exactly the same modus operandi in conducting a pretext stop – and illegal search – of a vehicle driven by Terrence Huff and John Seaton of Hamilton, Ohio. Huff and Seton had traveled to the St. Louis Science Center to attend a Star Trek exhibit. Their return trip, unfortunately, included a stretch along I-70 that was polluted by Officer Reichert, who was loitering in the median at taxpayer expense awaiting his next victim. The sight of two men in an SUV with out-of-state plates proved irresistible, so Reichert pulled out behind them and paced them for a few miles before pulling them over.
Once the pretext stop was made, Reichert – following exactly the same script described by Judge Reagan – claimed to have noticed an otherwise undetectable traffic infraction. He obtained Huff’s driver’s license and asked the passenger for ID. When he ran Huff’s license, he found a record of a previous arrest (without conviction).
“That mother****r,” sneered Reichert as he reviewed the information on his computer terminal. After calling for backup and resuming his pretense of professionalism, Reichert told Huff that he would let him off with a “warning” – and then began the “rolling no” routine.
“This highway, we have a major problem with people running guns and drugs and illegal stuff up and down the highway,” Reichert told Huff. “You guys don’t have anything like that in your car, do you?
“No,” replied Huff, adding, “I could show you the photos we took at the Star Trek convention. We’re not drug runners. It’s my birthday.”
“There wouldn’t be any marijuana in there right now?” Reichert persisted.
“No,” Huff responded.
“No cocaine in there?”
“No.”
“Any heroin?”
“No.”
“Any guns in there?”
“No.”
“How about any large amounts of U.S. currency?” Reichert probed, thereby revealing the true purpose of the stop: He was trawling for assets subject to confiscation in the name of “asset forfeiture.” If Huff or his friend had been carrying cash, Reichert – assisted by the second officer who had materialized during the questioning – would have stolen it, and most likely the car, as well.
When Huff pointed out that all he was carrying was a credit card, Reichert moved to close the deal:
“Would you have any objection to us searching the car real quick to make sure that there’s nothing illegal inside the car?”
Reichert had neither probable cause nor “reasonable suspicion” to conduct a search. If Huff and objected, however, Reichert would have arrested him – and then stolen his car.
When Huff briefly hesitated, Reichert deployed yet another lie:
“Now, let me tell you something, OK? I’m not overly concerned about personal amounts or stuff like that. If you have a little bit … I’m not worried about that, OK?”
Remember that line; we’ll revisit it shortly.
“There are no drugs in the car, and I’d just like to go on my way, if I could,” Huff said in the forlorn hope that he would be set free.
“Well, I don’t have a problem with that,” Reichert lied once again. “I’m just a little apprehensive about how your buddy’s acting, he’s a little bit nervous.”
“I’ve got a canine in the car,” Reichert continued. “What I’m going to do is detain the car long enough to run the dog around it.” He made that announcement in a tone intended to convey the impression that this was a mere formality – if not an actual favor he was doing on Huff’s behalf.
“That’s fine,” Huff – an unarmed man confronting two armed and thoroughly amoral strangers – conceded.
“If the dog alerts, I will search your car,” Reichert admitted, now that Huff had been manipulated into consenting. “And anything illegal I find I will charge you with.”
“Anything” would include the “personal amounts of marijuana or cocaine” to which Reichert had referred so dismissively just seconds earlier.
When Huff pointed out that Reichert had lied about the reason for the traffic stop Рa point he did not contest - -the uniformed liar abandoned the fa̤ade of professionalism:
“I’m asking for your consent to search the car,” he told Huff. “If your answer is `no,’ I’m going to detain the car long enough to run the dog around it. I can get you a ride” – an invitation that, in context, has to be considered an ill-disguised threat to arrest Huff and his friend (vide the foregoing business about “personal amounts”).
“If I’m free to go, can I go?” Huff asked.
“Not in the car,” Reichert curtly replied.
In other words: Huff was under arrest. He was entirely at the mercy of a cynical, impenitent liar armed with a gun and clothed in impunity.
Reichert retrieved his dog, and – with the practiced guile of a veteran con artist – went through his charade, tapping and prompting the animal to “alert” as if the vehicle were containing contraband. Once at the front of Huff’s car – which concealed his actions from the dashcam – Reichert claimed that the dog had “indicated” that there was something in the vehicle.
He informed Huff that the dog – which “is trained to smell marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and meth” – had “started scratching” at the front of the car. “I am going to search your car,” he continued. That search was utterly futile. Reichert, who appears to be a mucosal personality composed of unctuous malicet, emitted one last lie to cover up his criminal misconduct.
“Inside your car, under your seat and under the back seat, there’s shake – marijuana shake,” lied Collinsville, Illinois’s April 2011 Officer of the Month. “A little bit all over the car. That’s probably what the dog’s alerting to.”
Of course, there was nothing of the sort to be found – in fact, Huff’s vehicle didn’t even have a back seat.
Despite the devoted obstruction of the Collinsville PD, Huff -- who owns a small, independent film production company called T-Minus Entertainment-- obtained the dashcam video of the episode. He used it to produce "Breakfast in Collinsville," a brief and thoroughly infuriating documentary of Reichert’s attempted carjacking and extortion:
“I am usually rather suspicious of authority, and this was something of a reality check,” Huff told Pro Libertate in a telephone interview. “It’s pretty clear that what Reichert is doing is generating revenue for his department. This kind of thing is happening all over the place – federal, state, county, or city, they’re all using asset forfeiture to collect revenue.”
Although he has been contacted by lawyers and civil liberties activists who want to help him mount legal action against Reichert and his department, Huff simply wants to use the video to “expose this abuse and get people to look at what’s happening in this country.”
Huff is too busy doing work for paying clients to invest the time, money, and frustration that a legal battle with Reichert and the police union would require. Unless the officer’s superiors can be shamed into firing him permanently – an unlikely outcome, given previous performance – Officer Michael “Third” Reichert will continue to prey on the innocent and perjure himself, and teach the relevant skills to other cops. After all, as his awards and commendations attest, Reichert is the pride of the Collinsville PD.
Original report here
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Friday, March 30, 2012
This week in innocence
After imprisoning a man 17 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, Washington state finally sets him free . . . with $2,500 and a bus ticket.
But Washington state, like 23 other states, doesn’t compensate the wrongly imprisoned.
But even in states on the high end of the compensation scale, the money is usually paid out in annual installments over 20 years, not a lump sum, and the payments stop coming once you die. Which perversely means that the innocent people who have been incarcerated the longest see less money once they’re exonerated.
Original report here
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After imprisoning a man 17 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, Washington state finally sets him free . . . with $2,500 and a bus ticket.
Northrop was arrested for the rape and kidnapping of a housekeeper. “I instantly said, ‘No, you’ve got the wrong guy,’” Northrop recalls telling detectives. But detectives believed the victim’s testimony, although she was blindfolded for most of the attack. A jury agreed, sentencing Northrop, a father of three children under age 6, to 23 years in prison.
From behind bars, Northrop tried to prove police had the wrong guy. In 2000, he contacted the Innocence Project Northwest at the University of Washington School of Law in Seattle.
For years, prosecutors denied the project’s requests to use more advanced DNA testing on the evidence in Northrop’s case. In 2005, a new state law gave judges the power to order additional testing. But it took five more years for Northrop’s testing to be completed and for a court to consider the results that conclusively showed another man’s DNA was on the victim.
In 2010, Northrop, still sitting in prison, got a letter with news he thought he might never get.
“I was jumping around the day room saying, ‘I’m out of here! I’m out of here!’” Northrop said.
But Washington state, like 23 other states, doesn’t compensate the wrongly imprisoned.
According to an Innocence Project study, Northrop is among the 40% of exonerated prisoners nationwide who received nothing from authorities for their time behind bars. The report calls for all states to pass laws providing the same compensation that the federal government offers for federal crimes: $50,000 per year of wrongful incarceration with an additional $50,000 for each year spent on death row. Today, five states have the same standard.
Money would give Northrop a chance to “just get started over again and have a normal life again,” he said. He works full-time but lives in a small room in a friend’s house because he can’t afford his own apartment.
Even in the states that do offer compensation to the innocent, standards vary wildly. Some pay $50,000 per year. Two pay more (Texas and Vermont), but others less. Wisconsin pays $5,000 per year while Missouri pays $50 per day. New Hampshire sets an award cap of $20,000 while other states set a maximum of $500,000, $1 million or no limit.
But even in states on the high end of the compensation scale, the money is usually paid out in annual installments over 20 years, not a lump sum, and the payments stop coming once you die. Which perversely means that the innocent people who have been incarcerated the longest see less money once they’re exonerated.
Original report here
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Thursday, March 29, 2012
This does not look good
Australia: Police used psychological warfare on Lin killings accused, court hears. Typical of what knowall cops do to extract false confessions
Police investigating the 2009 Lin family killings engaged in a single-minded pursuit of their chief suspect, Robert Xie, subjecting him to psychological warfare and ignoring evidence suggesting an alternative theory, a Sydney court has heard.
The claims were made by the lawyer for Mr Xie, 47, during an application for bail in the NSW Supreme Court today.
Mr Xie was charged in May last year with five counts of murder for the killings, following one of the largest homicide investigations in NSW history.
In submissions made to the court today, Graham Turnbull, SC, said the police investigation "has the hallmark of a single-minded pursuit of the accused to the exclusion of all others", and that it ignored evidence that did not fit with their predetermined explanation.
Police claim that Mr Xie switched off the power in the Lin family's North Epping home before killing them, but DNA found on the power switch could not be identified as his.
There were also a significant number of hairs found at the crime scene but - other than those belonging to the victims - these could not be identified either.
"There was in fact no DNA from the applicant [Mr Xie] found on any items taken by police from the crime scene ... nor any of the victims' DNA found on any of his items or his property," Mr Turnbull said.
In a bid to counter Mr Turnbull's claims, the head of the police investigation into the killings, Detective Inspector Joe Maree, was called by the Crown prosecutor to give evidence.
He revealed that, a few weeks before his death, Mr Lin had seen an armed robbery outside the Epping RSL Club, and that police had investigated the possibility that the murder of Mr Lin and his family was an attempt to get rid of potential witnesses.
However, this explanation was disproved by the fact that two of the armed robbers were out of the country at the time of the killings, while the others were "under close police surveillance", the officer said.
Detective Inspector Maree said "all of the possible alternative explanations" had been investigated by police.
Mr Turnbull then claimed that police had subjected Mr Xie to "psychological warfare" including subjecting him to a torrid interview characterised by sardonic and sarcastic comments by the police, and a refusal to allow the suspect to have an interpreter.
"You rattled his cage because you needed more evidence didn't you?" Mr Turnbull said. The officer denied this, but conceded that, at the time of the interview, police had needed more evidence before laying charges.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Australia: Police used psychological warfare on Lin killings accused, court hears. Typical of what knowall cops do to extract false confessions
Police investigating the 2009 Lin family killings engaged in a single-minded pursuit of their chief suspect, Robert Xie, subjecting him to psychological warfare and ignoring evidence suggesting an alternative theory, a Sydney court has heard.
The claims were made by the lawyer for Mr Xie, 47, during an application for bail in the NSW Supreme Court today.
Mr Xie was charged in May last year with five counts of murder for the killings, following one of the largest homicide investigations in NSW history.
In submissions made to the court today, Graham Turnbull, SC, said the police investigation "has the hallmark of a single-minded pursuit of the accused to the exclusion of all others", and that it ignored evidence that did not fit with their predetermined explanation.
Police claim that Mr Xie switched off the power in the Lin family's North Epping home before killing them, but DNA found on the power switch could not be identified as his.
There were also a significant number of hairs found at the crime scene but - other than those belonging to the victims - these could not be identified either.
"There was in fact no DNA from the applicant [Mr Xie] found on any items taken by police from the crime scene ... nor any of the victims' DNA found on any of his items or his property," Mr Turnbull said.
In a bid to counter Mr Turnbull's claims, the head of the police investigation into the killings, Detective Inspector Joe Maree, was called by the Crown prosecutor to give evidence.
He revealed that, a few weeks before his death, Mr Lin had seen an armed robbery outside the Epping RSL Club, and that police had investigated the possibility that the murder of Mr Lin and his family was an attempt to get rid of potential witnesses.
However, this explanation was disproved by the fact that two of the armed robbers were out of the country at the time of the killings, while the others were "under close police surveillance", the officer said.
Detective Inspector Maree said "all of the possible alternative explanations" had been investigated by police.
Mr Turnbull then claimed that police had subjected Mr Xie to "psychological warfare" including subjecting him to a torrid interview characterised by sardonic and sarcastic comments by the police, and a refusal to allow the suspect to have an interpreter.
"You rattled his cage because you needed more evidence didn't you?" Mr Turnbull said. The officer denied this, but conceded that, at the time of the interview, police had needed more evidence before laying charges.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
NY: Two cops finally forced to resign over 2006 shooting
Two New York Police Department detectives involved in the 2006 shooting death of an unarmed man after his bachelor party have been forced to resign.
Marc Cooper and Michael Oliver quit the NYPD on Monday. Their resignations resolved disciplinary charges stemming from the slaying of Sean Bell. They'll still get their pensions.
The police department fired a third detective, Gescard Isnora, on Friday after he lost his administrative case. A lieutenant is expected to resign on Tuesday.
The detectives shot and killed Bell and injured two friends following an altercation outside a Queens strip club where he had his bachelor party. Isnora claimed he opened fire first because he thought the men were trying to retrieve a gun.
All three detectives were acquitted of criminal charges at a non-jury trial in 2008.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Two New York Police Department detectives involved in the 2006 shooting death of an unarmed man after his bachelor party have been forced to resign.
Marc Cooper and Michael Oliver quit the NYPD on Monday. Their resignations resolved disciplinary charges stemming from the slaying of Sean Bell. They'll still get their pensions.
The police department fired a third detective, Gescard Isnora, on Friday after he lost his administrative case. A lieutenant is expected to resign on Tuesday.
The detectives shot and killed Bell and injured two friends following an altercation outside a Queens strip club where he had his bachelor party. Isnora claimed he opened fire first because he thought the men were trying to retrieve a gun.
All three detectives were acquitted of criminal charges at a non-jury trial in 2008.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Outrage as British police seek secrecy at inquest into man whose death sparked the London riots
"The United Soviet Kingdom"?
A full inquest into the police shooting of a man whose death sparked the London riots last summer may never take place after a police watchdog suggested evidence should be kept secret.
The family of Mark Duggan reacted with anger yesterday after a pre-inquest review into his death in Tottenham in August heard that sensitive material relating to police ‘decision making’ may not be disclosed – even to the coroner.
The move has alarmed campaigners, who warn of a ‘pandemic of secrecy’ coming at a time of controversial plans to extend private court hearings.
The Daily Mail has led the way in revealing growing unease at Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke’s proposals for an extension of ‘closed material procedures’, in which cases are held in secret.
North London Coroners’ Court was told the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) may have material about 29-year-old Duggan’s death ‘that it could not properly disclose to a coroner’.
Instead a judge could hold a special inquiry where the crucial details about why firearms officers shot the suspected gangster would be held behind closed doors.
Yesterday the Duggan family accused the IPCC of ‘delay tactics’.
If an inquest was blocked, there would still be a legal obligation to hold an alternative inquiry.
But the family fear that the case may echo that of Azelle Rodney who was shot dead by police in 2005, yet his family are still waiting for a public inquiry seven years later.
Duggan’s aunt Carole said: ‘We believe the IPCC are withholding information from us. ‘Maybe they think we will go away, come to terms with what has happened, but we are a grieving family and we will always grieve for Mark.’
Duggan was being followed in a covert operation when armed officers stopped the taxi he was travelling in and shot him dead on August 4 last year. The shooting sparked the riots that swept across Tottenham before engulfing many parts of the capital and spreading to other parts of the country.
Yesterday Coroner Andrew Walker said: ‘We anticipate that the IPCC may be in possession of material that would be relevant to the issue of police decision making but could not be disclosed even to the coroner. ‘That raises a likelihood and I want the family to understand that that may mean that an inquest cannot proceed.’
He added: ‘Underneath this we must not forget is a grieving family who need to understand what’s happened. The sooner we can identify whether the inquest is the means by which the state discharge their obligations the sooner an alternative if one is necessary can be put into place.’
Even if an inquest does take place it will now be pushed back to January next year to allow for a separate criminal trial to take place into the circumstances in which Duggan got the gun.
Yesterday the IPCC refused to explain why evidence could not be disclosed, but it is thought to relate to surveillance Scotland Yard had been carrying out.
Helen Shaw, co-director of Inquest, a charity providing support for bereaved people facing cases in a coroner’s court, said: ‘We share the coroner’s concern about undue delay.
The IPCC needs to move much more quickly – it shouldn’t have taken this long for them to tell the family and the coroner about their concerns about sensitive evidence.
‘While there are legal complexities surrounding sensitive material, it is absolutely vital a solution is found so that the family can get answers. Failure to do so will only lead to more distrust of the investigation process.’
Shami Chakrabarti, of civil liberties campaign group Liberty, said: ‘The least Mark Duggan’s family and Londoners deserve is a full and open hearing into how and why he was killed.
Given Government attempts to lock down our open civil courts, public confidence is hardly boosted by the IPCC falling victim to this new pandemic of secrecy.
Mark Ley-Morgan QC, representing the IPCC, said its report into the killing would be released to the parties by early autumn.
A further pre-inquest review has been scheduled for October, with a provisional date for a hearing set in January next year if the disclosure issue is resolved.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
"The United Soviet Kingdom"?
A full inquest into the police shooting of a man whose death sparked the London riots last summer may never take place after a police watchdog suggested evidence should be kept secret.
The family of Mark Duggan reacted with anger yesterday after a pre-inquest review into his death in Tottenham in August heard that sensitive material relating to police ‘decision making’ may not be disclosed – even to the coroner.
The move has alarmed campaigners, who warn of a ‘pandemic of secrecy’ coming at a time of controversial plans to extend private court hearings.
The Daily Mail has led the way in revealing growing unease at Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke’s proposals for an extension of ‘closed material procedures’, in which cases are held in secret.
North London Coroners’ Court was told the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) may have material about 29-year-old Duggan’s death ‘that it could not properly disclose to a coroner’.
Instead a judge could hold a special inquiry where the crucial details about why firearms officers shot the suspected gangster would be held behind closed doors.
Yesterday the Duggan family accused the IPCC of ‘delay tactics’.
If an inquest was blocked, there would still be a legal obligation to hold an alternative inquiry.
But the family fear that the case may echo that of Azelle Rodney who was shot dead by police in 2005, yet his family are still waiting for a public inquiry seven years later.
Duggan’s aunt Carole said: ‘We believe the IPCC are withholding information from us. ‘Maybe they think we will go away, come to terms with what has happened, but we are a grieving family and we will always grieve for Mark.’
Duggan was being followed in a covert operation when armed officers stopped the taxi he was travelling in and shot him dead on August 4 last year. The shooting sparked the riots that swept across Tottenham before engulfing many parts of the capital and spreading to other parts of the country.
Yesterday Coroner Andrew Walker said: ‘We anticipate that the IPCC may be in possession of material that would be relevant to the issue of police decision making but could not be disclosed even to the coroner. ‘That raises a likelihood and I want the family to understand that that may mean that an inquest cannot proceed.’
He added: ‘Underneath this we must not forget is a grieving family who need to understand what’s happened. The sooner we can identify whether the inquest is the means by which the state discharge their obligations the sooner an alternative if one is necessary can be put into place.’
Even if an inquest does take place it will now be pushed back to January next year to allow for a separate criminal trial to take place into the circumstances in which Duggan got the gun.
Yesterday the IPCC refused to explain why evidence could not be disclosed, but it is thought to relate to surveillance Scotland Yard had been carrying out.
Helen Shaw, co-director of Inquest, a charity providing support for bereaved people facing cases in a coroner’s court, said: ‘We share the coroner’s concern about undue delay.
The IPCC needs to move much more quickly – it shouldn’t have taken this long for them to tell the family and the coroner about their concerns about sensitive evidence.
‘While there are legal complexities surrounding sensitive material, it is absolutely vital a solution is found so that the family can get answers. Failure to do so will only lead to more distrust of the investigation process.’
Shami Chakrabarti, of civil liberties campaign group Liberty, said: ‘The least Mark Duggan’s family and Londoners deserve is a full and open hearing into how and why he was killed.
Given Government attempts to lock down our open civil courts, public confidence is hardly boosted by the IPCC falling victim to this new pandemic of secrecy.
Mark Ley-Morgan QC, representing the IPCC, said its report into the killing would be released to the parties by early autumn.
A further pre-inquest review has been scheduled for October, with a provisional date for a hearing set in January next year if the disclosure issue is resolved.
Original report here
(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today. Now hosted on Wordpress. If you cannot access it, go to the MIRROR SITE, where posts appear as well as on the primary site. I have reposted the archives (past posts) for Wicked Thoughts HERE or HERE or here
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