Tag Archives: officer

Swann TV, US

Man Who Changed Investigations for WI Officer Involved Shootings, Speaks Out On Tony Robinson Shooting

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Washington D.C.- After Wisconsin police spent a mere two days investigating the police who shot and killed his son during a traffic stop in 2004, Michael Bell Sr. made it his mission to change how law enforcement in the state looked into officer-involved shootings.

He worked with police and sheriffs departments, lawmakers and criminal justice and law professors to require an external review takes place whenever an officer of the law shoots a civilian.

Bell tells Ben Swann how his son’s death has led to his involvement with the protests over Tony Robinson Jr.’s death in Madison.

Police Accountability, Police State, US

NYPD officer indicted for stomping a citizen’s head

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An NYPD officer has been indicted on multiple charges, including assault, after he allegedly kicked a subdued citizen in the head during an arrest over the summer.

A video of the arrest allegedly shows Officer Joel Edouard, 37, and his partner arresting 32-year-old Jahmiel Cuffee, according to CBS New York.

Cuffee was allegedly drinking on a sidewalk in Brooklyn, and the officers claim he was in possession of marijuana at the time. While attempting to arrest Cuffee, a bystander began to videotape the incident with their cellphone. This video shows other officers begin to arrive to help mediate the situation, but near the end of the video, Edouard allegedly is seen stomping on Cuffee’s head after he was already handcuffed and on the ground.

Brooklyn District Attorney Ken Thompson said, according to RT, “Police officers put their lives on the line every day to keep us all safe. However, this defendant allegedly stomped on the head of a suspect as he lay on the ground, which is unacceptable for a police officer.” Thompson continued by saying this indictment should not reflect the work the majority of officers who perform their duty honorably are doing in New York City. 

At the trial on Tuesday, Edouard’s attorney, Stephen Worth, pleaded not guilty to the charges he is faced with. Worth also said Edouard was simply trying to place handcuffs on Cuffee and this is no more than a case of an officer doing their job. “The act, so-called kick, was part of the arrest process and to attempt to get his hand in custody so he could be handcuffed… It’s not a kick, we’ll leave that for trial.”

After the incident, Edouard was stripped of his badge and gun according to New York Magazine. If convicted, Edouard could face up to a year in prison.

Drug War, Police Accountability, Politics, US

No Charges For California Officer Caught With 5 Pounds Of Marijuana

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No charges are planned on being filed against a California police officer who was in possession of between four and five pounds of marijuana at his home in Oakley, California.

Officer Joe Avila, a 17-year-veteran of the Richmond Police Force (RPF), has been under investigation by the RPF since January, according to the Richmond Confidential.  It was around this time the RPF began to notice Avila was not filing any follow-up reports for about 37 calls of service he had gone on.

One of these calls was to a UPS Store in November, 2013, where it is suspected Avila had collected the marijuana and then failed to turn the drugs over to the department’s evidence department.

Robin Lipetzky, the county’s chief public defender, told the Raw Story, “They are cutting him some slack because he’s a police officer… Anybody else found with 5 pounds of marijuana in their possession, I don’t care who that is, that person is going to be charged with a crime.”

While he was under investigation, Avila said he had used two of the five pounds of marijuana to help train his police dog.  The other drugs though, he did not comment on.

When the investigation was under way, Avila was the key witness in a case where he had helped to secure a conviction.  However, Deputy Public Defender Elise McNamara who represented the defendant in this case, is saying this is an ethics violation.

“They have a constitutional mandate to disclose exculpatory evidence to us prior to a trial,” said McNamara.  “If there’s an officer on the case who’s been discredited, then we have the right to know that.”

“The DA’s office is taking the position that this officer did nothing wrong. And because they think he did nothing wrong, they are not turning over any information,” said Lipetzky.  “They have a vested interest in not having an officer’s credibility called into question, because then it impacts all the cases they’re trying to prosecute.”

As of now, Avila is on paid administrative leave.

Civil Liberties, Featured, Police Accountability, Police State, US

Supreme Court rules an officer’s misunderstanding of a law is protected

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A Supreme Court ruling on Monday found police officers who pull over a car for a traffic stop can search and seize the vehicle, even if the officer does not have a full understanding of the law used to pull the vehicle over.

The ruling comes after Nicholas Heien, a North Carolina resident, was pulled over in 2009 on the premise of a single broken taillight.  After being pulled over, the officer searched the vehicle and found a baggie of cocaine, and the officer then arrested Heien.

However, North Carolina law only requires one working taillight, so when the officer pulled over Heien, it would appear he had no legal right to do so.

The case was brought up to a North Carolina appeals court who, according to VOX, agreed the stop was unlawful.  The case was then heard by the state’s highest court and the Supreme Court, who both ruled in favor of the officer, saying even if the officer does not know the technical aspects of a law, a search and seizure is still constitutional.

“This Court held  that reasonable mistakes of law, like those of fact, could justify a certificate of probable cause,” reads the Court’s ruling.  The vehicle search, therefore, does not violate the Fourth Amendment, as was argued by Heien, which protects citizens from unlawful searches and seizures without probable cause.  The Court said, “a search or seizure may be permissible even though the justification for the action includes a reasonable factual mistake.”

Ultimately, the Court found the Fourth Amendment requires officers to act reasonably, but not perfectly, since officers are human and make mistakes as well.  Chief Justice John Roberts said, according to the AP, an officer’s mistake of fact can rightly justify a traffic stop and therefore that misunderstanding can also satisfy the Constitution.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor was the only member of the Court to disagree with the decision, saying an officer’s mistake or misunderstanding of a law, “no matter how reasonable, cannot support the individualized suspicion necessary to justify a seizure under the Fourth Amendment.”

Featured, US

A California police officer has been fired for not using violence

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A California State University Monterey Bay police officer has been fired from the force after he chose not to use his Taser on a student threatening suicide in February.

The officer, a 20 year veteran of the force who has not been named, was reportedly the first officer on the scene when a CSUMB student was threatening to kill himself in a dorm room.  The student in question was holding a knife, hammer, and was threatening to light himself on fire, according to the Free Thought Project.

Rather then using his Taser on the student, the officer began to talk to the student which resulted in a deescalation of the situation.  The officer then went to get the student a glass of water when officers from the local Marina Police Department showed up and began to use their Tasers on the suicidal student.

Marina Police Chief Edmundo Rodriguez said, according to the Monetery Herald, when his officers arrived on the scene, they found blood in the student’s dorm, and the student’s sweater appeared to be singed. The knife and hammer were also in the room, but the weapons were not in the student’s hands.

Rodriguez then said, the student “was clearly a danger to himself and he was in crisis… We were trying to keep him from accessing the weapons or leave, to get him medical attention.”

After the incident, Rodriguez’s department issued a “failure to act” complaint against the campus police officer because he did not engage in the situation as the other officers had done.  “He just stood there,” said Rodriguez.

The president of the Statewide University Police Association (SUPA), Jeff Solomon, said according to the Raw Story, “Our officer said and felt that there was no need for the level of force that was applied.”

Solomon then said, “The other officers started yelling and screaming to get down, Tased him multiple times, and from what we understand (told the university officer) to Tase him again.”

Later, the father of the suicidal student told reporters, “It defies logic and is extremely disappointing that, at a time when law enforcement is under fire for using more force than necessary, an officer is being terminated for attempting to use civilized methods to resolve a situation,”

University officials did not comment on the details of the case, but they did say the situation “is much more complex than was conveyed.”