Whipped Cream Difficulties

Around this time last year, we noted the police officer in Franklin County, VA, who shot his ex-wife and engaged in a wild police chase that screwed up traffic for miles.

Well, the former sheriff – the one who allegedly ignored warnings that his deputy was hunting his ex-wife – the one who allegedly told dispatchers not to put out a BOLO – has been charged with “misconduct by an elected official”. This is a “class 1” misdemeanor charge, so it isn’t like he’s going to do hard time, but..

…he’s also being sued by the dead woman’s family. And by two former deputies who were fired after an investigation in 2009 that led to charges against the sheriff of “failure to maintain adequate records”. (Those charges were dismissed.) And by another woman who claims the sheriff didn’t act on threats to kill her son until it was too late.

(This comes by way of the Cato Institute’s new “National Police Misconduct Reporting Project” which in turn is an outgrowth of work done by David Packman.)

On February 9th of this year, Officer Daniel Harmon–Wright of the Culpeper, VA police department shot and killed Patricia Cook in the parking lot of a church preschool.

Officer Harmon–Wright was responding to a call about a woman “acting suspiciously”, and claimed that Ms. Cook attempted to flee, rolling up the window in her Jeep and trapping his arm as she did so.

There are questions about Officer Harmon-Wright’s account of events. For example, Ms. Cook’s Jeep did not have power windows, which raises obvious questions about the whole “rolling up her window and trapping his arm” thing. Reason’s “Hit and Run” blog has some good coverage of the case here.

One point noted by Reason and other reporters is that Officer Harmon-Wright has several names: he’s also gone by “Daniel Wayne Sullivan” and “Dan Wayne”.

On Tuesday, Officer Harmon-Wright was charged with “murder, malicious shooting into an occupied vehicle, malicious shooting into an occupied vehicle resulting in a death and use of a firearm in the commission of a felony” by a grand jury.

This is interesting enough, but there’s another aspect to the story that I think is worth noting: Officer Harmon-Wright’s mother, who was “an administrative secretary to the chief of police” when he was hired as a police officer, has been charged with three counts of “uttering” and three counts of “forgery of public documents”. Apparently, the grand jury turned up evidence that she had altered public records to remove “negative information” from Officer Harmon-Wright’s personnel file.

Some folks go “wow” at $320 million dollar incinerators, and I can’t blame them for that. Other folks go “wow” when they’re faced with how deep the corruption seems to run sometimes.

(Hattip: Commendante Balko.)

I apologize. I think I may have missed a firing or two along the way. I plead the pressures of various things and throw myself on the mercy of the court.

Today’s APD firing is a doozy.

Det. Richard Munoz worked in the burglary division. Apparently, back in December, someone brought up concerns about how he was handing their case. In the ensuing investigation:

• “Munoz told officials he had conducted an “interrogation” of a burglary suspect over the phone, but did not record it, and did not document other steps he had taken during his investigation, the memo said.”
• Munoz didn’t return calls from victims, didn’t properly document evidence, and didn’t follow up with witnesses.
• “During this investigation, Munoz said he was “running fast and loose doing investigations,” and also provided statements to officials that proved untrue when compared to statements from other officers, witnesses and documents on record, the memo said.”

Interestingly, former Det. Munoz (who can still appeal his firing) had been suspended six times since he started with APD (in 1995) and was actually fired in 2006 “for policy violations related to his honesty, use of force and documentation of incidents”. He was reinstated by an arbitrator, and suspended in 2008 for public intoxication. After that suspension, Chief Acevedo apparently told him “one more, and you’re out”.

Also:

Munoz was a member of a unit formed last year after an Austin Public Safety Commission meeting where city leaders discussed the low rate of burglaries being solved. Acevedo said in April that the burglary unit has seen several successes, including a rise in the burglary clearance rate.

An Alabama police chief says he recently discovered that his department has two unmanned aerial vehicles.

…

[Gadsen, AL police chief John] Crane, who was named police chief in February, says he doesn’t know why they were purchased. The cost was about $150,000, paid through a federal law enforcement grant.

This is still a developing story, but a (currently unnamed) APD officer was shot and killed early this morning. I expect to have more to say about this as information comes in, but two immediate points:

1. I drive past the location of this shooting (the Wal-Mart at I-35 and Parmer Lane) daily. This is not what we would call a “bad” part of town.
2. This is the first APD death in the line of duty since 2004, according to the Statesman.

Edited to add: The deceased officer has been identified as Jaime Padron.

In other news, there was also a fatal officer involved shooting in East Austin last night.

…the officer attempted during the chase to use his Taser stun gun to subdue the man but that “it was not effective.”

Carter said that at one point, the officer and the man struggled for control of the officer’s gun and that the officer then fired what investigators say was one to three shots.

And:

Shortly after 8 p.m., a crowd of more than 100 people had gathered near the scene and rocks were thrown in the direction of at least one police car, which sustained a broken window. Some officers donned riot gear.

Former New Orleans Police Department Officer Robert Faulcon Jr. was sentenced today to 65 years in prison for his role in the Danziger Bridge shootings. Officer Faulcon shot Ronald Madison, a mentally handicapped man who was 40 years old, in the back with a shotgun. Faulcon was convicted of six counts of depravation of rights under color of law, three counts of using a weapon during the commission of a crime of violence, one count of conspiracy, one count of obstruction of justice, and one count of civil rights conspiracy.

Former New Orleans Police Department Sergeant Kenneth Bowen was sentenced to 40 years in prison for his role in the Danziger Bridge shootings. Bowen jumped out of a rented truck loaded with police officers and fired an “AK-47” at a concrete barrier that people were hiding behind. Bowen was convicted of six counts of depravation of rights under color of law, two counts of using a weapon during the commission of a crime of violence, one count of conspiracy, two counts of obstruction of justice, and two counts of civil rights conspiracy.

Former New Orleans Police Department Sergeant Robert Gisevius Jr. was sentenced to 40 years in prison for his role in the Danziger Bridge shootings. Gisevius was in the same truck, and also jumped out of it and fired a “M-4 rifle”. He also helped cover up the events at the Danziger Bridge. Gisevius was convicted of five counts of depravation of rights under color of law, two counts of using a weapon during the commission of a crime of violence, one count of conspiracy, one counts of obstruction of justice, and two counts of civil rights conspiracy.

Former New Orleans Police Department officer Anthony Villavaso II was sentenced to 38 years in prison for his role in the Danziger Bridge shootings. Villavaso was also in the truck, and also jumped out and fired an “AK-47” at unarmed people on the bridge. Villavaso was convicted of five counts of depravation of rights under color of law, two counts of using a weapon during the commission of a crime of violence, one count of conspiracy, one count of obstruction of justice, and one count of civil rights conspiracy.

Former New Orleans Police Department Sergeant Arthur Kaufman was sentenced to 6 years in prison for his role in the Danziger Bridge shootings. Kaufman was not actually involved in the shootings, but was convicted of having “authored several reports and draft reports containing false or fabricated information”; in short, assisting in the cover-up. Kaufman was convicted of four counts of falsification of records in a federal investigation, three counts of giving false statements, two counts of “civil rights conspiracy for false prosecution” (translated into English, I believe that means he tried to have innocent people falsely prosecuted to cover up what really happened), and one count of conspiracy.

(For those who are unfamiliar with the Danziger Bridge incident, one of the sidebars to the linked article is a handy PDF explaining what really happened. The short version is that during Katrina a bunch of trigger-happy NOPD cops shot a bunch of folks on the bridge and then tried to cover it up.)

Bad news: Karl F. Thompson Jr. still has not been sentenced for beating Otto Zehm to death.

Good news: It looks like two more officers with the Spokane PD are going to be charged with crimes related to Zehm’s death.

Attorneys representing Officers Sandra McIntyre and Tim Moses both confirmed today that they have entered discussions with federal prosecutors about potential obstruction of justice charges relating to their clients’ testimony during the investigation that led to the Nov. 3 conviction of former Officer Karl F. Thompson Jr.

…

McIntyre testified three times before the grand jury in 2009. She admitted during her testimony at the 2011 trial that she met with an assistant city attorney who suggested that she answer “I don’t recall” to questions about the incident when in fact she did remember some portions of the event.

Question: if McIntyre is being charged with obstruction of justice, aren’t similar charges justified against the city attorney who suggested she lie under oath? Isn’t that, at the very least, subornation of perjury? And can’t you be disbarred for that, in addition to getting hard time in a federal prison?

(Hattip: the Injustice News Feed, by way of TJIC on the Twitter.)

I went around and around about posting this, because I was worried about spoiling the broth boring my readers. But I think this is worth noting.

Over the weekend, David Hanners, the Dallas Morning News reporter who did the early coverage of the Cook case, posted a long comment in response to Michael Hall’s post, “What the ‘Tyler Morning Telegraph’ Failed to Tell You about Kerry Max Cook”.  The Texas Monthly blog promoted that comment to a full post (in the process cleaning up the formatting so it is more readable): that post is here.

Summarizing, Hanners also has issues with the daily paper’s coverage of the case, and doesn’t believe Cook is guilty.

I am probably one of the few people who has gone into Mr. Cook’s case with objective eyes. When I began looking into it, I wasn’t out to prove him guilty or innocent; frankly, I didn’t care. My reason for looking into his case was to try and answer a very simple question involving the administration of justice: Why did it take the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals nearly eight years to rule in his initial appeal?

Hanners also mentions a couple of things about the police investigation that I didn’t know, and are frankly shocking. The police apparently did not interview the victim’s co-workers until they complained, then “the detectives went out to the school and basically waited for people to come to them—in full view of Mr. Mayfield. [the other suspect in the case -DB]”

Then there’s the missing stocking. Police initially found just one sock at the crime scene. The prosecution claimed that the killer mutilated Linda Edwards body, and took body parts away from the crime scene in one of her stockings. Apparently, there were no body parts taken…

When the jurors in the first retrial had the trial exhibits back in the jury room, they opened the sealed evidence bag containing Ms. Edwards’ jeans, pulled them out and held them up. The “missing” stocking dropped out. The cops couldn’t even find a stocking in a pant leg.

And, now that there’s DNA pointing to someone else…

I clearly remember David Dobbs, the prosecutor handling the retrials, telling me prior to the testing that they were excited about the prospects of a test because the semen sample “could only have been left by the killer.” Those were his exact words to me, and I remember him saying it as if it were yesterday. So then the sample is sent away for testing, the deal with Mr. Cook is offered and accepted—and then the results come back showing the semen belonged to someone other than Mr. Cook. Suddenly, the prosecution’s story changes. Now they say, “Well, of course it was somebody else. But Mr. Cook is still the killer.”

Over at the Texas Monthly web site, Michael Hall has an interesting blog post about the case of Kerry Max Cook.

To be honest, I’d heard the name, I’d seen some of the press coverage, but I never quite had a handle on what happened with this case. Hall’s post is a pretty good introduction.

In brief, Cook was charged with the 1977 murder of Linda Edwards. He was convicted at his first trial in 1978: ten years later, the Dallas Morning News exposed various issues from the first trial (a lying jailhouse snitch, a detective who claimed he could tell how old fingerprints were). Cook was granted a retrial in 1991.

The second trial ended in a hung jury. During that trial, even more evidence of prosecutorial misconduct came out in court. Cook was tried a third time in 1994, and was found guilty (again) and sentenced to death (again).

That third conviction was reversed in 1996 by the Court of Criminal Appeals, which specifically called out the misconduct on the part of the prosecution and police.

Cook, for various reasons, ended up entering a no-contest plea “in which Cook would maintain his innocence while only acknowledging the evidence the state would offer to try and convict him” before the fourth trial. DNA testing (the results of which became available only after Cook’s plea) seems to point to another man as the actual culprit. Cook is attempting to get additional DNA testing done, and to get a declaration of actual innocence from the Texas courts.

The entire case is much more complex than I’ve outlined here; I commend Hall’s post to your attention.

(Hattip: GFB.)