The Memphis Police Department has good reason to be down in the dumps....State auditors have found that drugs, guns and money went out the property room door.

More than $2 million worth of cocaine along with 560 pounds of marijuana,
66 guns and a small fortune in cash vanished from the Memphis Police
property and evidence room, a state audit released Tuesday shows.

Federal prosecutors say the loot was carted out the property room's back
door and sold. Numerous city workers and accused drug dealers face federal charges. One Memphis lawyer has been charged with laundering profits through his firm. The comptroller's report found that property room accounting was so sloppythat the stolen amounts could even be higher than auditors suggested.

by TChris

A former Maryland law enforcement officer who had the attitude "The law applies to everyone but me" -- a police superintendent, no less -- received a six month sentence for misusing thousands of dollars in public funds.

Edward Norris, 43, and his one-time chief of staff, John Stendrini, 60, spent the money on dinners, hotels and encounters with women. In one case, Norris used money from the police fund — originally set up during the Depression to help officers' families — to buy Valentine's Day lingerie for his mistresses.

by TChris

As TalkLeft has noted, the proliferation of Tasers in police departments holds the potential for abuse. While it's certainly preferable for an officer to incapacitate a suspect with a Taser instead of a gun, police departments must guard against the risk that officers will use Tasers when a less extreme response would suffice.

Experience in San Jose demonstrates that those fears are valid.

San Jose police zapped three separate suspects with 50,000-volt Tasers this past weekend, bringing the total of such incidents to at least 37 since every patrol officer was equipped with the less lethal weapons in April.

On Sunday, The Mercury News reported that the San Jose police had used their Tasers 34 times between April and June 12 -- a rate of about once every two days. The increase prompted one community activist to schedule a meeting with Police Chief Rob Davis to discuss what he called the department's "out-of-control" use of the weapons.

by TChris

This is sad.

A diabetic amputee who was released from a Los Angeles County jail languished for three days on a bench in the busy jailhouse lobby before he was noticed by deputies and rushed to a hospital, where he later died.

The Sheriff says that people often "linger" in the jail lobby, but it's difficult to understand why no county employee bothered to check sooner on an amputee who stayed on a lobby bench for three days.

by TChris

Fans of Crank Yankers may think that making prank calls is an art form, but making prank 911 calls has the potential to distract dispatchers from critical emergencies. Still, it's the kind of thing a 12-year-old might do without giving the consequences much thought.

Brian Daniel Vos and Corland Jay McDiarmid should know better. They aren't kids. They're officers of the Ionia, MI Police Dept. They called 911 three times and hung up because they wanted to "mess with" their friends on what they thought would be a slow night. Their reward? They've been charged with misdemeanors.

The runners-up for this week's award may not have committed a crime, but probably violated the Constitution by pulling over a car for "swerving" and giving a breath test to the driver (who tested zero and very probably didn't swerve). The real motivation for the traffic stop conducted by three Michigan police officers? They wanted to harass the passenger: the town's Mayor, who had threatened to lay off officers to save money in the town budget.

by TChris

Investigating the theft of a jet ski from his stepson's home, Sweetwater, Florida police officer Catalino Rodriguez questioned the owners of Extreme Jet Ski (one of whom was Peter Daniel). They denied knowledge of the theft. When Daniel drove through Sweetwater ten days later, a police car driven by Officer Allen St. Germain began to follow him. Daniel got scared and managed to lose St. Germain by turning off his headlights. That turned out to be a bad decision, as he was arrested later that night for "fleeing and eluding."

As Daniel was being booked into the jail, St. Germain slapped him, knocking him to the floor. The dispatcher, Robert Viera, decided it was a good time to take a lengthy "smoke break." St. Germain and Sgt. George Alvarez later pulled Daniel out of his cell to question him about the stolen jet ski. Daniel denied any knowledge of the theft, but that wasn't what the officers wanted to hear, so they used interrogation methods calculated to produce the desired answer.

Investigators alleged Alvarez then punched Daniel in the left cheek. Daniel fell to the floor. Daniel later testified that Alvarez and St. Germain kicked him and hit him repeatedly while he was on the floor. At one point, he said, Alvarez picked him up off the floor by his shirt and St. Germain hit him in the stomach area. He was not sure how many times he was kicked or punched nor how long the beating lasted.

As people who are brutally interrogated often do, Daniel told a story to put an end to the beating. He said that his friend, Danny Izquierdo, may have stolen the jet ski. The police arrested Izquierdo, but released him after a few hours of incarceration and questioning produced no evidence of his involvement. But Daniel's troubles didn't end there.

by TChris

From the Department of Irony:

The Attorney General of New Hampshire, Peter Heed, has resigned in the wake of an accusation that he engaged in inappropriate behavior (described by witnesses as rude and boorish) with a woman while they were dancing. The irony? They were attending a conference on the prevention of sexual abuse.

Heed, who denies that he did anything wrong, is in good company. "Rochester District Court Judge Franklin Jones was suspended after the conference after several women claimed he groped them." Maybe all the talk at the conference about sexual misbehavior was just too titillating for these public officials.

by TChris

Officer Bryan Conroy has been charged with manslaughter for shooting an unarmed African immigrant, Ousmane Zongo, to death. Conroy was guarding a locker full of counterfeit compact discs inside the Chelsea Mini-Storage when he saw Zongo.

Zongo, who did not speak English, had no criminal record and was not involved with the counterfeit ring, got scared and tried to flee, police said. Conroy pursued him and in a scuffle fired four shots at close range.

Conroy, who was in plain clothes, says he pulled his gun on an unarmed man to identify himself as a police officer. Pulling out a badge would have been more effective and less threatening. According to Conroy, Zongo thought Conroy was trying to rob him, so Zongo lunged for the gun. Conroy says he had no choice but to shoot Conroy. Four times.

Patrick Lynch, head of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, predictably complained that the grand jury made a "mistake." If it made a mistake, it was in indicting Conroy for the less serious offense of manslaughter rather than second degree murder, the charge reportedly pursued by the district attorney's office.

As TalkLeft reported yesterday, a 12-year-old who lacks the maturity to exercise sound judgment is facing a life sentence for murder. In this case, a police officer whose failure to exercise sound judgment resulted in a needless death might get probation. Does this make sense to anyone?

by TChris

There’s often a cozy relationship between prosecutors and the police -- so cozy that some prosecutors may be disinclined to investigate allegations that the police use excessive force when making arrests. That may be the case in El Paso, Texas, where more than 1,800 complaints of excessive force over the last five years led to the dismissal of only five officers, and the resignation of two more.

Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union say the investigations are overdue. "If you are a police officer in this town, you can violate criminal rights left and right and not get prosecuted," said Ed Hernandez, who with his wife, Maria, represents several plaintiffs.

Two “rarely used State Courts of Inquiry” are asking whether the district attorney and the police department “conspired to shield officers accused of brutalizing people in at least six cases.” One accusation (apparently substantiated by medical records) involves a teenager who says she was sexually assaulted by two El Paso officers. They remained free while she went to jail. Others who complained of brutality say that the police stalked them in retaliation for their complaints.

The investigation may extend to concerns raised by a former assistant police chief about the possible infiltration of the police department by Mexican drug cartels.

A collateral point demonstrates that the justice system isn’t working well in El Paso:

[The district attorney] defended an unusual arrangement, which critics call unconstitutional, that has his office rather than a magistrate setting bail for many defendants.

No need for separation of powers in El Paso. The DA is already acting as a judge by setting bail. Why not just let the DA act as jury and impose a sentence after finding guilt?

by TChris

The Mayor of Maple Park, Illinois was arrested last night in a gambling raid conducted by State Police at D.J.'s Tavern West. The Mayor was in good company: Maple Park's chief of police was also arrested.

In a highly unusual decision, set forth in a 45-page unanimous opinion, the Arizona Supreme Court upheld a recommendation for disbarment of the state's most "successful" capital homicide prosecutor for suborning and exploiting known perjury.

The use of false testimony in the trial of two men accused in a 1992 triple-slaying at a market in Tucson "could not have been more harmful to the justice system," wrote Justice Michael D. Ryan for the unanimous court. "A prosecutor who deliberately presents false testimony, especially in a capital case, has caused incalculable injury to the integrity of the legal profession and the justice system."

[Kenneth] Peasley was admitted to the state bar in 1974 and conducted about 250 felony cases, 140 of which were homicides, the court said. Sixty of the cases were capital murder trials. In a ruling overturning the conviction of one of the defendants in 2002, the Supreme Court said Peasley intentionally deceived the jury to paper over weaknesses in his case.

[hat tip to Peter Goldberger, who emails that apparently some of Peasley's victims were executed.]

by TChris

Off duty police officers sometimes work security at concerts or athletic events to earn a little extra cash, but a couple of officers in San Francisco are in trouble for pursuing movie careers in their off hours.

Two San Francisco police officers have come under investigation after their departments discovered they had starred in a pornographic movie entitled "Bus Stop Whores" that is circulating on the Internet. The officers, Kelly Francisco of the San Francisco Sheriff's Department and Darryl Watts of the city's police department, play a prostitute and a john in the film, whose teaser is, "These girls won't ride a bus today!" according to local news reports.