National Police Misconduct NewsFeed Daily Recap 10-26-11

Injustice Everywhere

VERBATIM POST

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Here are the 12 reports of police misconduct tracked in our National Police Misconduct News Feed for this Wednesday, October 26, 2011:

• Baltimore MD settled a lawsuit for $45k to a man who suffered broken arm when arrested by 2 cops on charges that were eventually dropped. It’s sad when excessive force is such a common problem in a city that newspapers bury these reports as a small blurb within an article about something else like it’s an everyday thing. [0] bit.ly/uKaqLg

• Orlando FL settles suit for $24k to a man who was tasered twice & peppersprayed several minutes after he turned around and grabbed a cop who shoved him from behind then apologized because he didn’t realize it was a cop. [0] thesent.nl/sHQtXW

• Antioch CA settled a class action suit for $360k to low-income African American renters who targeted for more aggressive enforcement activities by police, allegedly just because they were poor and black. [0] bit.ly/rwtA85

• Yuma AZ cop was indicted on bribery & obstruction charges for allegedly extorting sex from a woman in exchange for police assistance when she required help from the police. [1] bit.ly/rpfgST

• Honolulu HI cop who is accused of raping a mentally disabled shoplifting suspect was suspended w/o pay but hasn’t been charged despite word leaking out that he told his fellow cops he had sex with the woman and that he failed a polygraph test about the alleged incident. He allegedly insists the sex was consensual. [4] bit.ly/to2XVo

• St John the Baptist Parish LA school cop has been indefinitely suspended w/o pay after he was accused of inappropriately touching a female student. [0] http://bit.ly/uc9kJL

• Cheyenne WY cop sentenced to 4mo in jail on a misdemeanor false imprisonment involving a domestic dispute with his wife. He was acquitted on the other felony charges he faced. [0] bit.ly/v4YZim

• Winsboro LA cop was fired after arrested on a domestic violence battery warrant while he was on duty. His girlfriend was apparently hospitalized after the alleged incident. [0] bit.ly/sTORfq

• Milwaukee WI cops face minimal punishment for drunk driving even when taxi drivers usually lose their licenses for the same crimes as detailed in part 2 of a local paper’s onging series about police misconduct, transparency and accountability in that city. [2] bit.ly/v8Ue9a

• Baltimore MD settled suit for $290k to an ex-police chopper pilot claiming he was retaliated against and forced out for reporting departmental waste and safety issues. [0] bit.ly/uKaqLg

• Indianapolis IN police are being accused of giving a police lieutenant special treatment when he was found drunk in his truck while armed in the parking lot of an apartment complex that he didn’t live at. Residents who called police about the people parked in a truck who didn’t belong there complain that he wasn’t detained when anyone else clearly would have been arrested. [3] bit.ly/uRv69f

• Jefferson City MO cop is on paid leave after arrested for drunk driving and leaving the scene of an accident. [2] bit.ly/uNnn47

Before I go, a quick reminder about some of the guidelines about what reports qualify for our news feed and police misconduct database:

1. We only track reports about misconduct committed by people who are employed as a certified or sworn officer at the time of the alleged incident. This means we don’t track misconduct committed by people who are no longer officers when they do something bad and we don’t track cases involving non-sworn employees like clerks, parking enforcement, or corrections officers.
2. We have guidelines set to limit updates on reports to only include status changes that are significant to a case that has already been tracked. So, while we would report that a cop who we tracked as being charged with a crime was convicted or sentenced for it, we won’t track that the officer’s trial started or specific items of testimony about the case were published unless that testimony revealed other allegations not already tracked.

For a more detailed discussion about our reporting and tracking methodology, please refer to this page on our site.