Deaths and Injuries in Police Custody

[Andrea]

Video shows man caught in bite by SDPD K9
Andrea: Video shows handcuffed, down on the ground black man being bitten by K9 police unable to control

[Andrea]

Video shows police officer beating homeless woman

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/11/us/georgia-police-beating/index.html

A police department in Georgia has reopened an internal investigation after a cellphone video surfaced showing a DeKalb County police officer striking a homeless woman with his baton several times during an arrest.

The incident occurred at a gas station station in Decatur on June 4. The officer had gone to the Chevron in response to a complaint about the woman begging for money from customers.

The video posted on YouTube doesn't show what led to the incident.

It starts with a tense scene in which the woman, identified as Katie McCrary in a police report, is on the floor as a male police officer beats her with his baton. The officer had filed a Use of Force report after the incident and had been cleared following an internal affairs investigation.

In light of the new cellphone video, the DeKalb County Police Department said in a statement Monday: "Now that the Department has this new evidence we have reopened the investigation and will determine whether the incident is consistent with policy and the law."

The incident marks another controversy that has risen over the scrutiny of police tactics.

The identity of the police officer in the Decatur incident hasn't been released.

In his incident report dated June 5, the police officer said, when he arrived at the gas station, McCrary "attempted to push me out of the way and walk out of the door."

McCrary allegedly tried to walk past the officer again and told him she was a federal agent, according to his incident report. More words were exchanged and McCrary "reached out and grabbed my badge," and after being warned not to touch him, she "grabbed my vest and radio," according to his incident report. He said he used his baton on her legs, forearms and "one strike inadvertently struck the side of her head as she was moving around."

The cellphone video starts with McCrary lying on the floor with her arms and legs in the air as she attempts to kick at the officer who is standing. He swats her multiple times with his baton.

"Hey, Katie. Stop resisting!" yells an unknown man in the store. "Stop resisting."

The officer strikes her several more times as the woman squirms on the ground.

At one point, he places the baton on the back of her neck and pins her down with his knee on her back. When she grabs his baton, he says twice, "Let it go, or I'm going to shoot you."

"No. Please don't shoot her," a bystander says.

Near the end of the video, the officer places her in handcuffs.

McCrary asks repeatedly, "What did I do? What did I do wrong?"

DeKalb County Police Department said in a statement, "The narrative in the officer's report appears to be consistent with the video."

The officer wrote in his incident report that he took McCrary to DeKalb County Jail, "where she was refused and deferred to Grady Memorial Hospital for further evaluation." He noted she had a half-inch cut on her shin and a welt on her forearm. She was later released by the hospital.

McCrary was charged with obstructing or hindering law enforcement officers. She was given a criminal trespass warning at the request of the convenience store manager, police said.

CNN is attempting to reach McCrary or her lawyer.

CNN affiliate WGCL reported McCrary is currently in jail for an unrelated charge. One man who says he knows McCrary told WGCL that she's often seen at the store asking for money and alluded to mental health issues.

[Andrea]

Minneapolis Police Officer Fatally Shoots Australian Woman Who Called 911 for Help

http://fusion.kinja.com/minneapolis-police-officer-fatally-shoots-australian-wo-1796964768?utm_source=fusion_facebook&utm_medium=s ocialflow&utm_campaign=socialflow_fusion_facebook& utm_content=link

A 40–year–old spiritual healer from Australia who was engaged to be married next month was shot and killed Saturday night by a Minneapolis police after calling 911 to report suspicious activity in an alley by her home.

Police have not released many details of the shooting, and family members of the woman’s fiancé, a 50–year–old Minnesota man, say they are frustrated by the lack of cooperation from the police department.

The name of the victim, who lived in the U.S. for about three years, has not been released pending notification of relatives in Australia.

A statement by the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension released Sunday and reported by the Star Tribune said that two officers responded to the 911 call about a possible assault in an alley off W. 51st Street around 11:30 p.m.

“At one point one officer fired their weapon, fatally striking a woman,” the statement said.

The son of the victim’s fiancé said she would have walked about 100 yards in a well–lit alley to reach the scene of the shooting.

According to the Tribune, the responding officers’ body cameras were turned off during the incident, and patrol car cameras were unable to record what happened.

The shooting occurred just over a year after former police officer Jeronimo Yanez shot and killed Philando Castile in a St. Paul suburb during a traffic stop. Castile, whose girlfriend and her 4–year–old daughter were in the car at the time, had complied with the officer’s orders when Yanez inexplicably began firing.

Last month, a mostly white jury found Yanez not guilty of manslaughter charges, sparking nationwide protests including in Minneapolis–St. Paul, where thousands took to the streets in anger after the verdict was announced.

A vigil and rally for the latest victim was planned for Sunday evening in the southern Minneapolis neighborhood where the shooting occurred.

[Andrea]

How Fake Cops Got $1.2 Million in Real Weapons

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2017/07/21/how-fake-cops-got-1-2-million-in-real-weapons?ref=hp-1-112#.Cs5eHRmFT

When you think of a federal sting operation involving weaponry and military gear, the Government Accountability Office doesn’t immediately jump to mind. The office is tasked with auditing other federal agencies to root out fraud and abuse, usually by asking questions and poring over paperwork.

This year, the agency went a little more cowboy. The GAO created a fictitious law enforcement agency — complete with a fake website and a bogus address that traced back to an empty lot — and applied for military-grade equipment from the Department of Defense.

And in less than a week, they got it.

A GAO report issued this week says the agency’s faux cops were able to obtain $1.2 million worth of military gear, including night-vision goggles, simulated M-16A2 rifles and pipe bomb equipment from the Defense Department’s 1033 program, which supplies state and local law enforcement with excess materiel. The rifles and bomb equipment could have been made functional with widely available parts, the report said.

From left, examples of night-vision goggles, a simulated M-16A2 rifle and a pipe bomb trainer obtained from the Department of Defense by the Government Accountability Office through a fictitious law enforcement agency. GAO

“They never did any verification, like visit our ‘location,’ and most of it was by email,” said Zina Merritt, director of the GAO’s defense capabilities and management team, which ran the operation. “It was like getting stuff off of eBay.”

In its response to the sting, the Defense Department promised to tighten its verification procedures, including trying to visit the location of law enforcement agencies that apply and making sure agents picking up supplies have valid identification, the GAO report said. The department also promised to do an internal fraud assessment by April 2018.

A Defense Department spokesman declined to comment further.

The sting operation has its roots in the 2014 fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. At the time, many were surprised to see law enforcement respond to protests with armored trucks, sniper rifles, tear-gas bombs and other weapons of war.

Reporting by The Marshall Project and others found that much of the equipment came from the obscure 1033 program, which dates back to the Clinton era. Any equipment the U.S. military was not using — including Humvees, grenades, scuba-diving gear and even marching-band instruments — was available to local cops who could demonstrate a need.

The program has transferred more than $6 billion worth of supplies to more than 8,600 law enforcement agencies since 1991.

After Ferguson, then-President Barack Obama issued an executive order prohibiting the military from giving away some equipment and deeming other equipment “controlled,” establishing strict oversight and training requirements for law enforcement agencies that wanted it. The order also required a Defense Department and Justice Department working group to ensure oversight.

But since President Donald Trump took office, the group has not met, according to the Constitution Project, a bipartisan thinktank that had been participating in the meetings. Trump has said that he will revoke Obama’s executive order, although he has not yet.

Congress ordered the GAO to look into the program last year. A survey of local law enforcement did not turn up any instances of outright abuse at the state level but did find one illegitimate agency that had applied as a federal entity and was approved for equipment, Merritt said.

That’s when the agency launched the sting. Contrary to its public image, GAO has snagged other agencies with undercover work in the past, including an investigation of the Affordable Care Act in which the agency submitted fictitious applications and was approved for subsidized healthcare coverage.

In this case, the GAO created the fake law enforcement agency — whose name the agency would not reveal — and claimed it did high-level security and counterterrorism work. Once approved, the agency easily obtained the items from a Defense Department warehouse of unused military goods.

Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, which lists rescinding Obama’s executive order one of its top priorities for the Trump administration, said the possibility of fraud does not indict the whole program.

“It suggests only that the U.S. military is one of the world’s largest bureaucracies and as such is going to have some lapses in material control,” Pasco said. “Law enforcement is going to get that equipment and we’re going to use it, to protect both officers and civilians. And if we don’t get it free from the military, we’re going to have to buy it with taxpayer dollars.”

But to Madhuri Grewal, senior counsel for the Constitution Project, and other opponents of police militarization, the problem is more fundamental.

“There just aren’t many everyday policing uses for military equipment like this,” Grewal said. “The question is why can real law enforcement agencies get some of this stuff, let alone fake ones?”

Andrea: Bolding mine

[Andrea]

Two Baltimore detectives plead guilty in racketeering case

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/us/baltimore-police-guilty-pleas/index.html

Two former Baltimore police officers pleaded guilty Friday to federal racketeering charges, admitting that they committed armed robberies, made fraudulent overtime claims and filed false affidavits.

Detectives Maurice Ward and Evodio Hendrix were among seven Baltimore officers indicted in March as part of an alleged conspiracy involving those and other crimes. The seven officers, members of Baltimore's Gun Trace Task Force, were accused of stopping people -- some of whom were not suspected of any crimes -- seizing their money, and pocketing it.

In one instance, Hendrix and Ward, allegedly with another officer, stole $17,000 in cash from a suspect's house following a SWAT raid.

In another instance, several officers stopped a nursing home maintenance supervisor and stole $1,500 that he was planning to use to pay his rent, according to the indictment.

The stolen amounts range from $200 to $200,000, authorities said.
"These are really robberies by people who are wearing police uniforms," said then-Maryland US Attorney Rod Rosenstein in March.

Attorneys for Ward and Hendrix did not respond to requests for comment on Friday. A spokesperson for the Baltimore Police Department said the men are no longer employed with the department.

The other five officers included in the indictment are awaiting trial, scheduled for January 2018.

The indictment said the seven officers schemed to steal money, property and narcotics by detaining people, entering residences, conducting traffic stops and swearing out false search warrant affidavits.

The investigation began a year ago and included electronic surveillance of the officers.

Hendrix and Ward committed "large-scale time and attendance fraud," according to prosecutors, a charged leveled at their five co-defendants as well.

In one instance, Ward, Hendrix and another officer were paid for two days of work while on vacation in the Dominican Republic, according to the indictment.

Two of the officers were heard on a phone call boasting about their colleagues, including Hendrix and Ward, committing overtime fraud for "a whole year" and making "at least $8,000 to $10,000 a month," the indictment states.

"These are 1930's style gangsters as far as I'm concerned," Baltimore Police Commissioner Kevin Davis said in February. "This is a punch in the gut for the Baltimore Police Department."

The pleas come as the State's Attorney's office reviews about 100 cases in a separate investigation sparked by body camera footage allegedly showing a Baltimore police officer planting evidence at the scene of a January drug arrest.

It is also about seven months after the Justice Department, under former Attorney General Loretta Lynch, and the city of Baltimore announced a consent decree mandating police reforms in Baltimore.

That followed a DOJ report which said unconstitutional practices by some of Baltimore's officers lead to a disproportionate rates of stops, searches and arrests of black residents, and excessive use of force against juveniles and those with mental health disabilities.

[homoe]

I see Betsy Hodges has thrown her Police chef under the bus! By what I saw on the news, I thinking the voters will do the same to her!

[*Anya*]

They must have watched the Jonah Hill movie (War Dogs) or read the book first. These two guys exploited holes in bidding on government contracts and bought weapons to sell.

Watching it, I kept thinking, "This didn't really or couldn't really happen, could it?"

Our tax dollars at work:

"With the war in Iraq raging on, a young man (Jonah Hill) offers his childhood friend a chance to make big bucks by becoming an international arms dealer.

Together, they exploit a government initiative that allows businesses to bid on U.S. military contracts. Starting small allows the duo to rake in money and live the high life. They soon find themselves in over their heads after landing a $300 million deal to supply Afghan forces, a deal that puts them in business with some very shady people."

From IMDb.com

Originally Posted by Andrea

How Fake Cops Got $1.2 Million in Real Weapons

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2017/07/21/how-fake-cops-got-1-2-million-in-real-weapons?ref=hp-1-112#.Cs5eHRmFT

When you think of a federal sting operation involving weaponry and military gear, the Government Accountability Office doesn’t immediately jump to mind. The office is tasked with auditing other federal agencies to root out fraud and abuse, usually by asking questions and poring over paperwork.

This year, the agency went a little more cowboy. The GAO created a fictitious law enforcement agency — complete with a fake website and a bogus address that traced back to an empty lot — and applied for military-grade equipment from the Department of Defense.

And in less than a week, they got it.

A GAO report issued this week says the agency’s faux cops were able to obtain $1.2 million worth of military gear, including night-vision goggles, simulated M-16A2 rifles and pipe bomb equipment from the Defense Department’s 1033 program, which supplies state and local law enforcement with excess materiel. The rifles and bomb equipment could have been made functional with widely available parts, the report said.

From left, examples of night-vision goggles, a simulated M-16A2 rifle and a pipe bomb trainer obtained from the Department of Defense by the Government Accountability Office through a fictitious law enforcement agency. GAO

“They never did any verification, like visit our ‘location,’ and most of it was by email,” said Zina Merritt, director of the GAO’s defense capabilities and management team, which ran the operation. “It was like getting stuff off of eBay.”

In its response to the sting, the Defense Department promised to tighten its verification procedures, including trying to visit the location of law enforcement agencies that apply and making sure agents picking up supplies have valid identification, the GAO report said. The department also promised to do an internal fraud assessment by April 2018.

A Defense Department spokesman declined to comment further.

The sting operation has its roots in the 2014 fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. At the time, many were surprised to see law enforcement respond to protests with armored trucks, sniper rifles, tear-gas bombs and other weapons of war.

Reporting by The Marshall Project and others found that much of the equipment came from the obscure 1033 program, which dates back to the Clinton era. Any equipment the U.S. military was not using — including Humvees, grenades, scuba-diving gear and even marching-band instruments — was available to local cops who could demonstrate a need.

The program has transferred more than $6 billion worth of supplies to more than 8,600 law enforcement agencies since 1991.

After Ferguson, then-President Barack Obama issued an executive order prohibiting the military from giving away some equipment and deeming other equipment “controlled,” establishing strict oversight and training requirements for law enforcement agencies that wanted it. The order also required a Defense Department and Justice Department working group to ensure oversight.

But since President Donald Trump took office, the group has not met, according to the Constitution Project, a bipartisan thinktank that had been participating in the meetings. Trump has said that he will revoke Obama’s executive order, although he has not yet.

Congress ordered the GAO to look into the program last year. A survey of local law enforcement did not turn up any instances of outright abuse at the state level but did find one illegitimate agency that had applied as a federal entity and was approved for equipment, Merritt said.

That’s when the agency launched the sting. Contrary to its public image, GAO has snagged other agencies with undercover work in the past, including an investigation of the Affordable Care Act in which the agency submitted fictitious applications and was approved for subsidized healthcare coverage.

In this case, the GAO created the fake law enforcement agency — whose name the agency would not reveal — and claimed it did high-level security and counterterrorism work. Once approved, the agency easily obtained the items from a Defense Department warehouse of unused military goods.

Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, which lists rescinding Obama’s executive order one of its top priorities for the Trump administration, said the possibility of fraud does not indict the whole program.

“It suggests only that the U.S. military is one of the world’s largest bureaucracies and as such is going to have some lapses in material control,” Pasco said. “Law enforcement is going to get that equipment and we’re going to use it, to protect both officers and civilians. And if we don’t get it free from the military, we’re going to have to buy it with taxpayer dollars.”

But to Madhuri Grewal, senior counsel for the Constitution Project, and other opponents of police militarization, the problem is more fundamental.

“There just aren’t many everyday policing uses for military equipment like this,” Grewal said. “The question is why can real law enforcement agencies get some of this stuff, let alone fake ones?”

Andrea: Bolding mine

[Andrea]

Officers kill man with no active warrants at wrong house

http://m.wmctv.com/wmctv/db_401748/contentdetail.htm?full=true&contentguid=AUdiWnEV&p n=&ps=#display

SOUTHAVEN, MS (WMC) - Documents show that Southaven officers went to the wrong house to serve a warrant on Monday, which resulted in the shooting death of a man who did not have any active warrants out for his arrest.

A warrant out of Tate County shows Samuel Pearman was wanted for domestic assault. But, when Southaven officers arrived on Surrey Lane to arrest Pearman, they did not show up to the correct house.

Instead, officers missed their target by 36 feet. Those 36 feet made all the difference to Ismael Lopez and his wife.

"Someone didn't take the time to analyze the address," attorney Murray Wells, who represents the family, said. "This is incredibly tragic and embarrassing to this police department that they can't read house numbers."

Wells pointed out that the house officers should have gone to, the one where Pearman was located, had a large 'P' on the door. While officials sort out what happened, the man they were looking for took to social media.

Pearson even posted on Facebook Live on Tuesday afternoon claiming he didn't do anything wrong.

"They made me out to be something I'm not," he said. "I haven't hurt her. She's the one who slapped me."

Ismael Lopez and his wife, Claudia Linares, were asleep inside their house across the street from Pearson when officers arrived.

Linares said her husband went to the door to see what was happening outside. That's when she heard gunshots and by the time she reached her husband, he was already dead.

"Bullet holes suggest they shot through the door," Wells said.

Officers said Lopez came to the door pointing a gun at them. Those officers claim to have asked Lopez multiple times to drop the gun before they started shooting.

But, neighbors said they didn't hear anything like that.

"I didn't hear yelling," neighbor Nicholas Tramel said.

Tramel's room is right next to the Lopez home. He said he never heard police tell Lopez to put his rifle down.

Wells implied that officers had reasons not to tell the truth in their account of what happened. Namely, because they could face consequences for shooting Lopez. He also said that Claudia, who was the only one on the property who could not be held responsible for shooting Lopez, did not hear any commands or instructions being given. In addition, Wells said Lopez never pointed a gun at the officers.

"There was a gun on the premises, but the man did not have the gun with him when police shot him," he said.

Wells said Claudia Lopez wants justice and for the world to know that her husband was a good man.

"When they came to my office, it wasn't money they sought. They wanted the story to come out," he said. "What they want everyone to know is who he was and what happened."

Wells described Lopez as a hardworking employee who, up until about four years ago, worked for City of Bartlett as a mechanic.

"They've been in that home for 13 years. The only time the police had ever been there was when they had been robbed," Wells said. "No criminal history whatsoever. A long-standing employee of the city of Bartlett, mechanic. Loved in the neighborhood."

He continued, "This could have happened to anyone. Her [Claudia's] sense of justice doesn't really come from a place of anger, but of confusion."

[Andrea]

Cellphone videos raise questions about Kentucky State Police cover-up in man’s arrest

http://www.wdrb.com/story/36066730/sunday-edition-cellphone-videos-raise-questions-about-kentucky-state-police-cover-up-in-mans-arrest

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – The testimony in front of a Harlan County grand jury last summer left little doubt Lewis Lyttle did not follow orders, became combative and assaulted Kentucky State Police officers as they tried to arrest him outside a hospital.

“We was trying to get him handcuffed and I think Detective Miller was trying to hold his legs to keep him from kicking and he ended up getting kicked too in the chest,” Trooper Jimmy Halcomb testified on Aug. 1, 2016, according to a recording of the grand jury hearing.

“We finally had to force the handcuffs on him because he wasn’t complying with anything.”

But cellphone videos and more than a dozen sworn statements from eyewitnesses paint a different picture, and are the focus of a wrongful arrest and assault lawsuit against police.

State police said an internal investigation completed last month concluded that one of the officers used excessive force and was suspended four months and demoted.

Lyttle’s attorneys argue, however, the investigation didn’t go nearly far enough, and that evidence shows state troopers lied to prosecute Lyttle and tried to cover up their actions from the June 15, 2016 arrest.

“There were several glaring omissions in (Halcomb’s) testimony,” said defense attorney Douglas Asher, who represented Lyttle in his criminal case. “The sad part of it is, that if it weren’t for these witnesses, this old man would be in the penitentiary.”

Lyttle, 68, is a former construction worker who has been disabled since 1992 with a back injury.

On the day of the incident, Lyttle left his home in St. Charles, Virginia, to drive his neighbor to Harlan Appalachian Regional Hospital because she was having problems with chronic bronchitis.

Someone called the police to complain that Lyttle was exposing himself in the hospital parking lot.

When the first witness video begins, Lyttle can be seen sitting on the ground, his hands already handcuffed behind his back as Halcomb and KSP Sgt. Rob Farley hover over him.

In an instant, Farley reaches down and slaps Lyttle across the face, sending him to the pavement.

The woman who filmed the incident on her smartphone from an office overlooking the parking lot and those watching with her can be heard gasping after Lyttle is struck.

“He had no business smacking him in the face,” one woman can be heard saying on the video.

“I bet that’s part of the movie, reckon?” another said, talking about a crew filming in Harlan at the same time.

A second witness, also using a smartphone, captured what happened next.

The officers pick Lyttle up and uncuff him. Farley stands in front of Lyttle and Halcomb behind him. Then, two other KSP officers arrive.

Because the video was filmed inside an office building, it was unclear what was said between Lyttle and the officers, but Lyttle doesn't appear to make any aggressive movements toward them.

Unlike some local departments such as Louisville Metro, state police do not equip their officers with body cameras to record their interactions with the public.

After about 30 seconds, Farley reaches out and grabs Lyttle by his beard, knees him in the stomach and yanks him to the ground.

As Lyttle lies on the pavement, Farley punches him while another officer kicks him, the video shows.

“They are just punching him, beating the s--- out of him,” said the man recording the incident from the window of a nearby building. “Four cops for one man, and as old as he is.”

The officers then handcuffed Lyttle, again, and arrested him.

When he testified to the grand jury, Halcomb did not disclose that he had successfully handcuffed Farley before other officers arrived.

Instead, he tells grand jurors Lyttle resisted, kicking him, and the trooper “hollered for assistance.”

“So it took all of you all to try and get him handcuffed?” the prosecutor asked Halcomb.

“Yes,” Halcomb said.

Halcomb also did not tell jurors about how the officers slapped, punched and kicked Lyttle.

Based on Halcomb’s account, the grand jury indicted Lyttle on charges of assaulting Halcomb and Det. Kevin Miller, driving drunk, disorderly conduct, resisting arrest and menacing, among other charges.

Both Lyttle’s criminal attorney and the lawyers representing him in the civil case claim Halcomb lied and intentionally omitted evidence.

“Trooper Halcomb said (Lyttle) was resisting arrest and that he kicked two of the troopers, but the video clearly shows it was the troopers who were kicking Mr. Lyttle as he was laying on the ground,” said David Ward, a Louisville attorney representing Lyttle in the lawsuit, which was filed two days after the incident on June 17, 2016.

The lawsuit remains pending.

“Mr. Lyttle did nothing, he complied with all of the officers’ requests and, during that period of time, he was submissive with them. And as a result of that, he was assaulted, brutally assaulted, for no reason,” Ward said.

Case dismissed

The criminal case against Lyttle unraveled and in January, prosecutors filed a motion to dismiss the felony charges.

Prosecutors based the decision on evidence that came to light after Lyttle was indicted. That evidence included the two cellphone videos of the incident and 16 sworn statements by witnesses who said Lyttle was the one assaulted.

Harlan County Commonwealth’s Attorney Parker Boggs, who handled the criminal case, did not return phone messages seeking comment.

In February, eight months after the arrest, state police launched an investigation “shortly after the events were brought to our attention,” Trooper Josh Brashears, a KSP spokesman, said in a statement emailed to WDRB News.

In a report completed last month, investigators found Farley used excessive force. He was suspended for 120 days and demoted from sergeant to trooper.

Brashears wrote that troopers were called to the hospital after Lyttle was accused of exposing himself to a juvenile and he then became combative, resisted arrest and spit on troopers.

“But even under these circumstances, KSP officers are trained and expected to uphold professional standards of conduct and must be held accountable for violations,” Brashears wrote in an email to WDRB.

The state police internal investigators questioned the other officers involved with Lyttle’s arrest and cleared them of wrongdoing. Lyttle still has a misdemeanor indecent exposure case pending in Harlan District Court.

And attorneys for the troopers said video of Lyttle’s arrest represents only an incomplete snapshot of what happened.

“You can’t form a conclusion based on just the video,” said attorney Scott Miller, who represents Trooper Kevin Miller, who is accused of kicking Lyttle.

Attorney Jason Nemes, who represents Halcomb, said “we believe our guy did what was appropriate.” Nemes is also a member of the Kentucky House of Representatives, where he represents a Middletown-area district.

The attorneys declined to go into detail. Lawyers for the other troopers declined to comment.

In court records, Halcomb said in his investigative summary that after he “forcibly cuffed” Lyttle and sat him on the ground, the trooper noticed the cuffs were too tight and Lyttle’s wrists were bleeding.

When Farley arrived, Halcomb said he decided to uncuff Lyttle and reapply the handcuffs for the defendant’s comfort, according to Halcomb’s summary of the arrest.

After taking the left cuff off, Lyttle “clinched his fist and pulled it back,” prompting Farley to grab his beard and “put his hand up,” Farley wrote in his summary.

When Lyttle would not let Halcomb cuff him, Farley “applied a knee strike” and officers took him to the ground, Halcomb wrote.

Lyttle then “started kicking and being aggressive” and troopers forcibly cuffed him, according to Halcomb.

In a response to the lawsuit, troopers said they were reacting to Lyttle’s conduct and trying to get him to comply with being handcuffed and arrested, claiming he was “fiercely combative, spit at the officers, kicked the officers, tried to draw back his fist ... and refused to comply with repeated lawful commands from the officers to submit to the attempt to peacefully arrest him.”

"Had to fight him"

But the KSP findings, and Halcomb’s investigative summary, are just part of a larger cover-up by state police, Ward said.

He pointed out that several witnesses provided affidavits to investigators saying Lyttle was not aggressive with troopers, didn’t resist arrest and never spit at them.

The other officers should have been punished, and state police failed to hold Halcomb accountable for lying to the grand jury, Ward said.

The lawsuit argues that Halcomb uncuffed Lyttle and Farley began “verbally taunting him in order to provoke him to fight. When Lyttle refused to fight, Farley became infuriated, grabbed Lyttle's long, white beard, violently jerked his head downwards, and then kneed him in the groin area.”

Ward also argues that KSP knew about the alleged use of excessive force long before February, noting multiple witnesses called police during the arrests claiming Lyttle was being assaulted.

One witness identified Farley specifically and told a dispatcher in a 911 call during the incident that she wanted to talk to a supervisor about what she saw, according to a recording of the call in court records.

Lyttle’s attorneys also point to the murky circumstances surrounding the resignation of Lt. Jason Adams, the state police supervisor who immediately followed up on the incident. They claim Adams coached the officers on what to say to avoid culpability.

Adams called the hospital on the day of the arrest and asked for any video, saying his troopers “ended up arresting a guy over there and they had to fight him,” according to audio of a phone call in court records.

The lawsuit claims Adams helped the troopers draft “untruthful memorandums regarding the assault of Lyttle. These memorandums were crafted so that” the troopers “would not be disciplined or criminally charged for their conduct.”

On Jan. 13, 2017, the day the charges against Lyttle were dropped, Adams resigned. On his resignation letter, KSP officials wrote that he would not be considered for rehire as a trooper “or in any other capacity.”

Another note on the resignation letter said: “Based on the circumstances surrounding Lt. Adams’ retirement, I am unable to recommend him” for a program that allows retired troopers to work part-time. The notes do not go into further detail.

One of the hospital employees interviewed by Adams a few weeks after the incident said in an affidavit she believed Adams was trying to protect the troopers rather than find out what really happened.

Misty Mullins said Adams interviewed her about what she saw and “for someone who is supposed to be an un-biased fact finder, (he) went out of his way to inflame my emotions against the old man,” according to her affidavit. “In fact, I think he was nothing but biased.”

She claims Adams told her “that if that old man had exposed himself to my child and I had beaten the old man up that ‘we’ (KSP) … would not even arrest you for it.

“I told Lt. Adams that it didn’t matter what the old man had been accused of, the officers couldn’t just beat him like that,” she said in her sworn statement.

She said Lt. Adams theorized that while he didn’t know what Farley was thinking, he had a young daughter and “he was just upset over what the old man had done (allegedly).”

Mullins wrote that several of her coworkers who also witnessed the incident would not talk to Adams “because it will all be covered up like it normally is and nothing will be done about it anyway.”

The findings by state police also ignore conduct by the other troopers, Ward said.

“To only discipline Sgt. Farley for what occurred, and not the other troopers – who were on video kicking a helpless old man – is troubling,” he said.

The lawsuit is on hold as Lyttle’s attorneys last month asked a federal judge to order Kentucky State Police to turn over records from the internal investigation.

“The ultimate goal in filing the suit is to hold the troopers accountable for their actions,” Ward said. “What they did was reprehensible and … they should be subject to the same laws as everybody else.”