Deaths and Injuries in Police Custody

[Andrea]

How did Joe Arpaio manage to lose fully automatic assault weapons?

https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2018/11/01/joe-arpaio-managed-lose-assault-weapons-yeah-thats-not-good/1848778002/

Be on the lookout for 27 guns, some of them fully automatic weapons, lost by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office.

It seems that while then-Sheriff Joe Arpaio was running all over the county chasing brown people and running all over Hawaii chasing Barack Obama’s birth certificate and running from TV station to TV station chasing publicity, pieces of his agency’s arsenal were walking out the door.

Two of those weapons were found this week, used to shoot and wound three Department of Public Safety officers during a rush-hour shoot-out on Interstate 17, near Seventh Street.

Let me say that again: a high-powered rifle used to shoot DPS officers belonged to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office.
Rifle was missing for at least 3 years

Sheriff Paul Penzone says the rifle, and one other MCSO gun found in the suspect’s car, were last seen sometime between 2010 and 2015. Nobody knows where they went or how MCSO lost them.

He said that an 2016 audit shows 27 other weapons, some of them fully automatic, still are out there, somewhere.

"The fact that any dangerous individual in our community can acquire possess and use fully automatic weapons ... is unacceptable and intolerable," Penzone said during a press conference on Wednesday.

Arpaio seemed not all that concerned.

"Vaguely remember there were some weapons unaccounted for,” he said in a statement to ABC15. “I'm sure my staff looked into it and took whatever action necessary."

No doubt.

Really, should we be surprised?

I guess we shouldn’t be so surprised at this particular display of Arpaio-era department discipline. This is what you get when you have a politician rather than a professional cop running a law enforcement agency.

A sheriff who obsessed about our security with all those dishwashers and gardeners running about even as MCSO machine guns were walking out the back door.

Penzone has vowed to investigate how the suspect, who was killed in Monday's shootout, got the guns and to tighten controls to ensure that that more weaponry doesn't disappear only to someday surface and be used to shoot police … or you or me.

Meanwhile, there are 27 MCSO guns, some of them fully automatic, out there, somewhere.

[Andrea]

Former JPD officer found guilty of assault after 2017 incident

http://www.wlbt.com/2018/11/08/former-jpd-officer-found-guilty-assault-after-incident/



JACKSON, MS (WLBT) - A Hinds County judge finds former Jackson police officer Justin Roberts guilty of assault.

In 2017, Roberts was recorded by cell phone making an arrest and seen punching and kicking a handcuffed man.
Former Jackson Police officer Justin Robert was seen on cell phone camera hitting and kicking a handcuffed man. He was later fired from JPD but found work at Jackson State University as a campus police officer.
Former Jackson Police officer Justin Robert was seen on cell phone camera hitting and kicking a handcuffed man. He was later fired from JPD but found work at Jackson State University as a campus police officer.

Roberts arrested LaDarius Brown and according to his attorney, Carlos Moore, suffers memory loss and headaches since the violent encounter. The former police officer faces a $500 fine and seven days in jail suspended.

“We’re so glad that the prosecutor, Mr. Mumford, was able to get a conviction today. $500, a fine of $500, seven days jail, even though it was suspended -- that’s significant in that most officers get nothing," said Moore. “Those blows, caught on video tape, were brutal. My client did nothing wrong and was never found guilty for any infraction.”

Roberts was fired from JPD after the video of him kicking and punching a man surfaced on Facebook. He is currently employed at Jackson State University as a campus police officer -- which also worries the attorney.

“I am very worried," said Moore. "In 2013, I also represent Adrian Jackson. He was shot by Justin Roberts when he was a security guard. So he shot my guy Adrian Johnson in the back several times. In 2017, he does this to this guy (Brown), while he’s in handcuffs. What does he have to do before they take a gun from this man?

Francis Springer, the attorney for the former embattled officer sees the action fit the situation and that the Roberts was just doing his job.

“We’re going to probably appeal this. We’re looking at that," said Springer. “Every action and every blow that was taken there was justified and of course police work is brutal. That’s why officers carry guns, that’s why they carry tasers, that’s why they carry handcuffs, because it is brutal.”

[Andrea]

Kentucky jail video shows officer slamming inmate to floor

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2018/11/07/kenton-county-jail-investigates-brutality-claim-inmate/1889759002/http://

Newly released body camera footage shows a Northern Kentucky corrections officer slamming an inmate to the floor.

Corrections Officer David Nussbaum said in his incident report that Kenton County jail inmate Steven Jordan was disobeying orders.

Jordan says Nussbaum used excessive force.

The incident – which left Jordan with a large gash above his right eye – was captured on another officer's body camera. It is unclear from the video what prompted the scuffle, but Jordan and Nussbaum can be seen facing each other at the start.

Nussbaum pushes Jordan, who rocks back on his heels. Nussbaum then slams Jordan to the floor.

"What the f---, man?" Jordan cries. “Ow! Ow! Ow! What the hell did I do?”

A second officer handcuffs Jordan, and he is told several times to be quiet as he is lying face-down, blood pooling under his head. Jordan continues to swear, saying he needs to go to the hospital.

“You busted the s--- out of my head,” he says at one point.

At another, he says to Nussbaum, “That was a little obsessive, man," to which an officer - it's not clear which - replies, “Not at all.”

Jailer Terry Carl said he is investigating the incident. He would not say whether Nussbaum is on leave.

Nussbaum could not be reached for comment, but in the incident report, he said he told Jordan to stop looking through his bag of property.

"Inmate Jordan refused my verbal instructions and said, 'F--- you,' " Nussbaum said. He said Jordan slapped away his hand after Nussbaum grabbed Jordan's wrist.

Nussbaum said he tried to push Jordan against a wall. Then, because of Jordan's "aggressive" stance and his continued attempts to pull away, "I wrapped my arms around inmate Jordan's torso and muscled him to the floor."

Other officers corroborated Nussbaum's statement.

Jordan, 28, in a statement provided to The Enquirer, said he was simply looking through his property bag when Nussbaum confronted him.

"I was slamed (sic) against the wall and to the floor ... for no reason other than trying to explane (sic) myself," Jordan wrote.

He acknowledged he "exchanged words" with Nussbaum, but Jordan's mother, Pennie Tackett, of Taylor Mill, said Nussbaum was retaliating against her son because he complained about Nussbaum the day before.

In that complaint, Jordan said that Nussbaum, while driving inmates back to the jail from the courthouse, was braking the vehicle repeatedly, causing inmates to bounce around in the back.

Nussbaum started working for the Kenton County Detention Center in 2008 and was assigned to the jail's court team in 2011.

He got several positive evaluations but over the years was reprimanded for tardiness; for arguing with a police officer at the Covington F.O.P Lodge; and for interfering with a Dayton, Kentucky, police investigation that involved his brother.

In 2013, Nussbaum was suspended without pay for 10 days after a fist fight with another deputy.

In 2017, he was arrested in Florence for driving under the influence of alcohol. An evaluation from that same year notes he was "quick to go defensive and argue with others."

In June of this year, Nussbaum was given a written warning after he failed to turn on his body camera to record an incident with an inmate.

Jordan, who has struggled with addiction for several years, was in jail on a meth-possession charge and was in the process of being released to go to a treatment program.

Tackett, his mom, said she took Jordan straight from the jail to the hospital, where he got stitches. Jordan is now at Transitions Inc. of Northern Kentucky, a residential treatment center in Falmouth.

"I'm so angry. And sad," Tackett said. "This just didn't have to happen."

[Andrea]

Black security guard wanted to be a cop — then police mistakenly killed him, pastor says

https://www.sacbee.com/news/nation-world/national/article221526770.html

For Patricia Hill, the pastor of Purposed Hill in Chicago, the police killing of 26-year-old Jemel Roberson is especially hard to understand.

That’s because Roberson, along with being a musician for nearby churches, had dreamed of being a police officer, Hill told WGN-TV. He was working at Manny’s Blue Room, a bar in Robbins, Illinois, as an armed security guard when shots rang out early Sunday morning, she said.

“The very people that he wanted to be family with took his life,” Hill told WGN-TV.

When police arrived to help, they found Roberson armed with a gun and on top of another patron at the bar as he tried to stop the fight until authorities arrived, witness Adam Harris told Fox32.

“The security guard that got killed, he caught somebody and had his knee on him the whole time,” Harris said, according to Fox32. “Just waiting on the police to get there. I guess when the police got there, they probably thought he was one of the bad guys, cause he had his gun on the guy and they shot him.”

But Harris told WGN-TV that “everybody” tried to warn the responding officers that Roberson was a security guard who was trying to subdue a suspect — and not a threat.

“Everybody was screaming out ‘security, he was a security guard,” Harris told the outlet, “and they still did their job and saw a black man with a gun and basically killed him.”

Sophia Ansari, a spokeswoman for the Cook County sheriff’s office, told The Chicago Sun-Times that officers first got word of gunfire at the bar sometime after 4 a.m. on Sunday morning. Four people had been shot inside the bar after an argument had broken out, police say, and a responding officer from the Midlothian Police Department fired at Roberson.

He later died at a nearby hospital, according to CBS Chicago, while the four others are being treated for their injuries.

The Midlothian Police Department told The Chicago Sun-Times in a statement that Illinois State Police are investigating the shooting.

“It is the policy of the Midlothian Police Department to utilize the Illinois State Police Public Integrity Task Force for any officer-involved shootings so we can ensure transparency and maintain public trust,” Midlothian police said, according to the newspaper.

As that investigation continues, some have questions about whether this could have been prevented.

Walter Turner, a pastor at New Spiritual Light Baptist Church in Chicago, said he shared a good relationship with Roberson, who played the organ at his church, according to WLS. He expressed confusion at 26-year-old’s sudden killing.

“How in the world does the security guard get shot by police?” Turner said, according to WLS. “A young man that was literally doing his job and now he’s gone.”

In 2012, 31 percent of the people killed by police officers in the U.S. were black — even though they make up just 13 percent of the overall population, according to an analysis of FBI data from Vox.

[Andrea]

Leaked video: Brusly officer slams middle school student twice; police chief shocked

https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/crime_police/article_61780be0-e867-11e8-a178-472292a1bc31.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twi tter&utm_campaign=user-share

Video footage of a police officer wrestling with a 14-year-old Brusly Middle School student last month has leaked in the midst of a Louisiana State Police investigation into allegations of excessive use of force by that officer and one other, authorities said Wednesday.

The footage shows former Brusly Police Officer Anthony "Kip" Dupre, who at the time had recently become the school resource officer, wrestling with the student and slamming him to the ground twice in the school's office as school staff watched on Oct. 5.

A top police official in Brusly said Dupre later claimed the student had reached for his pistol during the struggle, and the video appears to show Dupre handing his holstered weapon to a school staffer to get it clear of the melee on the floor of the school's administrative office.

WAFB broadcast the surveillance video of the incident Wednesday evening, saying it had been sent to the television station by an anonymous source.

Brusly Police Chief Jonathan Lefeaux said his officers obtained the school office surveillance video Oct. 8 or 9 and, once he saw it, decided to turn it over to Louisiana State Police for a possible investigation.

"Once I seen the video, I said, 'Oh, Lord,' … you know, so that's when I called them to look at it," Lefeaux said.

WAFB reported the State Police investigation is nearing completion, but Lefeaux told The Advocate he could not speak to that. Trooper Bryan Lee, spokesman for State Police Troop A, said the investigation "is still ongoing."

Tony Clayton, chief felony prosecutor for the 18th Judicial District Attorney's Office, said the office plans to bring the incident before a West Baton Rouge Parish grand jury no matter what the State Police probe finds.

"The optics to this one are bad, and I'm going to put it before the public and let them make the determination what to do with it," Clayton said Wednesday night.

Citing anonymous sources, WAFB's report says that the student later admitted to reaching for the officer's gun and that the student had previously fought with other officers on at least two occasions.

Lefeaux told The Advocate he was familiar with prior incidents related to the teen that happened outside the school but didn't share more details.

Lefeaux said Officer Dupre had originally been called to the school office the morning of Oct. 5 while he was heading to work. The youth was reportedly acting out and wanting to go home, Lefeaux said.

WAFB reported the student was trying to make a phone call to be picked up after getting into an argument with the vice principal.

Though the school surveillance camera appears to be mounted near the ceiling, a full view of the scuffle is blocked by the office's front desk. The officer and student appear to be on the ground below the front desk for much of the struggle, with only Dupre's head, shoulders, arms and the youth's feet visible for long stretches in the five-minute video.

In one, roughly 30-second period, however, Dupre can be seen rapidly thrusting his right shoulder and arm up and down apparently toward the youth, as if punching him, while the much larger man had the teen pinned to the ground. Lefeaux estimated Dupre is about 6-feet 2-inches tall and pushing 300 pounds.

Seconds after the right arm jabs, Dupre can be seen passing a gun back behind himself with his right hand to a school employee, who put the gun behind the front desk and away from the fray.

Dupre then appears to speak on his police radio just seconds before getting the teen in a headlock, lifting him upside down so his legs and feet were pointing up in the air and whipping the teen's body back around to the ground.

Dupre and the second officer, Dan Cipriano, who arrived near the end of the struggle, eventually get the student in handcuffs and escort him out of the office.

Dupre, who has about two decades of law enforcement experience, and Cipriano were initially placed on paid leave last month but resigned last week, Lefeaux said.

Lefeaux said he had asked for the officers' resignations because he believes the nature of the incident would have made it hard for them to continue to work in the community. Both men had been with the police department in this West Baton Rouge community for about three years.

Lefeaux added neither officer had his body camera on during the incident for reasons that remain unclear.

The police chief said he didn't know the student's status at the school. Attempts to reach school system officials Wednesday night were unsuccessful.

[Andrea]

KSP trooper accused of punching man remains on duty, but investigation remains hidden

http://www.wdrb.com/story/39491542/ksp-trooper-accused-of-punching-civilian-remains-on-duty-but-details-of-investigation-stay-hidden

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A Kentucky State Police trooper accused of punching road construction workers is still on the job and facing a federal lawsuit, but state police won’t release details about its investigation of the incident.

The workers say Trooper Anthony Harrison drove too fast toward their work zone near Fort Knox late one night in September 2017, adding that he stopped his personal car abruptly, confronted the workers and started arguing.

They also said Harrison lunged for one of their phones and punched one of them. Four of the workers then pinned him on the pavement until police arrived. Much of the incident was caught on cellphone video.

Two of the workers said Harrison was angry about not seeing the crew and their equipment in a closed-off and marked traffic lane. He was off-duty at the time.

Harrison was not charged with a traffic violation or a crime. Instead, after an internal investigation, Harrison was suspended without pay for four days. He’s since transferred to Bowling Green, where he remains a state trooper.

Earlier this month, WDRB News obtained a memo closing the internal investigation that stated charges of “conduct unbecoming” were substantiated.

In spite of a request under the Kentucky Open Records Act from WDRB News last month for the full internal investigation, KSP only provided the disposition of the investigation and no other details.

“Full IA investigations are not available for release per open records,” KSP Spokesman Josh Lawson said. “The complaint and the final disposition is what is provided.”

Other agencies, such as Louisville Metro Police, do provide full investigative files after the disposition of the investigation.

Harrison is also facing a federal civil rights lawsuit filed by three of the workers involved in the incident. The lawsuit alleges that Harrison punched workers multiple times.

An attorney for Harrison could not be reached for comment.

The suit seeks compensatory and punitive damages.

[Andrea]

U.S. Marshals: Cuyahoga County deprives inmates of food, water and Constitutional Rights amid string of seven deaths

https://www.cleveland.com/expo/news/erry-2018/11/9b3d3f3cc89150/us-marshals-cuyahoga-county-de.html

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Cuyahoga County fails to provide jail inmates with the basic necessities they to need live. It withholds food and water and doesn’t provide medical and mental health care for inmates, according to a blistering report released Wednesday by the U.S. Marshals.

The report says that the inmates’ constitutional rights are routinely violated.

The report offers a clear picture of a jail rife with deplorable conditions, described by marshals' investigators as inhumane.

The jail investigation comes after the deaths of seven inmates between June 10 and Oct. 2. Cleveland.com learned of the seventh death during some two months of investigating the jail. Three of those inmates committed suicide. Fifty-five other inmates tried to take their own lives within the past year, the marshals found.

The county doesn’t investigate what led to the deaths, the report says.

Among the findings in the 52-page report made public Wednesday:

· Warden Eric Ivey withholds food as punishment and inmates aren’t fed properly.

· Jail staff shut off water to toilets and sinks.

· Pregnant women are forced to sleep on mats on the floor.

· Vermin infest the kitchen.

· Inmates sometimes are denied toilet paper and toothbrushes.

· Officers decked out in paramilitary gear routinely threaten inmates until they fear for their lives, going so far as to call some prisoners snitches in front of other prisoners.

· Medical staff lack proper licenses to provide treatment.

· Inmates with mental illness are denied care, even while they’re in isolation.

· Children are housed with adults.

· Inmates spend long stretches of time locked in their cells, sometimes up to 27 hours at a time, once for 12 days in a row.

The problems are so egregious that the U.S. marshals say the county won’t be able to fix them in a timely manner.

The marshals’ team that performed the review consisted of U.S. marshals from Washington and Cleveland, and FBI agents who investigate civil rights violations and economic fraud.

“They need to have a strong leader to implement all of these changes,” U.S. Marshal Pete Elliott said of the jail. “They need a strong leader with corrections experience to make it up to standard with other jails. I have full confidence in the sheriff that he’s going to find someone who is able to do that.”

Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish asked for the marshals' review. His top jail official, Ken Mills, resigned last week ahead of the release of Wednesday’s report.

In an interview Wednesday, Budish said he based his previous conclusions about jail safety and conditions on state inspections that never raised the breadth of the issues raised after the marshals' investigation. Budish and Sheriff Clifford Pinkney said they were stunned by the marshals' findings.

The report was made public just days after the former jail director Ken Mills tendered his resignation shortly after the U.S. marshals’ presented its preliminary findings to county officials.

Budish said that fixing the problems in the jail is now his top priority, but both he and the sheriff acknowledged that significant changes in leadership at almost every level is needed.

“We need to make sure that our prisoners and our staff is safe in the jail. That is number one,” Budish said.

The list of findings by the marshals is long, and at times, overwhelming. Cleveland.com is providing the full list so that the public, which foots the bills for the jail, can understand the magnitude of the problems.

Former Jail Director Ken Mills, who resigned last week ahead of a scathing U.S. Marshal report about the conditions of the county jail, talks April 5 about the opening of the Bedford Heights Jail. (Cory Shaffer, cleveland.com)
County doesn’t investigate jail deaths

After seven county inmates died this year, Cuyahoga County spokeswoman Mary Louise Madigan said the Sheriff’s Department would investigate what led to the deaths. That never happened, the report says.

The county never performed post-mortem reviews and provided the marshals with insufficient and unclear answers about the recent deaths, including two that remain unexplained today. The county doesn’t review its own policies, procedures or any other possible contributing factors to the deaths.

There are no debriefing reports or mortality reviews, no required documentation, minutes of debriefing, medical summaries, timelines of incarceration, notifications, or autopsy reports in the county’s case files in the medical unit, all in violation of county policy.

The warden kept no files regarding the deaths.

The marshals also found that after every inmate death, someone took the housing unit’s logs, which document routine information, emergencies, and unusual incidents. Someone removed the logs and replaced them with a new one. Those new logs never mentioned why it was necessary to start new logs.

The marshals also had issues uncovering any information about inmates and said their records are stored in various locations throughout the jail, making them difficult to find. The jail has no central place for all inmate records.

Jail officials, along with Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish, far right, at an April 5 ribbon cutting ceremony at the Bedford Heights Jail.
Inmates with medical and mental illness don’t get treated

The jail’s most vulnerable inmates, those with chronic and mental illnesses, are denied consistent and proper treatment. Some nurses and medical staff don’t have the necessary qualifications to administer health care.

Medical files provided to the marshals were surprisingly deficient. Of 10 nurses hired in October, no records were available for review. Of the files provided, four medical staff members had expired professional licenses; one nurse had no license on file; one medical staff member was not certified to perform CPR and two had only partial CPR certifications; a medical technical assistant had no diploma, and a nurse and nurse practitioner had board actions against them with no documentation of their disposition.

Inmates with serious mental-health needs, developmental disabilities, physical impairments, or inmates who are frail or elderly don’t get specialized treatment that takes into account their conditions.

Some inmates with mental illnesses who are placed in isolation don’t receive the mental health care they need, and never receive mental-health treatment for the entire time they’re in isolation. They don’t have access to therapeutic activities either inside their cell or outside their cell.

There’s no documentation of mental-health providers making face-to-face contact with isolated inmates, which violates federal guidelines.

Cleanliness and sanitation in mental-health-care unit is “minimally acceptable.”

Medical staff doesn’t maintain lists of patients who need medical care for chronic health issues. Treatment schedules for those conditions aren’t tracked on a patient-by-patient basis.

There’s a quarterly meeting that identifies problems with health care in the jail, but when a recent meeting found that there were problems administering medicine to inmates, nothing was done about it.

Jail staff “pass” on training about administering medication. The method used to track missed medications involves a numerical code without a description of what that code means.

Medical and mental-health appraisals aren’t conducted within the required 14 days after an inmate’s arrival at the jail. The people that Cleveland police arrest and take to the jail never get an initial medical screening . Medical staff are only made aware of those inmates’ health concerns when they become urgent, such as a “diabetic inmate who has not had his/her insulin for four days, or others who become symptomatic due to not having hypertensive or psychotropic medications.”

Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish speaks before the swearing in of Carole Rendon as U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio. Joshua Gunter, Cleveland.com
‘Men in Black’ threaten inmates, use excessive force

The Special Response Team, a specialized unit in the jail decked out in riot gear, frequently threatened, harassed and intimidated inmates, sometimes withholding basic necessities as a way to control inmate behavior.

Marshals interviewed 100 inmates who described this team as the “Men in Black” because of their paramilitary uniforms. The marshals also viewed the response team's body cameras to reach their conclusions.

The marshals described a chilling scene where members of the specialized team escorted inmates to interviews with the U.S marshals’ investigators, and officers threatened and intimidated the prisoners and called them “snitches.”

The intimidation was so pervasive that guards bullied inmates in full view of the marshals' investigators. The behavior concerned investigators, prompting them to request that 10 inmates get released from the jail “for fear of SRT members retaliation, and the legitimate fear of detainee/inmate safety.”

The inmates interviewed described the Men in Black as routinely abusive. They placed inmates in isolation or segregation and refused to give them blankets when they were cold. They withheld hygiene products such as toothpaste and toilet paper, forcing inmates to use old towels, rags or clothing.

In one case, a response team officer told an inmate that toilet paper is only handed out on Wednesdays and handed him a paper towel.

The team used excessive force on inmates during cell extractions.

The officers verbally abused the inmates with explicit language and used “prejudice and unofficial authority to dictate and control” inmates.

Child inmates are held in the same areas as adult inmates while assigned to isolation or segregation. This is in violation of federal jail standards.

While child inmates charged as adults are held in the main county jail, they aren’t supposed to mix in with the general adult jail population for their safety.

Those children don’t receive the extra nutrition or exercise they need for development, and don’t receive programs that are educational or aimed at brain development.

They are subjected to the same extreme lockdowns as adults. That means they often don’t have access to hygiene, recreation and time outside of their cells.

A video that a judge ordered Cuyahoga County to release to cleveland.com shows a jail supervisor taking a naked and mentally ill female inmate to the ground and spraying her face with pepper foam.