Fairfax County Police Watch: Second Student Says Police Officer Struck Him at McDonald's

Police, students clash at downtown McLean McDonald's

At 9:23 pm. Feb.10, Peter Horst of McLean received a text from his son saying:" I was literally just assaulted by a cop."

His son Sam, 17, said he was in the downtown McLean McDonald's where a Fairfax County police officer struck him three times, took him outside for a breathalyzer test, then told him he was free to go.

He is the second student to describe how police officers struck them. Sam sent McLean Patch an e-mail message after the news-site published a story about incidents at McDonald's based on an interview with the McLean Police District Commander. He disagreed with the commander's description of events.

Nearly 30 people who left comments on the McLean Patch front page after that story, many disagreeing with the commander's report.

McLean District Commander Capt. Daniel Janickey said hundreds of students were at McDonald's on Old Dominion Drive following the Langley-McLean basketball game, an intense crosstown rivalry.

"The officers were telling them to disperse and they were not listening. The officer did use his baton to hold one individual up against the wall. No one was ever struck with a baton,” Janickey said.

“We were outnumbered tremendously. We had three officers available and the crowd was being unruly. It was unsafe situation” for the community, Capt. Daniel Janickey, commander of the McLean Police District, said last week.

"You had over 100 kids in there (at the McDonald's). They just took the place over. Some were intoxicated. They didn’t listen to management or police. The officers were trying to maintain order," he said. "This is a community and public safety issue."

The incidents are now under investigation by the Internal Affairs unit of the Fairfax police department because of allegations of excessive force.

Capt. Janickey said that night police arrested four students at the game at McLean High School and arrested a fifth student outside the McDonald's. All were juveniles and were charged with public drunkenness.

Sam Horst attended the game then headed to McDonald's. He arrived alone to find police officers outside and an army of Langley and McLean students inside.

"There were people all over the place. It was wild but not a drunken mob,” he said .

He immediately saw "two kids confronting each other." Then "Two or three police officers came rushing in the front door and sort of knocked the kids apart.”

Sam, who had entered through the Elm Street side door, was on his way to the counter to order “And the cop turned to me.”

A police officer was standing off to the side, “I had taken four steps when he started hitting me.” They had not spoken.

“He hits me three times. He rams me in the chest." The officer then pinned him against a wall.

“He was pushing the baton against my throat." Sam said he tried to move the baton to relieve the pressure on his throat.

The officer said, “He would knock me down on the ground and handcuff me,” if he didn't stop.

“The whole time I was trying to ask him what I had done wrong,” he said.

The officer takes out a notebook, asks his name then tells Sam to follow him outside for a breathalyzer test, Sam said.

"I don’t know what I had done to make him think I had been drinking,” the Langley student said.

Test done, the officer tells Sam he's not under arrest and he can go.

That's when he texted his dad.

Peter Horst, at a Friday afternoon interview with his son, said he immediately asked his son was he okay and if he had been " a smart mouth (because) you just don’t mess around with a policeman doing his thing.”

Then he heads to McDonald's and talks to a police officer.

"I’ve been disappointed" by the police statement, he said. "I'm maintaining hope that they will do what great organizations do which is acknowledge a mistake, deal with it, and move on.”

He said a police investigator had contacted the family.

"No one has more respect for law enforcement than I do” said Peter Horst, adding that he has relatives and friends who are FBI agents, DEA agents, and local police officers.

“This is not a family with a grudge against the cops. . . I am just really disappointed that they can’t just acknowledge a mistake,” Peter Horst said.

Sam, a Langley High school junior, who said he had a 3.7 grade average and who plays for the soccer team, had an ACT test, the next day.

If you witnessed the events at the McDonald's and would like to share what you saw please contact us: bobbi.bowman@patch.com

Morrogh finds cop he doesn’t love. In other news, hell freezes.

Probe of fatal police shooting goes to federal authorities

By Justin Jouvenal/Post

The Fairfax County prosecutor has turned over the investigation of a fatal police shooting of an unarmed Springfield man to federal authorities, citing complications with the five-month-old case.

Commonwealth’s Attorney Ray Morrogh said the U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of Virginia has agreed to continue the probe into the death of 46-year-old John Geer, who was shot during a standoff with Fairfax County police in August. No one has been charged in the incident.

“There is a conflict of interest that has arisen in the case,” Morrogh said Thursday. “And there is a second potential conflict of interest that has arisen out of my office. . . . This is the prudent thing to do.”

Morrogh declined to describe the nature of the conflicts because the investigation is ongoing. The U.S. attorney’s office said Thursday that it could not confirm or deny any investigation or comment on pending investigations.

Police went to Geer’s Pebble Brook Court home on Aug. 29 because of a report of a domestic disturbance. Geer’s father, Don Geer, said his son was upset because his girlfriend, the mother of his two children, had decided to leave him.

John Geer had thrown his girlfriend’s belongings in the front yard. She called police and told them that Geer had a firearm. Police said they tried for about 50 minutes to persuade Geer to leave the home, but he refused.

Don Geer said he watched the climax of the encounter. He said that he could not hear what officers were saying to his son but that he saw him standing with empty hands resting on top of a screen door at the home’s entrance.

At some point, John Geer began to slowly lower his hands and an officer opened fire, hitting Geer in the chest, his father said. Geer retreated inside and closed the door. A SWAT team eventually entered the home and found Geer dead.

Don Geer said detectives later told him that his son did not have a gun on him at the time of the shooting but that there was a holstered handgun a couple of steps from the front door.

Don Geer said it appeared to him that the shooting was unjustified, but he was unsure what to make of the probe being turned over to federal authorities.

“I don’t know whether that’s good or bad — if I had a better idea of why they are doing it, I could form an opinion,” he said.

Geer and friends of his son have been critical of how long the investigation has taken, but Morrogh said police and prosecutors were working to explore all the evidence. He did not think federal prosecutors would have to start from scratch.

“No one wants these things to linger on,” Morrogh said.

Our ink will outlast his career

Under the reign of former Chief of Police Rhorer the Fairfax County Police arrested a man for not wearing clothes in his house while he made coffee, set up an eye doctor on a gambling charge and then used the SWAT team to kill him. An investigation into the charge that the Doctor’s primary clients were cops has never been investigated. The police gunned down an emotionally unstable man because cop who shot him wrongly assumed the man was trying to escape. He wasn’t. The cops also shot dead four other citizens under highly questionable circumstances. The department under Rhorer was sued multiple times by citizens. So did they fire Rhorer? Naw they promoted him. According to news reports Rhorer draws a salary of $191,168 per year as Deputy Fairfax County Executive as well as a concurrent pension from the Fairfax County police of $173000 per year.

Occupation by force

According to the most recent U.S. Census figures, nearly one in five Fairfax residents (17.5 percent) is of Asian descent while Hispanics make up nearly 16 percent of Fairfax’s overall population. Those numbers drop considerably when applied to the Fairfax County Police Department, where only 4.3 percent of officers are Asian and 4.1 percent Hispanic. White officers make up 84 percent of Fairfax County’s 1,360-member police department, significantly higher than the county’s general population (54 percent white). Almost 90% of the force lives outside the county.