Fairfax County Police Watch: 10 local officers charged with helping drug dealers

ATLANTA -- Ten law enforcement officers are charged with assisting drug dealers around metro Atlanta.

The U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia announced the charges after a year-long undercover investigation of gang related activity.

The overall undercover operation uncovered officers from the DeKalb County Police Department, Stone Mountain Police Department, the Atlanta Police Department, MARTA Police Department, Forest Park Police Department, DeKalb County Sheriff's Office and the Federal Protective Service. In addition, one man, Alexander Hill, falsely represented himself to be a Clayton County Police Officer.

US Attorney Sally Yates said, "This is a troubling day for law enforcement in our City. The law enforcement officers charged today sold their badges by taking payoffs from drug dealers that they should have been arresting. They not only betrayed the citizens they were sworn to protect, they also betrayed the thousands of honest, hard-working law enforcement officers who risk their lives every day to keep us safe. We will continue to work with our local law enforcement partners to pursue this corruption wherever it lies."

According to the indictments, the drug deals didn't take place in dark alleys, but often in very public parking lots in broad daylight.

Investigators say the officers often used their patrol cars, wore their uniforms are carried a weapon as they observed the drug deals take place. Some would sit in their car, others would walk the parking lot around the deal as a backpacks with cocaine and money were exchanged.

But Yates says some did more than watch, some got involved in the process, counting the bags of cocaine, setting up signals to communicate, even discussing how and when deals should go down.

"Remarkably one of the police officers suggested that future drug deals be made in parking lot of a local high school so they could exchange backpacks there and that backpacks wouldn't be something that would cause suspicion," said Yates.

Perhaps even more frightening, was how far the US Attorney said some officers were willing to go to protect the dealers.

Dekalb county police officer Dorian Williams allegedly said if things didn't go well, he couldn't just shoot the buyer, he had to kill him.

Monyette McLaurin's, a former Dekalb Sheriff's deputy, also allegedly offered to shoot a buyer if necessary and discussed killing someone he feared might snitch.

Mark F. Giuliano, Special Agent in Charge, FBI Atlanta Field Office, said, "In recognizing the need for the criminal justice system and those who work within that system to firmly have the public's trust, the FBI considers such public corruption investigations as being crucial. The FBI will continue to work with its various local, state, and other federal law enforcement agencies in ensuring that the public's trust in its law enforcement officers is well deserved."

The law enforcement officers arrested today were: Atlanta Police Department (APD) Officer Kelvin Allen, 42, of Atlanta; DeKalb County Police Department (DCPD) Officers Dennis Duren, 32, of Atlanta and Dorian Williams, 25, of Stone Mountain, Georgia; Forest Park Police Department (FPPD) Sergeants Victor Middlebrook, 44, of Jonesboro, Georgia and Andrew Monroe, 57, of Riverdale, Georgia; MARTA Police Department (MARTA) Officer Marquez Holmes, 45, of Jonesboro, Georgia; Stone Mountain Police Department (SMPD) Officer Denoris Carter, 42, of Lithonia, Georgia, and contract Federal Protective Services Officer Sharon Peters, 43, of Lithonia, Georgia. Agents also arrested two former law enforcement officers: former DeKalb County Sheriff's Office (DCSO) jail officers Monyette McLaurin, 37, of Atlanta, and Chase Valentine, 44, of Covington, Georgia.

Others arrested today were: Shannon Bass, 38, of Atlanta; Elizabeth Coss, 35, of Atlanta; Gregory Lee Harvey, 26, of Stone Mountain, Georgia; Alexander B. Hill, 22, of Ellenwood, Georgia; and Jerry B. Mannery, Jr., 38, of Tucker, Georgia.

The undercover operation arose out of an ATF investigation of an Atlanta area street gang in August 2011. ATF agents learned from an individual associated with the gang that police officers were involved in protecting the gang's criminal operations, including drug trafficking crimes. According to this cooperating individual, the officers-while wearing uniforms, driving police vehicles, or otherwise displaying badges-provided security to the gang members during drug deals.

In affidavits filed in support of the charges, an FBI agent described how drug traffickers sometimes recruit law enforcement officers to maintain a physical presence at drug deals. The traffickers hope that the officers' presence at the drug deals will prevent rival drug groups from intervening and stealing their drugs or money, and also keeps legitimate law enforcement officers away from the scene. In return for the corrupt officers' services, the drug dealers often pay the officers thousands of dollars, according to the affidavits.

Acting at the direction of FBI and ATF, the cooperator communicated to gang members and their associates that the cooperator sought police protection for upcoming drug deals.

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.