Fairfax County Police Watch: Valley Falls Outraged Over Reported Auxiliary Police Misconduct

VALLEY FALLS, Kan. (WIBW) -- Disgruntled citizens in Valley Falls gathered to voice their opinions on what they're calling auxiliary police misconduct.
The reason why many of them are so heated has them wondering how their council is running their city.
Residents describe last Saturday night in downtown Valley Falls as total mayhem, and it had Wednesday's council meeting in mayhem as well.
Saturday night, residents reported teenagers drag-racing and speeding up and down the city's main street. The icing on the cake for them was finding out an auxiliary police officer and councilman, Todd Harrington, was part of it.
Another auxiliary member, Doug Wildeman was reported to have been driving around town with a young girl in his lap.
"He was turning the siren on and off, the headlights on an off, the flashers on and off, hit the airhorn a couple times," said witness Lee Kahn of Valley Falls. "He floored it and he gunned it at maximum speed. I assumed it was a police officer so I came in to City Hall to file a written complaint, only to find out it wasn't even a police officer driving the car, that it was a civilian."
Valley Falls city council approved its auxiliary police program April 25. It gives civilians the right to drive in police cars and patrol the city. The council said having a civilian on patrol will make kids feel comfortable with hanging out downtown. Harrington said in the meeting that the city council's goal was to have the kids all in once place so they would be easier to watch. He also said he wanted the atmosphere to be similar to when he was a teen, hanging out downtown.
"They are afraid to be uptown when the cops are up there. They get run off," Harrington said.
Many Valley Falls residents and parents are outraged that civilians were patrolling that Saturday when the situation got out of control. One trained patrolman was reported to have been filling out paperwork while two auxiliary members were out in police cars.
"We pay officers to do their job. I don't think people who aren't qualified should be doing something like that," resident Pat Reyley said. "As taxpayers, if something was to happen to the patrol car, who's going to pay for that? Us."
Residents say the auxiliary program test-run did nothing but encourage reckless behavior in the town's youth.
"This is the night to come and tear up our community. This is the town to be in at that night because they know there's no police around to do anything about it. That concerns me," Julie Trower said.
13 News received information from an anonymous source that the mayor, Charles Stutesman was going to fire the chief of police Josh Pence about the whole situation, but decided against it and reappointed him.
As it stands, the auxiliary program was tabled at Wednesday's meeting and will no longer be in effect for the time being.
No arrests, citations or tickets were given out on Saturday night. Two Jefferson County police officers were called to downtown Valley Falls when the teenagers were there.

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.