Fairfax County Police Watch: Firing Florida Cops

When Florida cops are fired, they often don’t stay fired

BY CHRISTINA VEIGA

CVEIGA@MIAMIHERALD.COM

The police officers have been accused of beating up gay men, looking at porn while on duty — even hiding drugs and stealing from those they arrested.

Each one was fired. And each one eventually got his job back.

The latest: A Miami Beach police officer, fired after he was accused of beating up a handcuffed man and yelling anti-gay epithets while arresting a witness to the altercation, just won his job back. His work partner in that incident also fought his termination and won.

In South Florida, it can be hard for cops to stay fired. Those who swear to protect and serve are supported by powerful unions with enough cash to pay for talented lawyers. Police contracts often require cities to adhere to the findings of an arbitrator when an officer contests a termination.

Cops have another tool at their disposal: an officers’ bill of rights, written into state law, which mandates certain protections for police officers accused of wrongdoing.

“It’s part of their security, and checks and balances that are necessary, because it’s so easy to falsely accuse a police officer,” said attorney Richard Sharpstein, who has represented many police officers.

“They face administrative problems in their departments; they face criminal problems from people they’ve arrested who have grudges or reasons to lie or outright hate a police officer. So yeah, they have those rights, because otherwise any jerk on the street could have them terminated based on some personal vendetta.”

Sharpstein is currently representing former Opa-locka Sgt. German Bosque, who has been arrested at least three times and fired six.

The former sergeant is believed to have been investigated more times than any other officer in Florida. He’s still fighting his latest termination, which came on the heels of his arrest on charges of kidnapping, battery and tampering with a witness who had tried to file a complaint against him.

The state is also considering yanking his police certification.

Sharpstein said the latest charges against his client stem from “personality conflicts” in the department and called the case “ridiculous.”

In other cases around South Florida:

• In Miami Beach, officers Frankly Forte and Eliut Hazzi were fired after a gay tourist accused them of gay bashing. The American Civil Liberties Union sued on behalf of the tourist and Miami Beach settled the case for $75,000.

In December 2012, an arbitrator decided Hazzi should have his job back. The decision to return Forte to the force was reached on Aug. 31. In his case, the arbitrator decided that the officers didn’t target the subjects because of their sexuality, that the arrests were justified and that the officers didn’t use excessive force.

• In Miami Beach, a sergeant who was fired after an infamous ATV incident — in which a drunk cop ran over two people on the sand while giving a bachelorette a ride on the back of the vehicle — won his job back after the city fired him for ignoring his police radio and leaving his shift early. The arbitrator decided the sergeant wasn’t negligent but simply “overwhelmed by circumstances” beyond his control.

• In Broward County, Lt. James Murray won his job back at the Broward Sheriff’s Office after he was fired for harassing employees and looking at porn while on duty, according to the department.

In each of these cases, the officers and their unions argued they were stripped of their badges because of political retaliation. In Miami Beach’s case, the union argued that cops were offered up to “appease” the community after a series of embarrassing incidents. In Broward, Murray told the media he was targeted because he refused to conduct surveillance of a union representative.

The American Civil Liberties Union, however, sees things differently.

“Ultimately, the most basic job of police officers is to keep the communities they serve safe. When they are failing to do that, when policies and practices actually put people at risk of either false prosecution or physical danger, the trust that people have in law enforcement breaks down. Especially when no one is held responsible. That makes all of us less safe,” spokesman Baylor Johnson wrote in an email.

Follow @Cveiga on Twitter.

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.