Fairfax County Police Watch: City of Mission releases details on excessive force allegation in officer’s suspension

A Mission officer accused of excessive force and facing indefinite suspension once received commendations for his accomplishments with the U.S. Air Force.

On Sept. 13, Omar Diaz De Villegas, 29, was handed a letter from Interim Chief Robert Dominguez stating Diaz de Villegas was indefinitely suspended after an investigation into an incident in April. In the letter Dominguez states he has affidavits from officers who saw Diaz De Villegas hit a suspect on the head with his service weapon and then throw him in the back of a police vehicle.

Diaz de Villegas was born in Mission and joined the Air Force in 2005. He worked primarily as a security forces journeyman through 2009, according to documents in his personnel file.

In May 2007, he received an Air Force Commendation Medal for his achievements for transporting prisoners from August 2006 through February 2007 as part of the 455th Expeditionary Security Forces Squadron in Afghanistan.

“His security measures ensured the safe and secure transport of captured enemy combatants to an internment facility,” states a portion of the commendation, signed by Lt. Gen. Gary North of the U.S. Air Force.

Diaz De Villegas also received an Air Force Achievement Medal in June 2009 after serving in Kuwait with the 49th Mission Support Group. The recognition states during that time Diaz De Villegas was the first on the scene when an individual had alcohol poisoning.
“His quick response and decisive actions ensured the timely arrival of medical personnel, preventing further injury and loss of life,” the certificate states.

He earned an associate degree in criminal justice through the Community College of the Air Force and was honorably discharged in 2009. Diaz De Villegas joined Mission PD in March 2011.

According to Dominguez’s letter, one Friday morning in April, Palmview Police Department called on Mission PD to assist officers in a car chase involving a stolen vehicle. Diaz De Villegas had to take evasive maneuvers, pulling off to the side of the road, after the car sped southbound on Inspiration Road off Griffin Parkway.

The officer turned around and joined the pursuit, the letter states. After another officer deployed an “interceptor spike stick,” deflating one of the stolen vehicle’s tires. The driver kept going, losing pieces of the tire along the way. By Veterans Memorial Cemetery, the vehicle was driven onto a dirt path and hit a drainage ditch.

The driver tried to run and was caught by two officers. Diaz De Villegas arrested the passenger, later identified as Omar Pina. Diaz De Villegas requested an ambulance because Pina’s head was bleeding, the letter states. Then, the officer took Pina to the Palmview Police Department.

Later, a lieutenant with Palmview PD called Mission PD and reported that Pina claimed the arresting officer used excessive force, intentionally hitting Pina on the head with the officer’s service weapon. According to the letter, a Palmview officer said he saw Diaz De Villegas hit Pina twice on the head with his service weapon. Another officer said he saw Diaz De Villegas lift Pina into the air while he was handcuffed by grabbing his arm and his crotch and throw him into the back of a patrol unit, according to Dominguez’s letter. One officer told Diaz de Villegas to put Pina down, but he did not, the letter states. It adds that video from patrol units at the scene back up their accounts.

“It is obvious that you were angry and not following appropriate professional police practices in securing and treating a prisoner,” the letter states.

Diaz De Villegas was put on suspension with pay April 19 while an investigation was conducted. The department received affidavits from other officers at the scene as well as from Pina on July 10 stating he was filing a formal complaint. On top of hitting Pina on the head with his gun, Pina added that Diaz de Villegas grabbed his genitalia and said, “This is what you get,” the letter states.

On July 17, Diaz De Villegas was interviewed. According to the letter, Diaz De Villegas said Pina was resisting arrest, moving his hands and looking back at the officer. It states Diaz De Villegas said he didn’t know if Pina had a weapon and he wanted to “Ki….(stutter).”

Diaz De Villegas also said he may have hit Pina on the head unintentionally when trying to turn him over and Pina was kicking his feet, according to the letter. It adds Diaz De Villegas said he picked Pina up by the bicep and inner thigh (possibly touching Pina’s genitals) because he did not want to give Pina a chance to headbutt or kick anyone.

Diaz De Villegas has the right to appeal the suspension under civil service law.

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.