Fairfax County Police Watch: 03/29/13

"I have to realize every single day that I come to work that the decisions that I make -- you always have to say, how does this impact a patrol officer interacting with the community? " Roessler said. "I'm looking forward to the honor and the privilege to serve all the members of what I call the police family."

Artists concept of what roessler looks like

No, wrong. Decisions made by government officials should be based on how they affect the citizens who employ them. Not the other way around. Decisions should not be made on the impact they will have on employees hired by the citizens to run their government.

Citizens first, hired help second.

Roessler is the latest in a long string of police executives who probably live in a bubble, a bubble that makes them fail to understand that the honor and privilege is in serving the citizens of the community and not the cops the community pays and pays and funds (And far above the national average, at that.)

It's our government, not theirs and so long as the county allows the vast majority of our well paid cops to live outside the county, it will never be their government. Other counties have live in requirement for their police. We don’t. The cops have that kind of pull in your government.

Roessler appears to be part of, if not one of the architects of, the“us first” mentality that permeates the Fairfax County Police. But we can’t blame him. The cops have been out of control (and grossly over funded) for decades and the guilty finger for their arrogance and brutality should be directly pointed at us, the county residents, the owners of the government who keep reelecting the same old tread-mill thinking hustlers in slightly shiny suits who let the cops run rampant on our traffic jammed crowded roads (and ridiculously overcrowded schools.)

We don’t have the money for more roads (or more schools.) But the cops have enough money to employ a dozen deputy chiefs, a navy and an air force that may or may not includes drones with a few bucks left over to hire even more cops and open even more police stations. Think about that while you sit on the beltway.

The policeman is not your friend. The Fairfax County Police Department holds its self-interest far above your wants and needs. In fact, the full time job of the several dozen assistant to the assistant chiefs of police we carry on the payroll, is to get you to trust the cops and not to ask too many questions. They need you to stay dumb. Trust us, the cops tell you, we don’t need police oversight in Fairfax County, we’ll handle it ourselves. Trust us.

Your elected officials agree with the cops. They don’t want police oversight because the hundreds of misdeeds, transgression and criminal actions the cops get involved in every year….on your dime….. would go public and citizens would be aware that the elected officials we pay to run government aren’t very good at what they do, and, proving the cops point, should not be trusted.

Trust us, the cops say. We’re hiring nine new cops this year because we need them. We won’t offer any proof, your elected officials won’t ask why, they trust us, why don’t you?

Local government, hell government in general, runs better and is more efficient in delivering services when it’s not trusted. The cops know that and in their view, as, long as citizens stay asleep, everything will be just fine.

Don’t trust the bastards, by not trusting them we not only empower ourselves and keep the collected elected sleaze on their toes, we give the hundreds of good, decent people who work in government, the ones who have nothing to hide, a boost up and a chance at running things, out in the open.

Roessler has been raised in the “trust me” culture of the Fairfax County Police and that form of leadership sets the tone for further abuse, mismanagement and secrecy by the police.

We need to hire a police chief not born and bred in the old south-redneck, good ole boy network that is the Fairfax County Police. It’s a new century. It's time to change things. We’ll need to look outside the Fairfax cops secrecy system, outside the county and probably outside the state to find someone capable to tear down the “trust me”-think mentality that runs the cops, someone who will attract more outsiders to the force, hiring fewer white boys with Nazi haircuts and mangers who are creative, committed to the community, and idealistic in their goals.

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.