Fairfax County Police Watch: BART POLICE OFFICER SHOT AND KILLED BY FELLOW BART POLICE OFFICER IN EMPTY APARTMENT

5:56 PM: A BART police officer was accidentally shot and killed by a fellow officer while conducting a probation search in Dublin this afternoon, an Alameda County sheriff’s spokesman said.

The shooting occurred just before 2 p.m. at the Park Sierra Apartments at 6450 Dougherty Road, Alameda County sheriff’s Sgt. J.D. Nelson said.

Nelson said several officers went there to search an apartment belonging to a suspect in a series of recent robberies on BART.

The two officers entered the apparently empty apartment and one officer accidentally fired a shot that wounded the other officer, Nelson said.

The wounded officer was taken to Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley, where he succumbed to his injuries, Nelson said.

Nelson said he assumes that the officers had their guns drawn as they entered the apartment but that the details of how or why the officer’s gun went off remain unclear.

The suspect was not at home at the time of the shooting.

Dublin police are investigating the shooting. The city of Dublin contracts with the sheriff’s office for police services.

BART Police Chief Kenton Rainey and General Manager Grace Crunican said in a statement, “The entire BART organization is deeply saddened by this tragic event and we ask the public to keep the officer’s family in its thoughts and prayers.”

Rainey said that he and Crunican visited with the officer’s family after the shooting to offer condolences and support. The officer’s name has not been released.

The shooting marks the first death of a BART police officer in the agency’s history.

Jeff Shuttleworth/Sasha Lekach, Bay City News

4:41 PM: A BART police officer was accidentally shot and killed by a fellow officer while conducting a probation search in Dublin this afternoon, an Alameda County sheriff’s spokesman said.

The shooting occurred at 1:03 p.m. at the Park Sierra Apartments at 6450 Dougherty Road.

Alameda County sheriff’s Sgt. J.D. Nelson told reporters at the scene this afternoon that the officers were searching the apartment of a suspect who had committed various crimes, including robberies.

During the search, one of the BART officers was shot, and it appears he was shot accidentally by another BART officer at the scene, Nelson said.

The wounded officer was taken to Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley, where he succumbed to his injuries, Nelson said.

Nelson said there are no suspects at large, and Dublin police are investigating the shooting. The city of Dublin contracts with the sheriff’s office for police services.

Sasha Lekach, Bay City News

4:11 PM: A BART police officer who was shot while doing a probation search in Dublin this afternoon has died, transit agency officials said.

BART officials said the shooting occurred at 1:03 p.m. and the officer was taken to a hospital to be treated for his wounds.

BART officials said they aren’t releasing any additional details at this time and the investigation has been taken over by the Dublin Police Department.

Jeff Shuttleworth, Bay City News

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.