Fairfax County Police Watch: Federal court upholds Tulsa police officer's corruption conviction

DENVER -— An appeals court on Friday upheld the conviction of a former Tulsa police officer who was caught in a sting during a federal police corruption investigation.
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 3-0 against Harold R. Wells' claims that he was unfairly convicted in 2011 in federal court in Tulsa.
Wells, 62, is serving a 10-year term at a federal prison in Minnesota and is not scheduled for release until 2020, Federal Bureau of Prison records show.
The former Tulsa police corporal was among three police officers and a federal agent to be sent to prison in connection with the corruption probe by FBI undercover agents. It began on suspicions that police officers were stealing drugs and money from drug dealers.
"The evidence supporting Wells' convictionswasexceedingly strong," judges of the Denver-based appellate court wrote in Friday's 41-page decision.
The evidence included wiretaps of Wells' telephone calls.
Wells was convicted of conspiracy to possess methamphetamine with an intent to distribute it, conspiracy to steal public funds, theft of public funds and using a telephone to facilitate the commission of a drug felony.
The public funds were sting money the FBI planted in 2009 in a motel room that Wells and other officers thought was occupied by a drug dealer they purportedly were investigating.
The supposed dealer was an uncover FBI agent.
Hidden cameras captured images of Wells and other officers taking the planted money.
Wells contended, among other claims, that the FBI obtained evidence against him by unconstitutional means.
"This court has no difficulty concluding there is sufficient evidence to support the jury's finding that Wells was not engaging in legitimate police practices but was, instead, engaging in a criminal conspiracy," Friday's decision states.
"The evidence ... provided the jury a sufficient basis to infer that Wells' and (former office John K.) Gray's motivation in developing a relationship with Joker (the pseudonym for the FBI agent posing as a drug dealer) was to maintain a steady supply of drug dealers from which they could potentially steal cash and drugs," the decision states.
Gray pleaded guilty in federal court to stealing money during the sting. He cooperated with prosecutors, was sentenced to four months in prison and was released in May 2012.
Former officer Jeff Henderson was convicted of civil-rights violations and perjury. He completed a 42-month prison term in October.
Brandon McFadden, a former ATF agent who pleaded guilty to drug conspiracy in the corruption case, was sentenced to 21 months in prison. He was released in July.
The trials of the former law enforcement officers involved allegations of falsifying sworn affidavits for search warrants, perjury, witness-tampering, selling drugs and conspiracy.
Three officers were acquitted of civil-rights violations.
At least 48 people have been freed from prison or had their cases modified because of civil-rights violations or potential problems with their cases stemming from the police corruption scandal.
At least 17 lawsuits have been filed against the city of Tulsa and individual police officers as a result.

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.