Fairfax County Police Watch: Suspended Cops Used Force to End 'Emotional Rollercoaster'

The town will soon confirm the names of the three suspended police officers and provide additional statements about the investigation.

Posted by Kyle Stucker (Editor

Seabrook Town Manager Bill Manzi will issue a new statement Wednesday afternoon about the investigation into three officers suspended due to alleged police brutality against a local teen, and the names of the officers are expected to be released at that time.

Manzi will meet with the Seabrook Board of Selectmen in a non-public session at 1 p.m., after which he said he will hold a short press conference. He declined to release or confirm the names of the officers before that session, even though other media outlets have obtained that information through a police report detailing the events of the Nov. 11, 2009, arrest that have led Michael Bergeron Jr. to make his police brutality claims.

The police report, which reportedly characterizes a then-19 Bergeron as combative and aggressive, was released to certain outlets by the Seabrook Police Department either Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, although Patch was unable to obtain the report.

Seabrook Deputy Police Chief Mike Gallagher said the report is no longer available because the New Hampshire Attorney General's Office has requested that the documents no longer be released.

Senior Assistant Attorney General Jane Young said her office won't release the report "because this is an ongoing criminal investigation" that she said could be compromised by the continued release of the documents.

Young confirmed that her office is conducting a criminal investigation into the three officers and that her office is working to "determine whether there was any type of criminal conduct on behalf of anybody" in connection to the incident, although she said her office won't release the documents because it has a duty to protect all parties involved and to protect the integrity of the investigation.

No charges have yet been filed against any parties involved.

"We are looking at all of the facts and circumstances," said Young, later adding that she "cannot make [a] prediction" about the length of the investigation.

The Union Leader has published excerpts of Bergeron's arrest report, which names Officers Mark Richardson and Adam Laurent as two of the individuals shown in a YouTube video that has now gone viral.

Richardson is reportedly the officer who used an "armbar" to allegedly bring Bergeron to the floor. The surveillance video posted by Bergeron appears to show Richardson forcing Bergeron face-first into a cinderblock wall using his arm.

Laurent is identified as the officer who used pepper spray to subdue Bergeron while Bergeron was already on the floor. The Union Leader reports that Bergeron was pepper-sprayed because of "prior spitting and failure to comply" with officers while Bergeron was "on an emotional rollercoaster."

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.