Fairfax County Police Watch: Mayor addresses disciplinary action within Seattle Police Department

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray on Friday spoke out about disciplinary action within the Seattle Police Department.

Murray is defending Interim Police Chief Harry Bailey, who reduced the penalty of Seattle Police Officer John Marion. Marion originally got a one-day suspension for threatening to harass Dominic Holden, who is a reporter and news editor for The Stranger newspaper. The punishment was changed to Marion being required to get more training.

"While this could be perceived as a lesser punishment under the current legal framework, Chief Bailey believes, and I support him, that the framework for this process is reflective of what is most constructive," said the mayor. "Training. Changing behavior."

The one-day suspension, Murray says, would not be as effective because Marion, or any other officer who is suspended, could use vacation pay to make up the hours and income he would've lost.

Holden says Marion was let off too easy, and argues that the officer could have been ordered to go through more training, in addition to the one-day suspension.

"Training is not a punishment," said Holden. "Training is what we should be doing no matter what. What police officers do is punish people who do wrong, and we need the same standards for them as they give us."

Holden also says the interim chief mis-led city officials, including the mayor, by trying to pretend he had not reduced the officer's punishment.

"The letter you sent to the mayor and city council says you concurred with the finding of misconduct," Holden challenged Bailey during Friday's press conference.

Then he turned his attention to the mayor.

"If you want to reform a police department, don't you want a chief who is honest with you?" he asked.

Mayor Murray immediately responded.

"First of all, I disagree with you," said Murray. "I believe we have a chief who is honest and taking action against individuals who need to have action taken against them."

Holden isn't so sure.

"The police chief has let him off the hook and that sends a message to all cops that you can commit acts of misconduct and you can simply wait it out and political forces will free you later," he said.

If was also disclosed Friday that Bailey changed the discipline of several more officers, in unrelated cases.

Mayor Ed Murray has asked for a review of the entire grievance process. He hopes that re-evaluating the process will help both the public and the police department.

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.