Fairfax County Police Watch: WPD officer suspended after internal investigation

WILMINGTON, NC (WECT) -

An internal investigation by the Wilmington Police Department has found that an officer used excessive force during an arrest in May in downtown Wilmington.

A cell phone camera captured a police officer using his baton on a man during an arrest in downtown Wilmington over the weekend.

Now, the man who was cuffed says he wants an apology and wants to see the officer punished.

Earlier this week, WECT obtained a copy of a letter sent from an internal affairs investigator to the person who made the original complaint.

It specifically states that the complaint against Officer A.J. Phillips was sustained, which according to the WPD policy manual means the employee acted improperly.

A second officer involved in the arrest was also investigated. That same investigation found there was not enough evidence to confirm or refute the allegations.

The investigations stem from an incident in May when Khale Gay was leaving a club on Front Street and walked into a fray of pepper spray and police officers. Gay claimed before he knew what happened he was under arrest and an officer was hitting him in the legs with a flashlight.

Officer Phillips was suspended for two days according the WPD.

At first, the WPD denied our public records request, saying that any disciplinary action taken against an officer would be kept in his personnel file and therefore would not be a public record.

We pointed them to North Carolina General Statue 160a-168 which specifically says the dates of suspensions and other change of classifications are public record.

At that point the WPD said the department does not keep track of suspensions. Cpl. Leslie Irving explained in an email:

"I was informed that our system is not set up to track suspensions because suspension does not change salary. It only tracks changes in position and salary classification for example: Administrative Leave with or without pay or Family Medical Leave. We don't keep a public record that shows suspensions."

On dozens of occasions in the past, the WPD has provided WECT and other media outlets with information about suspensions and officers who have been placed on administrative leave, including just two weeks ago when Chief Ralph Evangelous announced another officer had been placed on administrative leave in a separate excessive force complaint: http://bit.ly/1lxNbsB

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.