Fairfax County Police Watch: NOPD officer charged with sex crimes involving juvenile bonds out of jail

Paul Murphy

NEW ORLEANS -- Suspended Officer Willie A. Gant, Sr., was bonded out of Orleans Parish Prison late Wednesday afternoon.

The 26-year veteran on the New Orleans Police Department faces two counts of indecent behavior with juveniles and two counts of sexual battery on a juvenile.

According to arrest documents, a 12-year-old girl claims Gant molested her on two separate occasions at his house in the 1500 block of Marigny Street in the St. Roch neighborhood. His attorney Patrick Giraud says Gant denies the charges.

"We haven't had a discussion as to where he believes these charges originated from," said Giraud. "He just denied them."

Police executed a search warrant at Gant's home after his arrest. His attorney wouldn't say what, if anything, was taken during the search. A judge set Gant's bond at $50,000.

"The main concern was making sure he got a livable bond, which we believe we were successful with," said Giraud. Willie Gant has a troubled past with the NOPD A check of his civil service record showed multiple suspensions for Neglect of Duty and traffic accidents. He was also accused of punching a French Quarter tour guide in 2008.

Gant is the fourth NOPD officer arrested in July.

Sunday, police booked Stephanie Caldwell with two felony charges of domestic violence. On July 14, police booked officer Christopher Carter with domestic abuse battery. On July11, Detective Robert Hurst was booked with attempted murder and simple battery, following an argument with his former girlfriend. The attempted murder charge was later dropped.

New Orleans Independent Police Monitor Susan Hutson said the recent spate of arrests is troubling.

"We have a number of issues coming out, domestic violence incidents, a lot of those lately, alcohol related issues and now this incident involving minors," said Hutson. "Those are very disturbing allegations."

Hutson said it's now up to the NOPD to put a program in place to address the issues.

"The consent decree does require the NOPD to have a health and wellness program for it's officers," said Hutson. "So you have to look at what can be done to make sure you're helping officers before they kind of flame out in these situations."

The arrested officers were all suspended from duty.

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.