By Editorial Board
September 5
AT POINT-BLANK
range, a Fairfax County police officer a year ago fired one shot, killing an
unarmed man standing inside his home. The man, John Geer, was distraught and
had been drinking — his longtime girlfriend had moved out and called police
when he threw her things into the front yard — but he held no hostages,
brandished no weapons and, so far as we have learned, posed no serious threat
either to police or to public order. (Mr. Geer did own guns, which he
apparently told police.)
Shot in the chest,
he was left to bleed to death inside his doorway while police officers, remaining
outside the house, did nothing for an hour. Five and a half hours after the
shooting, his body remained sprawled on the floor where he died.
Incredibly, the
authorities in Northern Virginia — including Fairfax County police and state
and federal prosecutors — have refused to furnish any explanation for this
stupefying sequence of events last Aug. 29 in Springfield. They have
stonewalled.
Fairfax County
Police Chief Edwin C. Roessler Jr. promised to “hold myself accountable” to Mr.
Geer’s family, which includes two young daughters. He has done nothing of the
kind. No official information about the shooting has been forthcoming. The
officer who fired the shot, who remains on the force with full pay, has not
been identified.
The authorities
conduct themselves as if the case presented insurmountable complexities. This
strains credulity. It involved one shot, one gun, one shooter and one fatality.
It took place in broad daylight, at mid-afternoon. It was witnessed at close
range by at least two other police officers, as well as friends and neighbors
of Mr. Geer. And still authorities refuse to act or discuss Mr. Geer’s death.
Some witnesses
have spoken with The Post’s Tom Jackman, who has reported their accounts as
well as their mounting frustration at the official paralysis that has ensued
for more than 12 months.
At every juncture,
the authorities appear to have abdicated their duty of accountability, both to
Mr. Geer’s loved ones and to the public. Police took more than three months to
furnish reports on the shooting to state prosecutors in the Fairfax County
Commonwealth’s Attorney’s office. More than another month elapsed before the
chief prosecutor, Raymond F. Morrogh, citing unspecified conflicts of interest,
punted the case to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of
Virginia, then stopped taking questions on the matter.
That was in
February. Since then, U.S. Attorney Dana J. Boente has refused even to
acknowledge that his office is looking into the case, although Justice
Department lawyers have interviewed witnesses.
On Tuesday, Mr.
Geer’s longtime partner, Maura Harrington, who is the mother of his two
daughters, sued the county police, the police chief and three unnamed officers,
alleging gross negligence. She seeks $12 million — in addition to some answers
that she and Mr. Geer’s other loved ones clearly deserve.
Will no one take
responsibility and make some decisions in the unexplained death of Mr. Geer?
