Fairfax County Police Watch: LAPD Honors Officers Who Didn't Use Deadly Force, Much to the Police Union's Dismay "Preservation of Life" award valorizes officers who successfully de-escalated dangerous situations.

Anthony L. Fisher|

The LAPD bestowed its newly created "Preservation of Life Award" — recognizing officers who take exceptional care to successfully de-escalate dangerous situations and avoid using deadly force — on 25 officers at its annual "Above and Beyond" gala last Thursday night. The new honor is considered to be at the same level of prestige as the department's highest honor — the Medal of Valor.

One of the honorees, Officer Danielle Lopez, confronted a man who she believed was pointing an assault rifle at passing cars. Lopez and her partner were able to convince the man to drop his gun and arrest him without violence. It turns out the gun was fake.

Another recipient of the Preservation of Life medal, Officer Ericandrew Avendano, encountered an ax-wielding man he suspected was suffering from mental illness or was high on drugs. Avendano spoke with the man and contained the situation peacefully before backup arrived to assist in subduing the man without shooting him.

Police departments in Camden (N.J.) and Philadelphia each have their own version of the award, according to the Los Angeles Times, but the LAPD's union — the Los Angeles Police Protective League (LAPPL) — thinks the award is a "terrible idea" which will "will prioritize the lives of suspected criminals over the lives of LAPD officers, and goes against the core foundation of an officer's training."

In a blog post reacting to the award's creation last November, the LAPPL Board of Directors wrote:

We recognize the Chief's intentions, however, the reality is the "Preservation of Life" award announced Tuesday by Chief Beck is ill-conceived and in actuality has dangerous implications. Incentivizing officers for "preservation of life" suggests somehow that this is not what they train hard to do. It suggests that officers must go above and beyond their normal activities to avoid harm; or put another way, that officers will be penalized for resorting to an appropriate, lawful use of force. That is ludicrous. The last thing an LAPD officer wants to do is to harm, or worse yet, take the life of a suspect.

It's not just the honoring of the successful deployment of de-escalation techniques that the union has a problem with, it's the training of such techniques at all. Earlier this year, I wrote about the LAPPL's opposition to the LAPD Police Commission's recommendation for new "use-of-force policies that emphasize de-escalation and the use of minimal force in encounters with the public."

Union Director James McBride addressed the Commission at the time, warning that if an officer were to die because the new use-of-force policies caused him/her to hesitate, "there will be blood on your hands." I also noted:

Union President Craig Lally, once named a "problem officer" in a blue-ribbon panel's report on "the problem of excessive force in theLAPD" following the 1991 beating of Rodney King, said the new policies create a "no-win situation for the officer."

Lally added that if faced with a potentially violent situation, "The best way to de-escalate is to run away."

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.