Fairfax County Police Watch: Virginian reporting theft of Trump signs gets cold shoulder from Fairfax County police

The Fairfax county police understand that the Democrats keep their money flowing and make sure they are left alone, so none of this is surprising

By World Tribune on October 26, 2016

Stealing Trump campaign signs from a supporter’s lawn is not a crime as it is “the season for these things to happen,” a police officer in Fairfax, Virginia told a citizen who had reported the theft of a sign.

The citizen who reported the incident subsequently learned that there have been a rash of such incidents. He submitted the following account of the Oct. 22 incident to the Fairfax Free Citizen:

“I witnessed a teenage boy in the car behind me hop out and run over to where a Trump campaign sign was staked in someone’s yard. He went up, yanked out the sign, and ran back to the car driven by a woman possibly in her early 20s.

“Realizing that I just witnessed a theft of yet another Trump supporter’s campaign sign, I got out of my car and went up to the car behind me. I pointed at the campaign sign that was now on top of the dashboard and steering wheel making any kind of driving hazardous. I pointed at the boy and then motioned with my hand for him to return the sign to the person’s yard. They refused, and the woman started demonstrating vulgar hand gestures at me. I again pointed at the campaign sign and the boy. The woman ignored me but starting honking her horn and locked her car doors. I politely knocked on her window, and the only response I got was more vulgar hand gestures.

“I went to the front of her car and took two pictures, one of the thieves and the other of their license plate number. It was at this time that the woman started gunning her engine with tires screeching, threatening to run me over and crush me against my car which was in between her car and me. Fearing for my safety, I jumped back in my car and the female driver raced away driving with the stolen campaign still on top of her steering wheel.”

The citizen then reported the incident to Fairfax County Police.

Several hours after the citizen’s call, a police officer was dispatched to her home.

“Next time this happens, you shouldn’t confront the person, you should just call us,” the officer said.

The citizen continued: “I asked what was going to happen to the perpetrators, and his response was in effect nothing. ‘No crime has been committed. This is the season for these things to happen.’

“I replied: ‘Stealing property out of someone’s yard is not a crime?’ No, he replied, only if the homeowner witnessed it and filed a complaint.

“The officer had no interest in seeing my pictures of the perpetrators; he got back in his car and drove away.

“Since I first reported this incident to the Republican Party, I’ve been flooded with comments from folks in Virginia and other states who’ve had their Trump campaign signs stolen from their yards. It is a violation of our right to free speech.”

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.