Fairfax County Police Watch: Fairfax County can restore confidence in its police department

Fairfax County can restore confidence in its police department

By Pete Earley and John Lovaas December 2

Pete Earley and John Lovaas served on the Ad Hoc Police Practices Review Commission.

It has been a year since Fairfax County announced it would review recommendations by a special commission to restore public confidence in its police department. Sadly, it has approved only a handful of changes and has weakened some reforms that it approved, raising questions about the county’s commitment to transparency and change.

Board of Supervisors Chairman Sharon Bulova took a courageous step when she appointed a 35-member Ad Hoc Police Practices Review Commission to examine police practices after the 2013 fatal shooting of John Geer. The unarmed Geer was killed by an officer who was later fired and who pleaded guilty to manslaughter, but only after 17 months of stonewalling by the police and the county.

The commission, which included nine active and former police officials, unanimously recommended 142 changes in October 2015 to bolster public confidence. County officials divided them into 202 recommendations under four broad categories. Nearly half concerned “use of force” by police officers. The others focused on police communications with the public, how officers treat individuals with mental illnesses and creating independent oversight of the police.

Of the 202 recommendations, only 20 have been approved. Four were rejected. The remaining 178 are listed as “under review” or “in progress” with no date for completion.

Among those stuck in limbo are the use of body cameras and requirements to make the police more forthcoming after officer-involved shootings to preclude a repeat of the Geer failures.

Besides the slow progress, the board has crippled some recommendations it approved. The commission recommended the board appoint an independent police auditor to review criminal and administrative (disciplinary) investigations of officer-involved incidents that result in civilian death or serious injury and, impanel a civilian review panel to receive and consider citizen complaints about incidents of alleged police abuse of authority or other serious misconduct.

In September, the Board of Supervisors agreed to hire a police auditor, but it sharply curtailed the auditor’s authority. It rejected hiring two independent criminal investigators and ruled that the auditor not review criminal matters until after the cases were officially closed, a legal process that often takes months or years. Instead of directly monitoring internal investigations, the auditor would be informed about them through the police chief.

On Dec. 6, the supervisors will meet to vote on creation of the civilian review panel. Although the commission’s recommendations were unanimously adopted, including “yes” votes by police department and police union representatives, Deputy County Executive David Rohrer, a former Fairfax police chief, and county staff are recommending the board restrict citizen complainants’ right to speak before the panel and its ability to question them, forcing the panel to rely largely on investigations by the department.

Police officers deserve public trust and support. Public outrage about Geer’s death showed significant distrust of the police and officers being subject only to investigation by fellow officers. Before Geer’s death, no Fairfax police officer had been criminally charged, much less indicted, in a killing during the department’s 75-year history. Also troubling: Of the reported 539 police use-of-force incidents in Fairfax County in 2015, 40 percent involved African Americans even though the county’s black population hovers around 8 percent.

If the board hopes to restore public trust, it needs to adopt the commission’s recommendations for the civilian review panel and citizens’ rights without tinkering, and it must speed up approval of the reforms still languishing on the shelves.

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.