August 21, 1989Fairfax County found no evidence implicating
Randall Lee Breer in the death of Rhiannon "Rosie" Gordon in a search
of his Dale City residence over the weekend, Fairfax County Commonwealth's
Attorney Robert F. Horan Jr. said in a telephone interview last night.
Undercover investigators arrested Breer, a 28-year-old Dale City construction
worker, Thursday afternoon at a used car lot in Woodbridge."There's not
sufficient evidence to charge him," Mr. Horan reiterated last evening.
"I basically happen to be a believer that if you have proof, you charge
them. If you don't, you don't. In my business you realize you need
evidence."
We called the Fairfax County police for help....the punks they sent threatened to arrest us. One cop tells my wife that if she keeps crying he'll arrest her and the other cop, La Forge or something, says to me "You call the police this what you get" I said that was wrong and he said "Go ahead, say more fuck'n thing prick" and I thought "Well if you insist".
Trivial Pursuits and Predatory Policing
August 15, 2004 Sunday
Trivial Pursuits and Predatory Policing
Falls Church Police
Chief Robert T. Murray imposes a quota on his officers: They must write an
average of three tickets or make three arrests per 12-hour shift. The most
obvious way to fulfill the requirement is to focus on trivial infractions.
"Traffic is a big issue" in his community, says Murray, because
serious crime is not. That may surprise the two men who were assaulted and
robbed recently on Monticello Drive. One victim, who was riding his bicycle to
his Falls Church home, happened upon six suspected gang members as they
brutally assaulted another Falls Church man. After robbing the first victim, these
hoodlums assailed the cyclist and stole his bike. Fairfax County police logged
that incident about 2 a.m. July 30. About the same time, according to other
police reports, criminals were robbing an Arlington business and stealing a car
from Kirkwood Street; breaking into a warehouse and a school in Alexandria; and
stealing another car. Later that day, an Arlington man was robbed at gunpoint
by thieves who shot him -- out of annoyance because he was carrying so little
money -- and then stole his car. And what were Fairfax County police doing that
day? At least some were conducting a sobriety checkpoint in McLean. This
checkpoint produced predictably paltry results -- of the 591 cars that passed
through the blockade between 11 p.m. and 2:15 a.m., police found only three
drivers to cite for driving under the influence. Why, with vicious thugs on the
loose, do police waste time on trivial pursuits and ineffective tactics? It
isn't as though serious crime is hard to find in Northern Virginia. In a single
week earlier this month, Fairfax County police logged 159 cases of larceny and
21 auto thefts. Open-air drug markets -- well known to police -- operate with
impunity. Yet citizens who dislike seeing their taxes wasted have no one but
themselves to blame. We have created a climate that hinders -- even hamstrings
-- effective policing. For instance, the National Drug Intelligence Center
(NDIC), an agency of the U.S. Department of Justice, provides stunningly
specific data about the distribution of illegal drugs in Northern Virginia.
"West African and Middle Eastern criminal groups are the primary
transporters of Southwest Asian heroin into Virginia," the NDIC reports.
"Mexican brown powdered heroin and Mexican black tar heroin available in
Virginia typically are transported into the state from southwestern states and
North Carolina by Mexican criminal groups. "Dominican and African American
criminal groups are the dominant wholesale and mid-level distributors of South
American heroin in Virginia." The average cop on the beat in Virginia
almost certainly is aware of these patterns, but an officer who targets the
likely suspects risks being excoriated for "profiling." Is it any
wonder cops turn to menial matters when they are criticized for intelligent
policing? Citizens also bear the blame for tolerating tactics that use law
enforcement to produce revenue. For example, sobriety checkpoints not only
yield negligible results, they may even be counterproductive. How many more
tragedies could be prevented by patrolling for impaired drivers? Nonetheless,
Virginia police set up roadblocks weekly because that allows them to collect
millions of dollars in grant money from the federal government -- and profits
from a windfall of tickets. Consider that Fairfax's 316 checkpoints last year
yielded only 770 arrests for DUI, but 7,209 citations for other infractions --
e.g., incorrectly installed child seats, expired property stickers, non-use of
safety belts, etc. Corralling citizens to sift for a few miscreants is
precisely what the Fourth Amendment prohibits, but officials promote it and
citizens acquiesce because dragnets are so lucrative. Most police officers are
courageous people whose talents are wasted in setting trivial traps. And,
surely, most Virginians would prefer being protected to being harassed. But
effective law enforcement needs a political climate in which facts can prevail
over political correctness -- and where local officials are willing to eschew
the revenue produced by predatory policing. Criminals in Northern Virginia,
sleep soundly.
August 11, 1994,4 Female Workers Sue Fairfax Police;
3 Officers, Civilian Accuse Lieutenant of Repeated Sexual
Harassment Three female police officers and a civilian employee sued the
Fairfax County Police Department yesterday for $ 1 million, claiming a male
supervisor sexually harassed them at times during the last 12 years. The women
alleged that Lt. Larry Jackson repeatedly made unwanted suggestive remarks and
overtures. Two of them said he retaliated after they complained about his
behavior to his superiors by filing petty or phony disciplinary charges against
them."This has been a recurring pattern," said Carla Markim Siegel,
an attorney for the women. "These women didn't know each other. They complained
independently, and the department didn't take adequate measures to prevent it
from happening again... . It creates a hostile work environment." The
suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, rekindles a controversy
surrounding the treatment of women in the 1,036-member department. Two years
ago, 10 female officers complained to the Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission about a "locker room attitude" in the department and said
they had been denied promotions and key assignments because of their
sex.Although the county drafted a policy against sexual harassment last year,
the suit contends that women continue to be subjected to abuse. Police Chief
Michael W. Young and Jackson also were named as defendants.Maj. Richard
Rappoport, a police spokesman, said the department has acted swiftly in cases
involving workplace harassment. All supervisors underwent training last year in
ways to detect and address sexual harassment, he said. He declined comment on
the allegations against Jackson, saying he had not seen the lawsuit.Jackson
referred questions to his attorney when reached at his office in the
department's West Springfield station. The lawyer, Kristin R. Blair, said the
allegations are false and stem from a "racially hostile" work environment
that "encourages unfounded claims and promotes exaggerations against
minorities."Jackson filed an EEOC complaint alleging racial discrimination
seven months ago, and that case is pending, Blair said. "I feel that Larry
is just being made out as some fiend and he's really a straight arrow,"
she said.The suit was filed by Officers Susan Long, Cynthia McAlister and
Elizabeth Dohm and Andrea Moss, a civilian communication aide, all of whom
worked under Jackson's supervision at various times during his 17-year police
career.Their lawyer, Siegel, said race had nothing to do with the lawsuit.Among
other things, Long said Jackson once ordered her back to the office while she
was on the way to a burglary call to ask her out to lunch. He also suggested
she use her "sex appeal" to get him new uniforms, the suit
said.McAlister said that Jackson made advances while the two took a private
airplane ride in 1982 and that her colleagues later ridiculed her about the
incident. Moss said Jackson made up a list of phony disciplinary charges
against her last year after he learned she complained about him to the
department's internal affairs unit. On another occasion, she said she found
computer records that falsely showed Jackson had disciplined her.Dohm also said
she was disciplined by Jackson after talking about him to internal affairs
investigators three years ago.
Fairfax County's first black cop sued the police
August 7, 1989
Christopher Stokes,
48, a youth counselor and Realtor who in 1967 became Fairfax County's first
black police officer, died Aug. 4 at Fair Oaks Hospital. He had sickle cell
anemia. He left the Fairfax police in 1973. Since 1974, he had been a youth
counselor with the Fairfax County courts and a part-time Realtor with Mount
Vernon Realty in Fairfax. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, he had testified
for federal attorneys against Fairfax County. It was charged that the county
discriminated against blacks and women in its hiring and promotion policies. In
1982, the Justice Department accepted a settlement offer by Fairfax County that
involved the distribution of $ 2.75 million to 685 discrimination victims. Mr.
Stokes was among those who received awards.
Labor union? When was the lst time you saw one of these weasels outside a cop car? You have to labor to have a union
August 4, 1990 Fairfax Cops form labor union