Fairfax County Police Watch: After police seize license plates, citizens see them on officer’s car

BY CHRIS HAYES

ST. LOUIS COUNTY, MO (KTVI) – A police officer, who in the past has been accused of drugging and raping women, appears to have used license plates seized by his old police department. Steve Blakeney no longer polices for Pine Lawn, where he was commander. The city fired him in December, but he remains licensed.

During our ongoing investigation of Steve Blakeney, we found a Crown Vic parked in the driveway of his South County home. We traced his license plate to this North County Woman.

Danielle Pettis looked at a picture we showed her and said, ‘And that would be them, right there. They don`t expire till the end of this year.’

Pettis says the plates were on her utility vehicle, until Pine Lawn police seized them.

She said, ‘I wonder if they even made it to the evidence room.’

She read from her registration paperwork saying, ‘My plate is WJ6 J1E.’

Police took them because the DMV reported they weren`t paid for. Pettis said her check bounced after someone hacked her bank account. She quickly cleared it up and the DMV gave her new plates. She added, ‘So I just assumed that Pine Lawn would send my plates back to the DMV to destroy. Well as we found out, they did not do that.’

A man in North City tells me that another plate, exposed in our recent Fox Files investigation- is his old plate.

A September 2014 St. Louis City Police report says Steven Blakeney had it on his car the night Billy Baker saw Blakeney in an unmarked car, with lights and sirens. Baker said Blakeney was parked near the Flamingo Bowl on Washington Avenue. Baker said, ‘At first I was sure he was a cop. Then after that I thought he was an impersonator or whatever, but regardless, the guy was obviously out there to prey on women that he thought were drunk.’

The North City man who recognized Blakeney`s plate, which we showed in the earlier report. The man didn`t want to talk on camera, but said he was surprised. He said police took his plates after Pine Lawn booted his vehicle for unpaid traffic tickets.

Now the North City man and Danielle Pettis both wonder who could come knocking on their doors. Pettis said, ‘(The plates) are coming back to the wrong people. Just like I was found. You know what I`m saying? And I didn`t commit a crime.’

Steven Blakeney texted me “I can’t even remember ever going to the Flamingo Bowl.” Later the same day he texted “I was in a city (of Pine Lawn) car with those plates.” Regarding the car in his driveway, Blakeney provided a letter, sent by his civil attorney to Pine Lawn after his termination.

The letter says in part, “a box of items was placed on the step of (Blakeney’s) house,” including a license plate that Blakeney thought was his personal plate.’

No one at Pine Lawn would answer my questions.

St. Louis Police and the FBI are currently investigating officer Blakeney. Coming soon in the Fox Files, we`ll explain how Blakeney got his police license and kept it despite warnings from police officers and police trainers.

WE NEED TO CHANGE THE COPS, NOT ENCOURAGE THEIR AWFUL BEHAVIOR

Boycott the following companies for hosting the Fairfax 2015 World Police & Fire Games

Apple Federal Credit Union,

LMI,

Noblis,

B.F. Saul Company,

Galls LLC,

Sage Communications,

Macerich,

Glory Days Grill,

Reston Limousine,

City of Fairfax, Karin’s Florist,

NOVA Media Services,

Clyde’s Restaurant Group,

Level3 Communications,

Verizon

Globe, Dewberry,

IMC, ESPN 980,

Serco,

Loudoun County,

Grant Thornton,

Prince William Convention and Visitors Bureau and

Booz Allen Hamilton.

Want to change the murderous arrogance and indifference of the Fairfax County Police? Then fire the people who hire the cops and watch how quickly things change. Start with tossing Gerry Hyland out of office. He basically works for the cop’s best interest and not yours.

Bottom line, if politicians don’t fear that you can harm their careers, then you don’t exist. They don’t see you, they don’t hear you. You don’t matter.

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.