Fairfax County Police Watch: 2025

'Zoey's Law' would limit police chases following tragic death of toddler

This issue needs federal attention...essentially ,we're allowing the dumbest people on our payrolls to drive at any speed they like while chasing someone who may or may not be worth a high speed chase

PRINCE GEORGE'S COUNTY, Md. - On Tuesday, Prince George’s County Councilwoman Krystal Oriadha is introducing a bill that would restrict a police officer’s ability to initiate a car chase.

Zoey’s Law — named after the 3-year-old girl who was killed last March in a deadly District Heights police pursuit — would create an internal pursuit review board and require the Prince George’s County police chief to deliver an annual report on all police-involved vehicle chases.

Zoey’s family stood alongside Oriadha today in support of the bill.

"This tragedy was preventable," said Gina Pryor, Zoey’s grandmother. "Had the officers made a different decision — one rooted in sound judgment and concern for public safety — Zoey would still be here today. I miss her every single day."

The backstory:

The deadly crash happened in March, when a District Heights police officer and a Capitol Heights police officer chased 39-year-old Timothy Naylor, who was fleeing a traffic stop in an Infiniti.

According to police, Naylor collided with four vehicles on the 1200 block of Addison Road South — one of them carrying 3-year-old Zoey and her mother, Tanishia. Zoey was killed in the crash. Her mother survived.

Maryland’s Independent Investigations Division is reviewing the incident as a police-involved death.

What they're saying:

Councilmember Krystal Oriadha says she’s introducing Zoey’s Law in hopes of preventing future tragedies.

"Sadly, when this happened, a lot of you in this room know there were multiple cases within a month’s timespan where we saw a tragic incident where a police chase led to the death of an individual who had no involvement with what was going on," Oriadha said.

Right now, the legislation would only apply to the Prince George’s County Police Department — so it would not directly address the pursuit that killed Zoey, which involved municipal officers.

But Oriadha says her goal is to get buy-in from municipalities through memorandums of understanding — or by passing similar laws at the city level.

FCPD adopts new policy on foot pursuits two years after fatal shooting

WTF took them so long?

Fairfax Co. police launches recruiting push targeting laid-off federal workers

That's how bad it is fo0r a department of gunslingers

and once again Fairfax County cops get away wth murder

RICHMOND, Va. (DC News Now) — The Virginia Legislative Black Caucus released a statement condemning Gov. Glen Youngkin for commuting a former Fairfax County Police Department sergeant’s sentence.

Sgt. Wesley Shifflett was sentenced on Friday, Feb. 28, to serve three years in prison for fatally shooting Timothy Johnson during a police pursuit. He was accused of shoplifting at Tyson’s Corner Center.

“I am convinced that the court’s sentence of incarceration is unjust and violates the cornerstone of our justice system—that similarly situated individuals receive proportionate sentences. I want to emphasize that a jury acquitted Sgt. Shifflett of the more serious charge of involuntary manslaughter, a conviction for which the sentencing guidelines recommend no jail time or up to six months’ incarceration,” Youngkin’s statement read in part.

Following Shifflett’s conviction for the reckless handling of a firearm, Johnson’s mother acknowledged “that most Black and Brown families that find themselves in this situation do not get this far … Today’s verdict has provided Mr. Shifflett a second chance-a benefit that my son, Timothy McCree Johnson, was not afforded.”

Members of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus believe this pardon is reckless and a gross misuse of power that threatens public safety. We will not allow him to use the chaos his friends are causing in Washington as cover to evade consequences as he places a recently convicted, violent criminal back in our communities.

Melissa Johnson, Timothy Johnson’s mother, said on Monday that she found out about the commutation from media reports, and the governor’s office had not reached out to her in advance of the announcement.

“It felt like I could hear my son’s voice crying out from the dirt at Tysons Corner mall again, saying, ‘Why did you shoot me? I didn’t have anything.’ That’s what it felt like,” she said.

And the cops kill another citizen

Fairfax County police officer Shifflett gets 3 years in prison for fatal shooting of shoplifter

A former Fairfax County police officer was sentenced Friday to three years behind bars for his conviction in the deadly shooting of a fleeing shoplifter.

Fairfax County Circuit Court Judge Randy Bellows handed down the three-year prison term to former sergeant Wesley Shifflett, 36, after a jury found the ex-cop guilty of reckless handling of a firearm in the fatal February 2023 incident outside Tysons Corner Center.

Shifflett was acquitted of his most serious charge — involuntary manslaughter — in the shooting that killed 37-year-old thief Timothy Johnson.

The former sergeant expressed his “deepest and heartfelt condolences to the Johnson family” shortly before his sentence was delivered in the crowded courtroom.

“This is a victory for everyone, and I don’t say ‘victory’ as any kind of loose term, because it will not bring our son back. But I do want to acknowledge that this is historical and unprecedented, and for that I am grateful,” Melissa Johnson, Timothy Johnson’s mother, said in a statement after the hearing.

Shifflett was booked into jail Friday night. The former cop’s defense attorneys told WRC-TV they will appeal the ruling.

Police union reps previously accused Fairfax County’s top prosecutor of pushing a “politically motivated” case that was determined to secure a conviction.

Fairfax County's proposed budget

Fairfax County's proposed budget for 2026 includes nearly $60 million in cuts. Among the proposed reductions are $11.5 million from the police department.

Thank God Fairfax County has finally come to it senses and gutted this bloated pig, especially when we take into account the millions of dollars the county has had to pay off for murders committed by the Fairfax County Police Department.

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.