Website and automated forms processes, Copyright
2007, Matthew August LeFande.
All
rights reserved. No claim to original government forms
Website and automated forms processes, Copyright
2007, Matthew August LeFande.
All
rights reserved. No claim to original government forms
Pickpocket Steals Police Chief's Wallet
A Oslo, Norway police campaign to crack down on pickpockets has come too late to help the capital's top crime fighter.
Police Chief Anstein Gjengedal's wallet was snatched by a pickpocket as the campaign was set to begin, the Oslo newspaper Dagbladet reported Friday.
The police chief was on the Oslo airport train Monday when a group of people jostled him. When he checked a few minutes later, his wallet was gone.
"I didn't have much money with me," he was quoted as saying. "But it still wasn't very nice."
Gjengedal said he had followed police advice by having the wallet in the inner pocket of his jacket, but the thieves got it anyway.
According to Dagbladet, Gjengedal's deputy _ Bjoern Aage Hansen _ wasn't aware of the theft when he announced the "Safe Summer" campaign later in the week, vowing that "we will have a special focus on pickpockets."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/25/AR2007052500383.html?tid=informbox
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:08 AM
matt@lefande.com
Armed Citizen of the Week
A Michigan man was able to turn an attempted attack around because of his concealed weapons permit.
The Kalamazoo County Sheriff's Department says 32-year-old Brian Smith was approached by two men as he was entering his apartment on Mt. Royal Drive just before 2 a.m. Friday.
One of the suspects asked Smith for directions to Kalamazoo Valley Community College and then pulled out a revolver. Smith pulled out his revolver to defend himself and fired two shots, hitting the suspect in his left hand.
Both of the suspects fled the scene on foot. The wounded suspect was arrested a short time later while trying to get medical attention.
The other suspect is still on the loose. He is described as a black man in his early 20s, about 5'8" tall and having a thin build, and last seen wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt and black jeans.
http://www.woodtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=6534873&nav=0Rce
posted by Matthew LeFande 12:19 PM
matt@lefande.com
Judge fines prosecutor for cost of murder retrial
A judge rebuked and fined an Ohio prosecutor's office today because a prosecutor's unconstitutional remarks caused a mistrial at the end of a capital-murder case two weeks ago.
But Common Pleas Judge Nancy Margaret Russo refused to dismiss the aggravated-murder charge against defendant Fernando Newcomb, as his lawyers had asked. Instead, Russo will set a new trial date for Newcomb on charges accusing him of shooting Alvin McKnight to death in January 2006, then trying to burn his body and dumping it near East 45th Street and Lakeside.
She calculated that a retrial would cost taxpayers $26,204, not including such fixed costs as court and prosecutor salaries. So Russo ordered Mason's office to pay a fine equaling that amount to the court's administrative judge.
During the prosecution's closing arguments on May 2, Assistant County Prosecutor Lawrence Floyd pointedly urged the jury to consider that Newcomb declined to take the stand in his own defense.
Russo immediately declared a mistrial and lambasted Floyd for violating Newcomb's Fifth Amendment rights by commenting on his decision not to testify.
Defense lawyers contended a mistrial isn't enough of a sanction and argued that the prosecution deliberately tanked Newcomb's trial because it was going poorly. They decided they lost the case because the jury wasn't going to impose a death sentence, defense attorney John Stanard said. So Floyd flagrantly violated Newcomb's rights because he knew the judge would declare a mistrial, Stanard said.
Russo acknowledged Floyd had deliberately committed prosecutorial misconduct, but said there was no proof that he threw the trial on purpose in "that apocalyptic moment."
http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2007/05/judge_fines_prosecutor_for_cos.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 10:43 AM
matt@lefande.com
New Hampshire man arrested for taping his own DWI investigation
A 48-year-old man was arrested early this morning for wiretapping for allegedly recording police while they were investigating him for driving while intoxicated.
Police say they were patrolling the downtown Rochester, NH area at 2:54 a.m. when they discovered Christopher A. Power of 52 Chestnut St. sitting in the driver's seat of a vehicle with its motor running at the Rochester Common.
After speaking with Power, police began investigating him for driving while intoxicated and arrested him. During the arrest an audio recording device was discovered.
"During a search after the arrest an audio recorder was discovered on the driver's seat cushion," Capt. Paul Callaghan said. "The officer noticed that the recorder was recording."
Power was charged with driving while intoxicated and wiretapping, which is a Class B felony.
Power is being held on $2,500 cash will be arraigned this afternoon at Rochester District Court.
http://www.fosters.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070507/FOSTERS01/105070187&SearchID=73280469534888
posted by Matthew LeFande 12:16 AM
matt@lefande.com
Outspoken Anti-Violence Advocate Gets Prison Time For Home Invasion and Assault
A self-proclaimed anti-violence advocate in Rochester, NY faces a maximum of 25 years in state prison for beating, pepper spraying and throwing another woman through a window.
A Monroe County jury returned a guilty verdict in the case against Joyce Powell.
Powell turned herself into police last October. Police said she and several other people forcibly entered the home and assaulted a woman on Copeland Street.
Powell, who took the stand in her defense, claimed that she was at a bible study group at the time of the attack.
Powell became an outspoken critic of city violence after the shooting death of her son back in August of 2001.
http://rnews.com/Story_2004.cfm?ID=48782&rnews_story_type=18&category=10
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:58 AM
matt@lefande.com
Judge Dismisses Officers' Suit Over Discipline for Vegas Trip
In a case seemingly riddled with wrongs, a federal judge had to decide yesterday who was more right: the Dumfries police officers who called in sick to head to Las Vegas, or their supervisors who confronted them at the airport upon their return.
The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Alexandria had charged that the town's police chief and captain violated the officers' constitutional rights by meeting the plane with a show of force in an effort to "humiliate and embarrass" them.
Three of the four AWOL officers, who say they disembarked at Dulles International Airport and were immediately questioned and searched in front of other passengers, had sought $1 million each.
Judge T.S. Ellis III dismissed the case, finding no constitutional rights had been violated.
"I don't doubt it was embarrassing to them," he said. "But life is about making choices and living with the consequences of the choices you make."
In this case, the officers had chosen to lie to their bosses, and the consequence was being "called on the carpet" by the town's top brass, Ellis said.
Afterward, Jennifer L. Parrish, attorney for Dumfries Police Chief Calvin Johnson and Capt. Ronald Mackey, said her clients had been vindicated.
"It's unfortunate that the lawsuit was even brought, because it shed a false light on the diligence and credibility of the police force," she said.
She maintained, and Ellis agreed, that Johnson and Mackey were working in the capacity of bosses executing a disciplinary action, not police officers making an arrest, when they showed up at the airport.
Her clients had already been lied to and they wanted to see for themselves if the officers stepped off that plane, she said.
And they did.
There to greet them, the officers said in the suit, were five to 10 officers, from both Dumfries and the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, in a horseshoe formation. The returning officers were questioned and stripped of their badges in an open, visible area, they contended.
Michael S. Horwatt, the officers' attorney, called it a "kind of disciplinary nuclear attack."
"This was punishment," he told the court yesterday. "This was to teach them a lesson. This was not for any other reason."
Horwatt said they will appeal. He added that the case is important because it indicates what is occurring on a national scale. "From top to bottom, from the highest levels to the lowest levels of government today, we are seeing an abuse of power and an abuse of authority," he said.
As part of the suit, the officers also contended that their return flight information was unlawfully obtained with the help of the airports authority. Tara Hamilton, a spokeswoman for the agency, declined to comment on the case.
None of the officers who filed the suit is still with the department. Two of the officers retired. The other two, who were auxiliary officers, were dismissed when their program was eliminated.
Dumfries, the state's oldest chartered town, is 35 miles from the District and tucked away in Virginia's second-largest county, Prince William. The police department patrols 1.6 square miles and is responsible for about 5,000 residents.
According to the lawsuit, the issue started when Officers Darrel Robinson and Troy Parker and auxiliary Officers Colin Ruffner and James Metcalf decided to attend a Feb. 15-17 junket in Las Vegas.
Ruffner and Metcalf were not required to request time off, but Parker and Robinson were, so they made up excuses.
Parker told his bosses he was scheduled for dental surgery and even presented a forged note from a dental office, Ellis said in his dismissal order. When he was caught, he then told supervisors that he had lied because he was at an abortion clinic with his girlfriend, which was also determined to be false.
Robinson told Johnson that he needed the time off because his grandmother had suffered a stroke and he had to go to New Jersey to be with her, Ellis said. That was also determined to be a lie.
The two were the only full-time officers scheduled to work those days, Parrish said in court. At the time, the force consisted of 13 full-time officers.
Ruffner lied when the supervisors called to ask him if he knew where the others were, according to Ellis. Ruffner said that he knows that he and the others did wrong but that it did not warrant the reception they received when they stepped off United Airlines Flight 1516.
"This was a very elaborate thing that they did. This is what you would do for an escaped fugitive," he said, adding that the lawsuit was never about the money. "This is about the record and my reputation."
Ellis said it was "perfectly reasonable" for the top officers to go to the airport that day. But he added, "Whether it was the best judgment or not is another matter."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/04/AR2007050401984.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:43 AM
matt@lefande.com
