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| NEWS > 10 December 2009 |
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Report Finds Patterns Of New Orleans PD Misconduct
A 150-page report from the U.S. Justice Department says the New Orleans police have engaged in "patterns of misconduct that violate the Constitution and federal law."
The report was released Thursday morning, following a comprehensive investigation at the invitation of NOPD Superintendent Ronal Serpas.
Serpas asked the Justice Department to thoroughly investigate NOPD shortly after he took over the department early last year.
The report says federal officials reviewed NOPD practices and engaged members of the community as part of the probe. It states that it found vi... Read more
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Woonsocket Call
10 December 2009
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To view it in its entirity click this link.
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Woonsocket Police Department,
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Feds arrest city cop
WOONSOCKET — A city policeman was arraigned Thursday in federal court on criminal charges of beating a 16-year-old boy in police custody and then attempting to engineer a coverup by pressuring fellow officers to lie about his actions to FBI investigators, the U.S. attorney's office said.
Patrolman John H. Douglas, 34, a resident of Blackstone, Mass., pleaded not guilty and is free on $10,000 unsecured bond pending further hearings in U.S. District Court on March 17, said Tom Connell, spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office.
The charges stem from allegations that several Woonsocket police officers had punched, kicked and repeatedly shot the boy with a stun gun in World War II Park on Sept. 15. A runaway from the custody of state child welfare authorities, the boy claimed he was beaten even more severely a second time at police headquarters, after officers initially took him to the hospital.
Doctors said the boy had suffered a broken eye socket, a fractured nose and other injuries. But the allegations that he had been attacked by police officers did not surface until the following day, after the boy appeared in court – to answer charges brought against him by the police stemming from the same encounter. Chief Family Court Judge Jeremiah S. Jeremiah was so taken aback by the extent of the boy's injuries, he phoned the press and instructed Police Chief Thomas Carey to initiate an internal probe into possible police misconduct.
A four-year veteran of the force, Douglas is one of three Woonsocket police officers who had been placed on paid leave after the FBI began investigating. His employment status was changed to suspended without pay pending resolution of the charges after he was arraigned, a police spokesman said.
Aided by local officers, the FBI placed Douglas under arrest at Woonsocket police headquarters shortly before he appeared in the federal courthouse in Providence, according to Carey.
“It's affected many members of the police department,” said Carey. “We believe it's just like the indictment says, it's just an allegation at this point. Officer Douglas is innocent until proven guilty.”
The charges were handed up by a federal grand jury Wednesday in an indictment that was unsealed shortly before Douglas was arraigned before Magistrate Judge David L. Martin, Connnell said. Count one of the indictment charges that Douglas “did punch, strike or otherwise assault” the victim, thereby depriving him of his constitutional right “to be free from the use of unreasonable force” at the hands of a law enforcement officer.
The indictment also accuses Douglas of obstructing justice when he “allegedly tried to persuade other Woonsocket officers to provide false information to FBI agents who were investigating” the matter.
If convicted, Douglas faces a maximum of 10 years in prison on the civil rights charge and 20 years for obstruction. Each charge also carries a maximum fine of $250,000.
Robert Laren, a Blackstone lawyer who was serving as the alleged victim's court-appointed attorney when Jeremiah called for the probe, applauded the FBI for bringing charges against Douglas Thursday.
“I think it's appropriate,” he said. “Just because you wear a badge it doesn't make you immune to all the laws we have to operate under. If my client had done this to someone he would be in jail now.”
The boy has told Jeremiah and investigators that on the day of the attack, several Woonsocket police officers punched, kicked and zapped him with an electronic Taser at least twice in World War II Park, where they cornered him after a foot chase.
Laren says the boy was later “slapped around” in a police cruiser, and then taken to Landmark Medical Center. Following his release from the hospital, the boy was allegedly beaten again in an area of the police station without security cameras, resulting in the most severe of his injuries.
Laren said his client is now “doing very well.” He said the boy is living at the home of his grandparents, his legal guardians, though he declined to say where. The boy, said Laren, has a background of significant family dysfunction. He also has a history of running away from facilities operated by the state Department for Children, Youth and Families.
The boy was placed in state custody because his mother had been ordered to serve eight years probation on charges of striking him in the head with a frying pan, Laren said.
Although Judge Jeremiah had ordered Carey to conduct an internal affairs probe into the alleged brutality, the chief said the administrative investigation is on hold until the department can fully assess the fallout of the criminal investigation.
In the days after the allegations surfaced, it was unclear which law enforcement agency would take charge of the investigation. But the FBI became the lead agency at the urging of Clifford Montiero, president of the Rhode Island Chapter of the NAACP.
The two-count indictment against Douglas was announced in a joint statement by U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha, Asst. Attorney General Thomas E. Perez of the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division and Special FBI Agent in Charge Warren T. Bamford. Assistant U.S. Attorneys John P. McAdams and Terrence P. Donnelly, and Trial Attorney Avner Shapiro of DOJ's Civil Rights Division are prosecuting the case.
Connell said the U.S. attorney's office is not commenting on whether the probe will yield further indictments in connection with the alleged attack.
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