On July 6th, Sarah Lee Circle Bear, was jailed on a bond violation. The 24-year-old mother of two boys, ages one and two, was brought to a holding cell in Brown County Jail, in Aberdeen, SD. Witnesses told Indian Country Today that Circle Bear had complained to her jailers that she was in “excruciating pain.” Jail staff purportedly dismissed her repeated requests for help, telling her to “quit faking,” and to just “knock it off”.

Eventually it was other inmates who came to her aid, calling on staff to attend to Circle Bear. Witnesses reported she was then “dragged” from the main cell and placed in a holding cell. She was found “unresponsive” and taken to the hospital by ambulance. She could not be revived.

Mike Carlson, coroner for Brown County, said her autopsy results were “inconclusive”, according to a KELO Television report. The coroner’s office is waiting on further toxicology and tissue results to determine a cause of death. Carlson did note that Circle Bear had “minor injuries” following a small car accident the same day as her arrest, but added that the nature of those injuries would not have been a contributing cause to her death.

Miami-Dade Police arrived at the home Wednesday and wound up in the family's backyard. For reasons unknown, a shot was fired, fatally killing the family's 120-pound American Bulldog, Tyson. The family's 8-year-old daughter is now left without her best friend. "You can never prepare yourself to get the phone call saying police entered your yard and shot your dog," said homeowner Vivian Lopez.

However, when she asked as to why officers were even in her home, Lopez said, she has received conflicting answers. She said one officer told her they were chasing car thieves in the area. "My dog's body was found right here," she said as she described the gruesome ordeal. "His head was facing this way, and the cops came from this way. They shot him in his chest with a shotgun, right here where the blood stain is still at, and we had to clean up the blood."

Lopez continued, "We have no dog, no answers and dog blood everywhere."

Miami-Dade Police have only confirmed that a weapon was in fact discharged and released a statement that reads, "As any open professional compliance bureau investigation, we do not comment into the matter," said Miami-Dade Police Detective Daniel Ferrin.

Neptune police Sgt. Philip Seidle was once declared unfit for duty and had his service weapon taken away three years before witnesses and officials say he shot his ex-wife to death on an Asbury Park street last month, court documents show.

In a Sept. 16, 2014, affidavit, Seidle, who is now charged with using his service weapon to kill Tamara Seidle last month, told a Superior Court judge that he was declared unfit for duty in 2012 and had to see a psychologist before being allowed back to work four months later.

The disclosure, contained among reams of documents in the Seidles' divorce file, comes as the Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office investigates whether Neptune police administrators appropriately handled domestic complaints lodged against him by his ex-wife spanning a decade of their 23-year marriage.

After fighting the federal government for more than 15 months, El Willis will get back his seized cash. Like many others who have faced civil forfeiture, the government never charged Willis with a crime.

In late May, federal prosecutors agreed to return all of his cash—$18,480. But as part of the settlement agreement, Willis will still be on the hook for paying his attorney.

Police first seized the cash during a traffic stop in February 2014. An interdiction officer for the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office pulled his girlfriend, Shonta Wilson, and Willis over as they were driving through Tennessee on Interstate 75. Officer Bobby Queen stopped Wilson after noticing she changed lanes without her turn signal.

Officer Queen patted down Willis for weapons and came across a money pouch he was carrying under his shirt. Inside was almost $20,000. After claiming he smelled marijuana, the officer had a drug dog sniff the car. Though the dog alerted, police never found any drugs. Nor was Willis charged as a result of the stop. In fact, only Wilson was reprimanded, and for driving with a suspended license.

“The money that was taken was our life’s savings. It was not drug money,” Willis stated in an affidavit in April. “Now, without any extra money, we are living paycheck to paycheck,” he added.

Don’t want to get hurt by police? Don’t break the law."

It's common phrase among those who unquestioningly support law enforcement [, Joe Perez,] regardless of documented incidents of corruption and misconduct.

onathan Sanders had broken no law before he was chased down by a Mississippi cop who threw him to the ground and strangled him to death in front of family members.

Esmeralda Rossi was getting into the shower when two Arizona cops illegally entered her home, pulled her towel off, assaulted and arrested her as she screamed in horror. Rossi had broken no law.

Eric Wilson was on his way home from his job at Lighthouse for the Blind when he was stopped by two Little Rock Police officers alleging he fit the description of a suspect. The fact that Wilson is legally blind did not stop the officers from assaulting a man who could not even see them.

Dillon Taylor had just walked out of a convenience store after purchasing a drink when police mistook him for a suspect. Taylor, who had in headphones at the time, did not hear the officer’s commands clearly. Officer Bron Cruz shot in broad daylight, despite Dillon Taylor not having committed a crime.

Daniel Chong was kidnapped by police and held in a dark cell for five days without food or water. He had broken no law and the officers who nearly killed him said that he had been at the wrong place at the wrong time.

Floyd Dent, a retired grandfather, was pulled over by cops who alleged he was a drug dealer. He was pulled from his vehicle and severely beaten on the side of the road by multiple cops. Video evidence later showed him to be innocent, and implicated an officer for planting drugs on his vehicle.

Antonio Martinez was 22 years old when he was brutally attacked, pepper sprayed and arrested by officer Jeffrey Guy. Martinez, who has Down syndrome and the mental capacity of a 7-year-old, had committed no crime. After realizing their idiocy, the Sheriff offered his family a frozen turkey as compensation.

Sureshbhai Patel, 57, was left paralyzed after officer Eric Parker brutalized him. He had committed no crime. Days after the attack, apologists set up a fundraiser for Parker.

Parker Mansell Jr. is in a wheelchair due to health complications. When police came to his house to serve a warrant to his son, they deployed a taser into the stomach of this immobile senior citizen.

Dustin Theoharis was asleep in his bed when two cops busted into his bedroom and began to unload their pistols on the unarmed man. It is estimated that the two officers fired over 20 rounds, of which 16 landed in Theoharis. Theoharis was not the man police were looking for and had committed no crime.

harod Kindell was on his way home when he pulled over to answer a cell phone call. He was not committing any crime. When police saw this “suspicious activity,” they pulled Kindell out of his vehicle before he could put it in gear. Instead of telling Kindell to put the vehicle back to park, an officer opened fire. Kindell received inadequate treatment for his gunshots and was held in torturous conditions for weeks.

Roger Carlos was photographing a building of what was soon to be home to his wife’s medical practice when he was ransacked by an undercover drug task force officer and two SAPD SWAT members. He was beaten to the point of hospitalization after cops mistook him for another suspect, who happened to already be in police custody.

Chad Chadwick was innocent when he was shot, tasered, brutally beaten, and had stun grenades thrown at him by SWAT officers. Those same officers tried to cover up their mistake by charging him with six criminal offenses including felony assault on a police officer.

David Hooks was killed by police as he lay face down in his own home. Police mistakenly raided the home based on a bogus tip from a car thief about methamphetamine.

Akai Gurley was walking to his apartment with his girlfriend when he startled a pair of rookie cops. Instead of saying, “hello” or “hi,” NYPD officer Peter Liang shot him.

Maria Fernada Godinez was having a night out at an Orlando club when a cop fired his weapon at someone outside the club, instantly killing Godinez. The police charged the man, who had not fired a shot, with her murder.

Henry Davis was mistaken by police for another man. He was then brutally beaten by Ferguson cops. Despite being innocent, the Ferguson PD charged him with property damage for getting his blood on their uniforms.

Jody Kozma is a 25-year-old woman who is mentally impaired. Police accused her of shoplifting before assaulting her and throwing her to the ground. After they had reviewed the tapes, they discovered Kozma hadn’t stolen anything.

Jerry Waller was asleep in his bed when police mistakenly burst into his home. Thinking he was being robbed, Waller went for his gun. The senior citizen was gunned down in his own bed and the officers responsible for his death were never disciplined.

Juan Ortiz, a 4′ 11″ Hispanic teen with Down syndrome, was mistaken by two veteran cops for a 5′ 8″ white man. Police violently assaulted the young man in his front yard, in front of his parents.

Najee Rivera was run over by two officers after they pulled him over, leaving him severely injured. Police said Rivera attempted to run away from them and that he “went for their batons.” However, months later, a surveillance tape from a nearby store showed that everything the officers said was a lie.

Robert Saylor was a young man with Down syndrome who threw a tantrum after watching a movie and refused to leave the theater. Three off-duty cops, moonlighting as security, killed him. Saylor had not committed a crime, and the officers were never charged with one.

Gilberto Powell is another Down syndrome man who was beaten after cops saw a “bulge in his pants.” Cops mistook his colostomy bag for an erection and severely beat him.

Kelly Thomas was a schizophrenic homeless man who was detained by several officers who then beat him to death, on camera. Thomas had not committed a crime.

Luis Rodriguez was an innocent man who was killed by multiple officers after leaving a movie theater with his wife and daughter. The murder was captured on video.

Douglas Zerby was watering his lawn when neighbors called the cops because they saw Zerby holding what they thought was a gun. It was actually a water hose nozzle. Officers approached Zerby, and without any warning, fired, fatally wounding Zerby with 12 rounds that entered his chest, arms and lower legs.

Tamir Rice was playing with a BB gun at a park when officer Timothy Loehmann pulled up and shot the boy, without ever giving him a chance.

John Crawford was looking to purchase a BB gun at an Ohio Walmart when multiple officers rushed in and shot him on sight. He had committed no crime and harmed no one.

Last is Baby Bou, whose face was blown apart after officers threw a stun grenade into his crib as he slept.

Seattle officers' use of force will be looked at even more closely after the U.S. District Court approved changes to the department's policies.

On Monday, Judge James Robart approved updates to the Seattle Police Department's policies that address when officers may and may not use force, as well as the reporting, investigation, and review following use of force.

...

The revisions to the policy are the product of feedback from officers and the community, including the Community Police Commission. The revisions come as part of the annual review of new policies implemented after the Department of Justice's civil rights investigation. The DOJ found a pattern of excessive force in the Seattle Police Department in 2011, which now requires the department to undergo approved changes.

The policy changes also include creating a stand-alone de-escalation policy, which clarifies that officers can be accountable for failing to attempt to de-escalate a situation that eventually led to use of force. The updated policies also clarify when the use of less-than-lethal "tools" are prohibited, including the consideration of the subject and environment.

"De-escalation provisions were already a critical part of the overall use-of-force policy, and the revisions now call those provisions out as a separate section to clarify that officers can be held accountable when they do not attempt to de-escalate tense situations, as their training instructs," a statement from the U.S. District Court reads.

The court approved the department's new use-of-force policy in December 2013. It became effective on Jan. 1, 2014. Officers have since received training on the revised policies.

Under the terms of the settlement agreement between the Department of Justice and City of Seattle, they are required to engage in an annual review of all policies, procedures, and training.

The changes to the department's use-of-force policy follow reports that Seattle officer Cynthia Whitlatch could be fired for arresting a man carrying a golf club. William Wingate, 70, was using a golf club as a cane, but was accused of using it as a weapon. Wingate was arrested, but later released. Police apologized to Wingate, who ended up suing.

"He purposely killed him." Prosecutor Joe Deters about UC officer Ray Tensing in Sam DuBose's shooting death. "He should never have been a police officer."

Deters says his office reviewed hundreds of police shootings. "This is without question a murder," Deters said.

Deters called Tensing's version of the events "nonsense. He said Tensing was not dragged, as he claimed in the police report, but fell backwards after he shot DuBose in the head.

Deters said holding back of shooting video was calculated move in part to ensure officer's story didn't change with the viewing.

Deters called stopping DuBose for a missing front license plate a "chicken crap stop."

Officers are out to arrest Tensing, Deters said. Tensing faces life in prison if convicted.

An NYPD cop told a jury Tuesday that he clocked a plastered upper Manhattan club patron — who was knocked into a coma when he hit the floor — to protect himself and his pal.

The rowdy reveler was threatening off-duty Officer Ariel Frias, 30, and a friend about 3:30 a.m. on Jan. 8, 2012, at the Mamajuana Cafe on Dyckman St., the officer said Tuesday at his misdemeanor assault trial in Manhattan Supreme Court.

Frias, a regular at the Inwood hotspot, said punching victim Edwin Veloz, 23, first swung at Javier Delarosa, the officer’s buddy.

“He says, ‘I’ll f--- you up . . . I’ll f---ing kill you!’ ” Frias said.

The cop said he also saw what appeared to be a metal object in the fired-up foe’s hand.

...

“I just threw one punch to get myself out of a situation,” he added on direct examination by his attorney Stuart London.

Frias then left the club — but the altercation between the two groups spilled onto the street on the frosty morning.

...

The cop said he tried to drag Delarosa away to “defuse” the situation but could not stop his friend from rumbling with Veloz’s cousin.

On cross-examination, Assistant District Attorney Jeanne Olivo suggested Frias was not in any danger when he punched Veloz, and that surveillance video showed Veloz was unarmed at the time of the attack.

Olivo also grilled the cop about why he failed to report what happened to his supervisors and did not assist the victim at the scene.

“Are you aware that the rule requires that if you are a witness or a participant in an incident, that you remain at the scene?” Olivo said.

“Now I know that,” Frias said.

The incident was caught on shadowy footage which shows Frias inside the crowded establishment sucker-punching an obviously intoxicated Veloz, whose blood alcohol level was 0.26, more than three times the legal limit to drive.

Frias was drinking a cranberry juice because he cannot have alcohol or smoke due to a medical condition, he said.

Veloz suffered lasting neurological damage and remained in a coma for weeks.

Closing arguments in the case are scheduled for Wednesday morning.

After 23 years of proclaiming their innocence, two Brooklyn men were fully exonerated after the highest courts in the state shut down prosecutors’ attempts to overturn a decision throwing out their kidnapping charges.

“I spent longer in prison than I should have, I just thank God,” said Everton Wagstaffe, 47.

Wagstaffe and Reginald Connor had their 1993 kidnapping convictions overturned and the original indictment dismissed last year by the state Appellate Division after it found that cops had withheld critical evidence that could have cleared them and then lied about it.

Shortly after the court's reversal, Wagstaffe was released from prison while Brooklyn prosecutors filed motions with the Court of Appeals and the Appellate Division to reargue.

Conner's attorney David Toscano said in an earlier interview that “it would be a misguided use of prosecutorial resources to pursue this matter further.”

A second witness has admitted on the stand to lying to investigators handling an excessive force case against a Huntsville police officer.

Huntsville police officer Brett Russell is charged with use of excessive force and obstruction of justice, stemming from an arrest made by Russell in 2011.

Russell is charged after a 2011 altercation with Gary Wayne Hopkins who was being placed under arrest after a domestic violence call. Officers on the scene arrested Hopkins for beating his wife in front of his children.

Monday, testimony from a participant in the police department's ride-along program was heard. The man said that he had lied to investigators three times about what happened that night in 2011 and he also lied to the FBI.

Testimony continued with members of the Huntsville police force Tuesday.

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Bates told the court that if he had known Russell talked about the assault, he would not have gone to assist. He broke down on the stand and admitted to the court that he lied twice to Internal Affairs, lied to an FBI agent, and then lied to a federal grand jury.

He said he lied about seeing Russell strike Hopkins and that he also lied about Hopkins' movement, which he now says were really from Russell's blows.

Bates admitted the truth to the U.S. Attorney a few days ago, saying it affected his family life and career. Prosecutors offered him immunity in exchange for Tuesday's testimony.

The officer who made this very wrong and unconstitutional statement works for the South Holland Police Department in Illinois. If the officer really believes what he is saying, he is a danger to all citizens and should be removed from duty.

Anne Arundel County police have arrested a Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation police officer after, according to a police report, he drunkenly put his firearm near the head of a neighbor who had pulled over his car to check on his welfare.

Fred Puryear, 44, used a black handgun to threaten his neighbor, Michael Wojciechowski, 34, on Saturday night, the report states. The tense standoff between the intoxicated officer and Mr. Wojciechowski happened just as Mr. Wojciechowski and his girlfriend, Angelica Divers, 26, were driving home from a store, along with their 1-year-old and 2-year-old daughters, according to the report.

The Los Angeles Times fires Ted Rall, an award-winning political cartoonist and essayist, after the LAPD objects to his criticism of cops and produces a hard-to-hear 13-year-old tape as “proof.” Listen for yourself. Exclusive.

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Now, regarding the 2001 jaywalking ticket about which the LAPD now calls me a liart, I should note that I wasn’t jaywalking. Not even a little bit. I was innocent.

And the cop was rough. While writing me a summons for what is, in Los Angeles, a misdemeanor, the cop shoved me around and handcuffed me. He was contemptuous, too — after issuing me a violation and releasing me, he feigned to hand me back my driver’s license.

Then he tossed it into the gutter.

I was upset. And, after discussing this incident with some friends, I fought the jaywalking charge. I also decided to file a formal complaint with the LAPD. (This is the only time I have done so.)

LA Times fires Ted Rall re LAPD criticismWhen I didn’t hear back, I called to check the status of my complaint. Eventually I received a letter from LAPD’s Internal Affairs division. It stated that, without interviewing me, they had found my complaint groundless.

That was the last I heard from the LAPD. Until, this past May, when I wrote a blog for the Times where I mentioned the story of when the angry cop shoved me around and threw my drivers license in the sewer.

...

Apparently, and unbeknownst to me, the LAPD officer who wrote me that bullshit jaywalking citation secretly recorded the incident — audio only, no video. We don’t know what device was used but, since this was 2001, it may have been an analog micro-cassette recorder.

That’s right: As far back as 2001, Los Angeles police were surreptitiously recording their interactions with the public. Did anyone know that?

Even more incredible, someone at the LAPD took the time, presumably while on the clock and while spending taxpayer dollars, to dig up a 14-year-old tape recording of a Times cartoonist getting a jaywalking ticket.

This, remember, is the same LAPD that couldn’t be bothered to test thousands of rape kits.

This Extremely Damning Audiotape, Pringle told me, seriously called my account — and by extension my journalistic integrity — into question. (Scroll below to hear the tape yourself, the one LAPD offers up as “proof” and which The Los Angeles Times accepted as such.)

On Monday, Times editorial page editor Nick Goldberg called to inform me that I had been fired, based on what he’d heard on the LAPD audiotape.

I was shocked. I’ve worked as a professional journalist, both in words and pictures, for more than 20 years. Journalism’s search for truth is sacred to me. When I get something wrong, I don’t hesitate to issue a correction or a retraction.

Was it possible that I had conflated two incidents? Fourteen years is a long time. Is it possible that I’d misremembered the incident? Was I suffering some sort of memory loss?

In short: No. I hadn’t. I wasn’t.

This so-called “evidence” against me is audio-only, and crappy quality at that.

Pringle emailed me the audiofile, along with an LAPD transcript.

With Pringle listening on the phone, I listened to it for the first time. When it was finished, I was baffled. Why was I in trouble?

Seriously?

Here. Listen to it yourself:

At about 1am a driver heading eastbound on Pacific Coast Highway crashed into vehicles stopped for the DUI checkpoint. One person was injured and taken by ambulance to the hospital.
The driver, an elderly male, was administered field sobriety tests and was not arrested.

Lex the police dog from central Illinois is far from top dog in drug-sniffing skills.

That's the core finding of a potentially influential new ruling from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which considered the question of how much police should rely on their K-9 partners to justify searches when a dog's own competence, as in Lex's case, is itself suspect.

The opinion stems from an appeal by Larry Bentley Jr, a St. Louis man serving 20 years in prison for drug possession. He argued the 20 kilograms of cocaine Bloomington police found in his car during a 2010 traffic stop derived from an illegal search triggered by Lex.

While the court upheld the conviction, it disparaged Lex and suggested it might have considered tossing Bentley's conviction if police had relied solely on Lex's nose.

"Lex is lucky the Canine Training Institute doesn't calculate class rank," a 15-page opinion said. "If it did, Lex would have been at the bottom of his class."

Lex's trainer at the Bloomington-based dog school staunchly defended the 10-year-old Belgian Malinois on Wednesday, a day after the court's decision.

"The opinion is unfair and very one-sided," Michael Bieser said in a phone interview. He added about Lex, who remains on the job, "He is a very, very good dog."

As a consequence of the decision, he added, some effective drug-sniffing dogs could be kept out of service for fear their performance records will be similarly misconstrued by courts.

Tuesday's ruling pointed to records showing Lex nearly always signals drugs are present — 93 percent of the time. And it cited other figures that indicated he is frequently wrong — more than 40 percent of the time.

"Lex's overall accuracy rate ... is not much better than a coin flip," the ruling says.

Bieser argued Lex's alert and false-positive rates on the street are misleading because they don't factor in times he detects drug residue or larger quantities police simply fail to find. Lex's success rates in controlled tests required for certification have been over 90 percent, he said.

He conceded Lex did fail one controlled test during the evidence-gathering stage of Bentley's case, calling it an anomaly. As a result, Lex was pulled from service for a two-week refresher course.

The court said it upheld Bentley's conviction in part because other indications at the traffic stop, including his contradictory statements, may have separately justified a search. It added that Lex's overall performance likely rose just above minimally acceptable levels according to criteria laid out by the U.S. Supreme Court.

But the judges make clear their concern that dogs that almost always signal for drugs could potentially provide police with a "pretext" to search anyone's car.

They also highlighted the practice of Lex's police handlers giving him a reward — a toy hose stuffed with a sock — each time he alerts, whether he's right or wrong about drugs, saying that "seems like a terrible way to promote accurate detection."

Lex's trainer says the institute doesn't instruct police to reward dogs after each alert. But dogs are so eager to please, he went on, they perceive pats or even encouraging tones of voice as a reward, so whether they get a toy reward is irrelevant.

Still, he says the Bentley case has forced the institute to alter one recommendation to police: From now on, while dogs are out on a job, never offer them a reward.

"We didn't do it because we agree rewards confuse dogs," he said. "But they will use the practice against us in court."

A former Valley Brook police officer, Courtney Schlinke, 21, is locked up and facing accusations remarkably similar to those faced by former Oklahoma City police officer, Daniel Holtzclaw.

Schlinke was arrested Tuesday afternoon by Oklahoma City police officers and is in the Oklahoma County jail on a number of felony charges. She was arrested on 33 complaints: 16 rape complaints, eight oral sodomy complaints, one burglary complaint and eight indecent or lewd acts with a child under 16 complaints.

Similarly, Holtzclaw is currently facing 36 charges, after being accused of sexually assaulting 13 women while on patrol.

The former cop faces 36 charges including lewd exhibition, forcible oral sodomy, felony rape and sexual battery, stemming from incidents that occurred while he was on duty in 2013 and 2014, according to News 9.

A K9 has died as the result of a heat stroke, according to the Muldrow Police Department.

K9 Zeke had been with the department more than four years.

The dog was inside of a patrol unit for longer than an hour on July, 24, 2015. Officer Robert Allen got into work at 4 p.m. and left Zeke in the vehicle with the air conditioner running, according to Chief George Lawson. A domestic battery report kept Allen on the phone for an hour and 15 minutes. When the officer eventually returned to the 2014 Chevy Tahoe, he discovered it had malfunctioned and was only blowing out hot air.

Sequoyah County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Charlie House said the investigation is ongoing.

In a preliminary report, House stated in part: “I told Chief Lawson that I have been a K9 handler for over 5 years and that it was not uncommon for me to leave my K9 in my unit with the air conditioner running while I am in the office working on paperwork. I also told Chief Lawson that the County is having some problems with the air conditioners in our Tahoe’s.”

House ended the report with this statement: “I told Officer Allen that in my opinion there was nothing that he could have done and that it could have happened to any K9 Officer. I told Officer Allen that I as a K9 Handler was going to learn from this.”

Muldrow Police released the following statement on its Facebook page:

“It is with great sadness that we inform our residents of the passing of our K9 Zeke. Zeke was seven years old and worked for MPD for over 4 years. Zeke assisted in over a hundred alerts over his career resulting in numerous drug arrests. Zeke passed as a result of heat stroke from a malfunctioning patrol unit. Thank you to the many individuals, businesses, and Cherokee Nation who assisted with donations in obtaining the funds to purchase him. Zeke will be missed and I ask for your thoughts and prayers for Brad Roberts and Current handler Robert Allen who are missing their partner.”