Dr. Bhagwan Bang is a pediatrician in Opp, Alabama, who says that in his seven years of treating newborn babies, he has encountered several who suddenly turned blue and stopped breathing. But he knows exactly what to do and is able to save the babies’ lives. Except to save them, he actually has to be there.

That was the scary situation back on September 8 of last year when Dr. Bang was at home and received a call about a newborn at Andalusia Regional Hospital who was in that exact critical crisis situation. If the doctor failed to arrive as fast as possible, the infant would die, or could suffer serious, life-altering brain damage.

“Several minutes count,” Bang said. “It could mean a whole life to this child, or making them handicapped.”

Police in Opp had given him a specific route to take for just such a situation and told him to call 911 on his way to the hospital if he needed to get there in a hurry. That’s what he did. But when the cops caught up with him, instead of clearing the road ahead so he could get to the hospital and save the baby’s life, they pulled him over.

In fact, even as Dr. Bang spoke frantically on the phone to the hospital, trying to tell them the situation, the cops held him for 15 minutes, took his license and threatened to slap the cuffs on him.

“I thought they were trying to escort me. I just kept on proceeding,” Dr. Bang said. “I realized that one of the police cars went in front of me to stop me. And this time, the image is in my mind of the baby. They could have a ruptured lung and I may need to do something.”

Finally, they let him go, and luckily he was able to reach the hospital in time to save the baby’s life, just barely. But his ordeal wasn’t done yet.

Police hit him with a laundry list of traffic charges, including reckless driving and similar charges. Last week he was convicted — despite testimony from doctors and nurses supporting him — and now faces the possibility of losing is driver’s license for six months.

A driver’s license isn’t just a convenience for the doctor. With 18 years practicing medicine in rural south Alabama, Dr. Bhagwan Bang is the only pediatrician at not just one but two local hospitals. If he can’t get to work quickly, the next baby might not be as lucky.

Bang admits he has had run-ins with police for speeding before, all related to emergency medical calls. Police say they have tried to work with him in the past, but wouldn’t otherwise comment on the case.

Dr. Bhagwan Bang has appealed the guilty verdict and is waiting for his appeal to be heard in hopes that he’ll be allowed to keep his driver’s license.

A former Utah Highway Patrol trooper who resigned amidst accusations of misconduct fired back at his former bosses Thursday.

An attorney for Neil Green sent a letter to UHP, accusing the agency of “needlessly” and “publicly” humiliating Green when they stated he had been dishonest about an arrest he performed in 2013. The full letter is embedded at the bottom of this story.

“Your statements regarding Neil’s 2014 investigation and resignation from UHP were callously inaccurate,” wrote Green’s attorney, Blake Hamilton.

The controversy surrounds a police report Green filled out following an arrest in August 2013. Green stated that he had performed a field sobriety test on a driver he had stopped. However, dash cam video shows no such test ever occurred. In the report, Green even details missteps the man allegedly made on the test.”

The former second-in-command of the nation's largest sheriff's department and a high-ranking official who was supposed to investigate crimes by deputies surrendered Thursday on charges they hid an FBI jailhouse informant to hinder a federal investigation into abuse by guards.

"The scheme to obstruct justice rose to the executive level of the Sheriff's Department," Acting U.S. Attorney Stephanie Yonekura said. "Both men were aware that there was rampant abuse at the jail, and both men were aware that the internal investigations of that abuse were insufficient."

Former Undersheriff Paul Tanaka and former Capt. William Thomas Carey, both 56, pleaded not guilty in U.S. District Court to charges of conspiracy and obstruction of justice.

The two are the highest-ranking officials charged in the investigation of jailhouse corruption and abuse that tarnished the career of Sheriff Lee Baca, who resigned last year.

Federal prosecutors wouldn't comment on whether Baca played a role in the cover-up or whether he would face charges.

Sam Schwartz, a former New York City traffic commissioner also known as Gridlock Sam, told WNYC's Brian Lehrer that New York City keeps all the revenue from parking tickets -- but must split revenue from moving violations with the state.

“The real mayor of the city is not the mayor, it’s the Office of Management and Budget,” Schwartz told Brian Lehrer. "And the Office of the Management of Budget...decides which programs will always be supported. So a program like parking enforcement will be supported. A program like writing moving violations to speeders will not."

He continued: "And that's why there's typically a ten-to-one ratio in terms of parking tickets to moving violations." Schwartz said when he was a city official, his staff wrote 25,000 moving violations and six million parking tickets, in keeping with the targets set from the city's OMB.

A Baltimore police officer who could be seen in a surveillance video beating an unarmed black suspect during an arrest last year pleaded guilty to assault on Friday and was sentenced to six months in jail, the Baltimore Sun newspaper reported.

The Sun reported that officer Vincent Cosom was suspended from the police force after the video, which shows him repeatedly punching Kollin Truss in the face last June, was made public.

Shaun Owens, Cosom’s attorney, could not be immediately reached, but he told the Sun that Cosom’s behavior was “quite simply a lapse in judgment”.

A lawsuit that Truss filed against Cosom is pending.

A Camden County woman who asserts she was denied access to a bathroom after being arrested and made to urinate on the floor of a jail cell has received a $180,000 settlement.

Rosa Badalamenti of Brooklawn also said police used excessive force when she was taken into custody outside Schileen's Pub in March 2010, according to court papers from the suit.

News of the settlement was first reported by NJ Civil Settlements, a blog which details settlements paid by New Jersey government agencies and their insurers to those who have sued them.

Badalamenti said when she told police that she needed to use a restroom, she was told by an officer to use the floor of a cell, which contained neither a toilet nor a drain.

When she objected, the cop simply repeated his suggestion, the suit says.

While handcuffed to a bench, Badalamenti then lowered her jeans and undergarments and relieved herself in view of several laughing male officers, the suit says. She asserts she was forced to urinate in the cell "due to excessive painful urgency and pressure," according to court papers.

The suit added the earlier arrest left Badalamenti with bruises on her chest, wrists and arms.

...

In agreeing to the settlement, Westville police didn't admit to any wrongdoing.

The CHP is under fire this week after one of their finest pulled over an entire funeral procession for driving too slow.

In an ostensible attempt to prevent a traffic problem caused by the procession, the CHP officer caused a far worse problem after having 100 cars stopped along the freeway.

The incident was captured on cell phone video as the family members were embarrassingly detained on the roadside during this somber time.

A uniformed officer was acting as an escort for the procession as the cars drove to Forest Lawn Cemetery when they were stopped by another officer, apparently drunk on power.

“I’m looking and I’m seeing the car my mom was in on the side of the freeway too. That was embarrassing,” said Rachel Behn-Humphrey.

Behn-Humphrey said the actions of the CHP cop were outrageous, and he showed no compassion.

“A lot of the family members did not make it to the gravesite,” Behn-Humphrey said. “We sat on the side of the freeway so long, they had to go on. I saw some of them drive past.”

Police sergeant Glenford Campbell has been convicted in the Yallahs Resident Magistrate's court on corruption charges.

He is to be sentenced on June 17.

On November 2, 2011, Campbell, who was attached to the Cedar Valley Police Station in St Thomas, was charged with four counts of breaches of the Corruption Prevention Act.

The sergeant was on patrol duty in Cedar Valley on October 29, 2011, when he cited a motorist for breaches of the Road Traffic Act.

He then corruptly solicited and accepted an undetermined sum of money in order not to prosecute him.

A report was made to the Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency and Campbell was arrested and charged.

Today, he was convicted on one count of soliciting and two counts of accepting money in a corrupt manner.

A Texas woman claims she was forced to give birth alone in jail during a horrific night in solitary confinement nearly two years ago, and that her baby died because of it, according to a federal lawsuit filed this week.

Nicole Guerrero alleges in legal documents that "Wichita County denied (her) access to reasonable medical care ... ignored her obvious signs of labor and constant requests for medical assistance, failed to conduct a physical examination ... when she began to display obvious signs of labor, left (her) unattended in a solitary cell while she was obviously in labor, failed to transport (her) to the hospital for safe delivery, which ultimately caused (her) to deliver her baby alone in the solitary cell, and resulted in (her) suffering severe and likely permanent, physical and psychological injuries."

Wichita County isn't talking about the case.

"We are prohibited (from talking) about pending litigation in Texas because we are representing the county in this case," said Wichita County District Attorney Maureen Shelton.

Some NYPD officers have continued to cling to the belief that citizens aren't allowed to film them, despite plenty of documentation otherwise. A letter issued to the Baltimore PD, but that CC'd law enforcement in general noted that "the justification for [filming police] is firmly rooted in longstanding First Amendment principles." (The footnote appended to this added: "There is no binding precedence to the contrary.") The NYPD's own Patrol Guide states this:

...

Higginbotham claimed the arrest was performed in retaliation for his filming police officers, and as such, was a false arrest. The NYPD countered by claiming Higginbotham's supposed "failure to disperse" justified the charge. The court found otherwise:


Now, this is still far from the final ruling, so there's no precedent specific to the NYPD's territory set at this point. But the court's denial of qualified immunity in respect to Higginbotham's First Amendment claims serves notice that future assertions of well-meaning, not-patently-incompetent ignorance won't be entertained by this court. The plaintiff's suit will move forward and the officers accused of taking retaliatory action against a photographer will have to move right along with it. I would expect a settlement in the near future if the NYPD wishes to prevent the Second Circuit from joining the rest of the circuit courts in establishing a First Amendment right to record.

Victoria Herr died in Lebanon County Correctional Facility last month after police hesitated to provide her with medical care for several days. Herr was addicted to heroin and began to go into withdrawal when she was taken into custody.

This is a situation that can be potentially deadly if not handled with care. Sadly, the corrections officers at the jail accused her of “faking,” and refused to get her medical care until it was too late.

According to the family, Tori may have been abused by the officers while she was in custody. On a petition page for Tori, a loved one mentioned the abuse, saying that,

“On arrival, she was not given a medical physical. No one addressed her addiction. She went into heroin withdrawal that turned out deadly. She had begged for help but was denied. The guards said she was faking. Before she was taken to a hospital, they abused and neglected her in horrific ways that are better left unsaid. She had laid in a coma for five days before she died on April 5th, Easter Sunday.”

The police department said in a statement that “all protocols were followed” and that there was no wrong-doing in the girl’s death.

“At approximately 10:15 p.m. due to a medical emergency involving an inmate. Upon initial questioning of staff, all operational protocols appeared to be followed. The PA State Police were notified of this incident and responded as per procedure,” the on-staff officer’s report said.

...

After that disturbing conversation, Moyer went to the jail to put money in her daughter’s commissary and to see if she was OK. She was told by officials at the prison that her daughter was in “quarantine” and that she would not be able to see her until the following week. Her parents returned the next day, not convinced that they were being told the whole story, but again they were turned away.

“I had concerns, I know Tori mentally. I knew this would be a huge thing to bear mentally and physically. Her physical condition just wasn’t that great. She was so thin and tiny. You know, just being an addict alone,” Moyer said.

After refusing to allow them to see their daughter for several more days, they got a message from Lebanon County prison Warden Robert Karnes who informed them that their daughter was in the hospital and in critical condition.

“She was in a coma, she had brain swelling. Her brain had swelled. They said they (the prison medical staff) did CPR on her for 33 to 40 minutes until they called 9-1-1. That’s what the doctor told us. So you do the math,” Moyer said.

Sadly, Tori was unable to recover from the coma and ended up dying as a result of her incarceration.

A North Texas woman recently found herself handcuffed, stripped naked and booked into jail by the North Richland Hills Police Department, all because of an overdue traffic ticket.

The ridiculousness of jailing someone for an overdue traffic ticket is an issue unto itself, but beyond that, the police apparently felt that not paying your traffic ticket is cause to strip you naked and give you a full body cavity search.

This was just a ticket for failing to stop completely at a stop sign.

Boaz says she knows she was supposed to have paid the ticket on time, but she was not able to pay it right when she received it. She had thus set it aside until she came up with the money, and paid it a month late.

For her troubles, she was sexually assaulted by police officers and thrown in a cage.

“I guess it was just frustrating to me, that a bill that I pay a month late, I end up in jail for,” Boaz said.

On her way to work Wednesday morning, the Richland Hills City Marshal showed up at her house with an arrest warrant.

“I’m like, nobody puts out a bench warrant after 60 days. Why would you do that? You wouldn’t do that.”

“I’m going to need you to undress,” one officer said. “I’m going to need you to stand against the wall. Please don’t step in front of this white box, or I’ll take that [as] aggressive toward me.”

Attorney Jason Smith told local CBS 11 News that there’s absolutely nothing that requires a city to imprison someone for an unpaid or late-paid traffic ticket. That is to say nothing of strip-searching for such a ridiculously trivial offense.

A King County sheriff's deputy has been fired after he reportedly passed out drunk while boating in the Tacoma Narrows and left his gun behind on the dock, where it was found by teenagers.

Deputy Christopher Dearth, assigned to the SeaTac Police Department, was terminated May 1, according to personnel records provided to The Associated Press under a Public Records Act request.

In recommending his termination, Chief Deputy Jim Pugel wrote that it was clear the off-duty, 28-year-old Dearth not only operated a vessel under the influence Jan. 19, but also left his department-issued identification and firearm on the dock at the Narrows Marina - and assaulted the Tacoma police officers who responded. They nevertheless appeared to give him preferential treatment because he was a deputy, Pugel said. The gun was turned over to police by marina staff.

"There is ample evidence that the primary reason Deputy Dearth was not arrested and booked into jail for assault, obstructing and boating under the influence was because of his employment," Pugel wrote. "Anyone else who behaved in such a way and was not a police officer would most probably have been."

“He jammed it in there and I started jerking and going all crazy. …go into a full-blown panic attack,” he tells the Guardian. “The damage it caused, it pretty much swole my rear end like a baboon’s butt.”

Scared to death of what the cops would do if he refused to cooperate, Perez agreed to go along with the sting. He later set up a meeting to purchase $170 worth of heroin.

For $170 worth of Heroin, Chicago police allegedly raped a man with a gun.

No charges were ever brought against Perez and in 2013 he filed a lawsuit for damages.