A veteran of the Hummelstown police department who is facing charges in the shooting of an unarmed man appeared before a Dauphin County judge this morning and pleaded not guilty to the charges against her.

Lisa Mearkle, who spent 14 years as an officer with the department, was charged with third-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter and involuntary manslaughter after the fatal shooting of 59-year-old David Kassick, according to court records.

She is accused of using excessive force in Kassick's death. State police allege she shot the unarmed man without justification when she fired two fatal rounds into his back while he was lying on the ground.

The incident followed an attempted traffic stop in South Hanover Township in February.

Mearkle's attorney, Brian Perry, has argued the shooting was justified because the officer believed Kassick had been reaching into his jacket for a weapon.

Perry entered the not guilty plea on behalf of his 36-year-old client before Judge Deborah E. Curcillo at 8 a.m. on Thursday in what Chief Deputy District Attorney Johnny Baer estimated to be a three-minute proceeding.

Mearkle's next scheduled court appearance is in November.

Now, an officer who dared to speak up and break the blue wall of silence is suffering the consequences.

Sgt. Randy Henry, the Missouri Highway Patrol trooper who spoke with Piercy the night of Ellingson’s death, gave investigators a recorded statement, and told them that he had concerns about inconsistencies and changes in Piercy’s story.

Henry was not invited to testify at the coroner’s inquest. Neither was a family who witnessed the drowning. That’s likely because their testimony would have supported an involuntary manslaughter charge – at the least – for Piercy.

Yesterday, it was announced that Henry has been demoted to corporal and moved from Lake of the Ozarks, where he’s worked for nearly three decades. He is now assigned to Truman Lake, according to his attorney, Chet Pleban of St. Louis, who sent out a release Thursday detailing the discipline and referring to his client as a whistleblower.


Pleban said Sgt. Henry is prepared to fight the disciplinary action and said a future hearing will occur. He also said that he believes the demotion and transfer of Henry was designed to force the trooper to retire.

Craig Ellingson, Brandon’s father, said Henry’s discipline is wrong.

“It’s retaliation,” he said. “They shouldn’t be doing that.”

It was announced this week that the officer who shot and killed 17-year-old Deven Guilford for flexing his rights this past February, will not be charged for any crimes.

Deven was traveling along the road and flashed his lights at an officer because his headlights were so bright that they nearly made Deven run off the road. He was then pulled over by Sgt. Frost of the Eaton County Sheriff’s Office, who stopped the young man for no other reason than the fact that he flashed his lights.

When Frost approached the car, Guilford explained that he was simply flashing his lights to be a polite driver, and let the officer know that his high beams were on so he didn’t cause an accident.

The officer began to get aggressive with Guilford when he was not immediately obedient and attempted to flex his rights during the traffic stop. Guilford refused to show the officer his license and registration because he had broken no laws and the officer had no reason to stop him.

Guilford also began recording the encounter with his cell phone and let the officer know that he was filming for his own safety. He then asked the officer if he was being detained and for what reason. He was told that he was being detained because he refused to comply with Frost and show him his ID. However, not showing his ID is a secondary offense, meaning the officer would actually need a real reason to pull him over to begin with.

On a power trip, Frost violently ripped Guilford out of the vehicle and forced him down to the ground. Guilford attempted to remain filming while he complied with the officer’s orders and moved to the ground. Sadly, Guilford was not moving fast enough for Frost, so he tased the young boy. At this time, both the body camera and the cell phone footage got cut off.

Off camera, Frost shot and killed the young boy. The known details are sparse because the killing happened out of the view of the dash-cam, and the body camera was turned off at that point. However, the officer claims that the young boy attacked him, so he “feared for his life” and killed him, firing 7 shots from his weapon.

After the announcement that officer Frost would not be charged, the Guilford family released the following statement:

On Friday, a family pet was shot by a member of the Cleveland Police Department and the family and Cleveland residents were left with many questions.

According to Tyler Muzzi, he arrived at his home on 1104 Harvard St. after lunch and noticed a suspicious person.

"Sometime after 1 pm I returned home from having lunch with my wife. I noticed a suspicious person walking up and down the street. After seeing this person go behind my neighbor's house I walked both to my mailbox and to my backyard to put my dog Miller on his leash line where he could run around our yard. When I did not see the man anymore I called the owner who then notified the police," said Muzzi.

The neighbor was Bryant Steele.

"When the Cleveland PD showed up on scene I told them I had seen the man and notified the owner. In a short period of time they had the man in custody and an officer came to my front door where I called the owner for him so that they could get him to come to the house," said Muzzi.

Muzzi said by this time he assumed the situation was handled, "and because my Miller had been in the backyard the entire time on his leash line with no problems I assumed everything was O.K. With my blinds open I saw investigators pull up a significant amount of time later. I could not see them once they were in the neighbor's yard," said Muzzi.

"Minutes later I heard what I thought was two gunshots but turned out to be three. I immediately jumped out of my recliner and ran to my front door not having any idea of what had just occurred. When I looked out the window all I saw were officers standing around, not one walking towards my door," he said.

"I opened my door to the sounds of my sweet dog yelling in agony and knew then what had happened. An officer told me to go check on my dog as I rushed into my backyard to see Miller bleeding profusely and still connected to his leash line," he said.

"At this point no other officer had said anything else or offered to help in any way as I rushed to wrap him up in towels while as the same time calling Cleveland Pet Clinic to let them know I was on the way. Multiple officers stood idly by, 10 feet away, watching me. Animal control showed up almost immediately and helped me get him to the vet," said Muzzi.

Miller was a one year old Labrador and was attached to a leash line in the Muzzi's backyard where he had the entire length of the yard to run.

Muzzi said, "The man that shot him walked up and said he was sorry and that he thought he was going to be attacked. I kept saying he was on a line and how did he not see it. He said he didn't see the line."

Miller's spinal cord was severed in two places and the family had to say goodbye that evening.

Muzzi has hired an attorney.

"This needs to be an example set to redo policies so it doesn't happen again to anyone else," said Muzzi.

Muzzi went to the police department and saw some video and said, "In the video I couldn't see the shooting but did see my dog laying around and whimpering—trying to get away from the guy who shot him. Miller was on the neighbor's land by about a foot but either way you have to walk through my backyard to get to where they were."

The Bolivar Commercial spoke with Cleveland Police Chief Buster Bingham who said he was gathering all of the information he could and it was still under investigation.

According to Alderman and police board member Paul Janoush, "The Police Committee will meet today with the mayor to do a thorough investigation of the incident. At this time the problem is there was only one officer involved and no witnesses. The officer has been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation."

Two former police officers embroiled in the NYPD ticket-fixing scandal have quietly agreed to plea deals that allow them to keep their pensions and avoid prison, officials say.

Christopher Manzi, 45, a former union delegate from the 41st Precinct in Hunts Point, pleaded guilty to a single grand larceny count yesterday before Judge Steven Barrett, who said Manzi can avoid jail by staying out of trouble for three years.

He retired in 2013, not long after his indictment.

Manzi's plea comes days after Brian McGuckin, a union financial secretary out of the 40th Precinct in the South Bronx, also pleaded guilty to a single count of grand larceny stemming from a sprawling investigation by Bronx District Attorney Robert Johnson and the NYPD's Internal Affairs Bureau of police officers making tickets disappear.

McGuckin, a 19-year veteran, hoped that his trial would not begin until late this summer when he would have reached his 20th year on the force. But when McGuckin recently tried to dump his lawyer, Judge Steven Barrett accused him of trying to stall the case, and insisted that it go forward.

McGuckin, 47, filed for retirement just as his trial was about to start. He will keep a pension based on his time on the force, but will lose an annual pension bonus worth $12,000 a year.

He was also part of an insurgent slate that unsuccessfully tried to unseat Patrick Lynch, the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association president, in this year's union leadership election.

McGuckin and Manzi, who each faced dozens of ticket fixing counts, risked several years in prison if convicted at trial.

Officers convicted of any felony charge automatically lose both their jobs and pensions, which in some cases can be as much as $1.5 million in total retirement payouts.

Eleven other officers are awaiting trial on ticket fixing charges. Johnson is playing hardball with them, and not expected to offer them any better deals.

If they were to plead guilty, they would immediately lose their jobs.

The ticket-fixing probe grew out of an investigation into alleged drug dealing by a Bronx officer, Jose Ramos, when Internal Affairs investigators conducting wiretaps overheard discussions about officers tossing summonses. Ramos was subsequently convicted.

More than 100 other police officer were disciplined internally by the NYPD for their respective roles in the scandal.

Off-duty police Sergeant, Phil Seidle, 51, was arrested on first-degree murder, weapons and child endangerment charges in the death of his ex-wife, 51-year-old Tamara Siedle, Monmouth County prosecutors said on Tuesday.

According to prosecutors, the officer chased a car driven by his ex-wife for several miles in New Jersey on Tuesday morning with their daughter in the front seat.

When Tamara’s car crashed into an unoccupied parked vehicle and the chase ended, Seidle got out from his car and approached her driver's side window.

Once he got close to the car, he fired several gunshots into the car and then held the gun to his own head, prosecutors said.

Police officers in the neighborhood for an unrelated traffic accident managed to take the girl from the car and remove her from the scene.

After a 30-minute standoff between him and police, during which Siedle had a gun to his head, officers eventually managed to convince him to put the weapon down and surrender.

Michael Terrell, who witnessed the scene, said Seidle was shouting at his ex-wife about their child custody fights.

"The guy was in the middle of the street," Terrell told the Asbury Park Press newspaper. “He was saying, ‘I'm tired of going to court.’”

The couple had nine children ranging in age from 7 to 24.

The US averages 87 deaths each day as a function of gun violence, with an average of 183 injured, according to the University of Chicago Crime Lab and the Centers for Disease Control.

The Northeastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council (NEMLEC) has settled a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts and agreed that its records are subject to the state public records law. Today, the parties asked the Suffolk County Superior Court to enter a proposed judgment reflecting that understanding. This effectively ends a dispute that began more than two years ago when NEMLEC initially refused to provide the public with information about its activities. The motion is currently awaiting a judge’s approval.

NEMLEC, a group of 61 police and sheriff departments in Middlesex and Essex counties, oversees several operational units and receives government grants and taxpayers’ dollars. Its Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team uses armored vehicles, automatic weapons and combat gear to carry out military-style operations, including forced entries into homes to serve search warrants.

In 2012, the ACLU of Massachusetts requested records relating to NEMLEC’s SWAT team and other operations as part of its efforts to document regional policing operations and the militarization of police. NEMLEC refused to allow access to those records, claiming that its records were outside the reach of the public records law. The ACLU of Massachusetts filed suit in state court in June of last year to obtain the documents.

NEMLEC ultimately reversed its position and agreed that its records are subject to the public records law. In keeping with its revised position, NEMLEC released more than 900 pages of documents about its activities to the ACLU of Massachusetts, including SWAT team after-action reports, policies, financial statements and training materials. The ACLU of Massachusetts is reviewing the documents and will release them to the public, along with in-depth analysis, shortly.

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Police officers in Los Angeles are backing off the practice of community policing in the aftermath of the Ezell Ford case, a police union official said Tuesday.

Craig Lally, president of the Los Angeles Police Protective League was on hand for the Police Commission meeting at the Civic Center in downtown Los Angeles for his first meeting with the panel since it ruled that one of the two officers involved in the shooting death of Ford last year violated department policy.

Lally told KNX 1070 NEWSRADIO the ruling has left many rank-and-file officers rattled.
“They’re continuing to handle radio calls when people call the police…but the word I have from a lot of the officers that are calling me is that they’re not gonna do any proactive police work,” said Lally.

His comments appeared to contradict the view of officers on the street who told CBS2/KCAL9’s Cristy Fajardo last week nothing has changed as far as day-to-day operations.

Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck and the department’s internal watchdog unit previously found the officers acted appropriately. It is now up to Beck to decide on punishment for the officers.

Lally said despite the Police Commission’s ruling, he doesn’t believe Beck will take action against the officer in the Ford case.

“He made it perfectly clear that once he made this an in-policy shooting that he’d be very hard-pressed to discipline this officer,” said Lally.

A New York man who served 18 years in prison for a murder he didn’t commit can move forward with his civil case which claims that the police officers who investigated him coerced witnesses into picking him out of a photo array, a federal judge ruled Monday.

Fernando Bermudez was convicted of killing a man outside a Greenwich Village nightclub in 1991 even though he had no relationship to the victim and ​had ​a number of alibi witnesses, his lawyer has said – and last year he won a $4.75 million settlement from the state over his wrongful imprisonment.

A three-judge panel from the US Court of Appeals ruled Monday that Bermudez could proceed with his second​ lawsuit alleging violations of his due process rights, overturning an earlier decision from a Manhattan federal court judge that dismissed his case.

The Appeals judges affirmed the Manhattan federal court judge’s decision to toss out the portion of Bermudez’s lawsuit that alleged malicious prosecution.

“Detective [Daniel]Massanova gave Lopez a photograph of Bermudez, told him that Bermudez was a drug dealer, and said to [Efraim] Lopez that if he did not identify Bermudez as the person who had killed Blount then Lopez would be charged as the shooter,” the judges wrote in their decision.

Bermudez’s case will now move forward in Manhattan federal court.

“We are disappointed with this decision,” a city Law Department spokesman said.

The city is paying $490,000 to the family of a man murdered by a rogue Philadelphia police officer who opened fire after his girlfriend's cellphone got wet during a neighborhood squirt gun fight, officials announced Wednesday.

Mark McDonald, a spokesman for Mayor Nutter, said the city also is paying $85,000 to a woman who was wounded when former Officer Rudolph Valentino Gary Jr. - who is serving a 25- to 60-year prison sentence for third-degree murder and aggravated assault - started shooting.

The attack happened May 2, 2010, after Gary and his girlfriend went to the 1800 block of Hoffman Street, in the Girard Park section of South Philadelphia, to pick up his son from his ex-wife's house.

When Gary and his girlfriend arrived in his Ford Expedition, adults and children on the block were squirting each other with Super Soakers. Some water was sprayed through the window of the SUV and splashed his girlfriend's cellphone, and she jumped out and began fighting with a neighborhood woman.

Gary, now 31, stepped out of the Ford, pointed his police-issued 9mm Glock at the neighbors, and then fired a shot into the air.

A witness testified that Howard Williams, 21, tried to calm the dispute, but Gary immediately shot him in the chest.

The off-duty officer then stood over Williams and shot him two more times, hitting him in the neck and chest.

Gary, who had been on the force 11 months, was charged with first-degree murder shortly afterward. In 2012, he pleaded guilty to third-degree murder and aggravated assault.

The $490,000 settlement will go to Williams' mother, Diane, McDonald said. The $85,000 is for Indria Johnson, a neighbor who was wounded in a leg by one of Gary's bullets, McDonald said.

Before the killing, Gary had been in a series of disputes with his ex-wife and Williams.

On at least one occasion before the shooting, Williams had complained to the Police Department that Gary had pulled a gun on him. But the department took no action against Gary, court records show.

The city agreed in March to pay Johnson and Williams' mother, but the money was not released immediately because of the size of the payments.

A former Pocahontas County sheriff’s deputy was sentenced Friday to 10 to 20 years in prison for sexually abusing a woman that he had arrested.

“You’re going to start serving time today,” Circuit Judge Jim Rowe told Bradley Totten of Hillsboro. Totten will have to serve at least 10 years before there’s a chance for parole.

The sentencing brought to a close an emotional case that was first brought to light publically when Totten was indicted in April 2012.

He was indicted twice on a total of 66 counts claiming that from 1995 to 2010 he would arrest women and teenagers and then force them to have sex with him. There were believed to have been at least 20 victims. Totten eventually pleaded guilty to a single count of sexual abuse involving a 17-year-old girl. There were multiple assaults of the same victim.

Totten apologized during Friday’s hearing but Judge Rowe appeared upset with some of the things the former deputy said in a written statement. The judge read some of it in court. He said it appeared Totten was claiming to be the victim.

“The bottom line—you used a position of trust over a 17-year-old to have sex,” the judge said.

Rowe said the length and magnitude of the conduct “has done extensive damage to law enforcement, criminal justice, the community and families.”

The judge added “even prepubescent females were at risk” due to Deputy Totten’s conduct.

Special Prosecutor Brian Parsons said it was a difficult case but a correct sentence.

“On one hand you hate to see a person removed from their family but on the other side the damage that’s been done is very hard to calculate,” Parsons told the Pocahontas Times. “I think in light of the totality of the crime and in light of his situation, I do think it’s fair.”

Parsons credits the work of State Police Lt. Rob Simon and FBI Special Agent Fred Aldridge.

Totten, who has been on home confinement, asked the judge to allow that to continue but it was denied. He was fined $5,000 and taken to jail. The judge did order protective custody.

None of the victims spoke in court Friday.

...Buono, along with former Newark police officer Dino D'Elia, was arrested and charged Tuesday with two counts of computer theft and one count of conspiracy after authorities said they illegally gained access to a private database made available to police departments to investigate insurance fraud.

"The public should not have to worry that sensitive information will be illegally accessed. These defendants at this juncture stand accused of compromising the public's trust,'' said Acting Essex County Prosecutor Carolyn Murray.

According to investigators, Buono and D'Elia later allegedly sold information taken from the database to third parties for as much as $100 per search.

The suspected illegal breach first came to light in 2014, sparking a joint investigation by the Essex County Prosecutor's Office Official Corruption Unit and the Internal Affairs Unit of the Newark Police Department, officials said.

Buono and D'Elia allegedly accessed the database on more than 900 occasions, and later sold the data as part of D'Elia's private investigation business, according to investigators.

If convicted, both Buono and D'Elia could face 5 to 10 years in New Jersey State Prison on each count.

A South Florida cop is accused of pulling a lesbian couple over, taking one of them into custody and ordering her to undress as he rubbed his *****.

The incident took place Saturday after the Hialeah cop pulled the two women over without providing an explanation for the stop.

One of the women was then taken into custody for questioning. They ended up inside an interrogation room in the police department while her partner remained outside in the parking lot.

...


The woman explained that she was sure she was going to be arrested and followed the officer’s orders out of fear. She said she believed that she was going to be raped.

She said when the officer brought her into the room, he told her they would be meeting with investigators, but found herself in an empty room, alone with the officer.

The woman claims that the officer asked to see her from behind, and then demanded that she take off her shirt and her bra. The woman asked why, telling him there was no reason for her to get undressed, and she says the officer said “Oh, I thought you wanted to ****.”

Eventually, after approximately 15 minutes, the woman was released from the police station with no charges and was reunited with her girlfriend. They believe there may be other victims out there.

The Hialeah Police Department is investigating the allegations against the officer, but has not released his name.

Sexual misconduct is the number two top complaint against law enforcement officers after brutality.

FORT WORTH — The Tarrant County District Attorney's office has sent out 4,000 disclosure notices to defense attorneys in Tarrant County after credibility concerns have been raised with 19 law enforcement personnel connected to the cases.

District Attorney Sharen Wilson said in a statement that after taking office earlier this year, she became aware of 6,000 handwritten notes by prosecutors detailing cases back to 1993. Some of these included notes on law enforcement witnesses.

"It's a big deal," said Alex Kim, who received one of the Brady notices on Monday.

The defense attorney says a client's pending DWI case from December is now under review after one of the officers involved was identified as one of the 19 that have "sustained findings of untruthfulness."

"It blows your mind that this was going on and it was never disclosed," he said. "From what I understand, the notes were whether they were a good witness or bad, things they covered, and if they fudged or not, whether they were lying."

The city of Milwaukee has agreed to pay $100,000 to settle a lawsuit from a woman punched by a Milwaukee police officer and pulled out of a police car by her hair.

The settlement was announced Wednesday. The federal civil rights lawsuit was filed on Jeanie Tracy's behalf in spring 2014.

According to police, Tracy was arrested in September 2011 after a traffic stop. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported video from a squad car shows her stomping her feet, spitting and cursing before being punched, dragged out of the car by her hair and kneed in the stomach by Officer Richard Schoen.

Schoen was initially fired, but a commission said he should get a 60-day suspension. Schoen was dismissed after the commission reversed its decision following public outcry. His firing was upheld by a judge last fall.

Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Longview, Texas - Code of Ordinances

Sec. 91-10. Use of public rights-of-way prohibited for certain purposes.

(1) A person commits an offense if the person stands or parks a vehicle upon any portion of a public right-of-way for the purpose of any of the following:
a. displaying such vehicle for sale;
b. washing, greasing, painting, decorating, filling with gas or oil, repairing or otherwise performing maintenance on such vehicle; or
c. utilizing the public right-of-way for customer parking.

Longview, Texas - Code of Ordinances

Sec. 58-21. Loud, raucous noises prohibited; prohibited noises enumerated, exceptions.

(a) It is unlawful to make, continue, or cause to be made or continued any loud or raucous noise which:
(1) is offensive to persons in the vicinity thereof;
(2) substantially impairs the peaceable enjoyment of public or private property; or
(3) causes material distress, discomfort, or injury to persons of ordinary sensibilities in the area.

b) The following acts, among others, are loud and raucous noises, and are unlawful:
(1) the playing of any radio, stereo, phonograph, musical instrument, or similar device in such manner or with such volume so as to be heard at least 50 feet away, or so as to offend persons in the vicinity;

TEX PE. CODE ANN. § 42.02 : Texas Statutes - Section 42.02: RIOT

(a) For the purpose of this section, "riot" means the assemblage of seven or more persons resulting in conduct which:
(1) creates an immediate danger of damage to property or injury to persons;
(2) substantially obstructs law enforcement or other governmental functions or services; or
(3) by force, threat of force, or physical action deprives any person of a legal right or disturbs any person in the enjoyment of a legal right.