Category Archives: US policing

LAPD helicopters cost $50m a year, more than 14 city offices’ entire budget

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City audit says police flights cost $3,000 an hour with unclear benefit, but police chief disputes findings

Los Angeles spends nearly $50m a year on its police helicopter program, or roughly $3,000 for every hour of flight, according to a new audit that raises questions about the financial and environmental impacts of the city’s aerial surveillance.

The LA controller’s report released on Monday suggests the use of LA police department (LAPD) helicopters is nearly constant across the city, and the majority of flight time is not in response to reports of major crimes, but instead for transportation, ceremonial trips or patrols. The flights are a major source of pollution and appear to disproportionately affect some communities of color, the audit said.

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Video captures California officer fatally shooting aspiring actor on freeway

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Officials launch inquiry as victim identified as Jesse Dominguez, 34, who family says may have been in mental health crisis

A California highway patrol officer fatally shot a man on Sunday during a confrontation in the middle of a Los Angeles highway, state authorities said as they announced an investigation into the incident.

The Los Angeles county medical examiner’s office on Tuesday identified the man as Jesse Dominguez. The 34-year-old was walking along the westbound lanes of Interstate 105 in south Los Angeles county when the deadly encounter unfolded, the California highway patrol said.

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Muscogee Nation sues Tulsa, Oklahoma, for ticketing drivers within reservation

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Tribe says city has been breaking federal law by continuing to ticket Native Americans within sovereign boundaries

The Muscogee (Creek) Nation filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday against the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma, arguing that police are continuing to ticket Native American drivers within the tribe’s reservation boundaries, despite a recent federal appeals court ruling they lacked jurisdiction to do so.

The tribe filed the lawsuit in federal court in Tulsa against the city; the mayor, GT Bynum; the chief of police, Wendell Franklin; and the city attorney, Jack Blair.

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Controversial police-led recall vote wins key ruling in California

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Attempts to oust progressive lawmakers across state continue, as police union targets council member who voted against pay raises

A California state judge dismissed efforts this past week to halt a recall vote led by a local police union who are attempting to oust a progressive city council member.

The union, which is upset that the politician voted against officers’ pay raises, has so far spent more than $660,000 on the vote to recall Santa Ana council member Jessie Lopez, with voting happening 14 November.

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Memphis police officer pleads guilty in fatal beating of Tyre Nichols

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Desmond Mills Jr is one of five officers charged in the beating death of the Black man who called for his mother as he was attacked

A former Memphis police officer pleaded guilty on Thursday in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols, becoming the first of five officers charged to reverse course, with prosecutors recommending up to 15 years in prison.

Desmond Mills Jr entered his plea during a hearing at the Memphis federal courthouse as part of a larger agreement to settle charges in state court as well. It was not immediately clear if any of the other officers would follow suit.

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Movement against Georgia’s ‘Cop City’ plans occupation and ‘week of action’

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‘Block Cop City’ plans non-violent march onto site of police center and a week of panels and screenings aimed at Black audiences

The movement against the police and fire department training center known as “Cop City” is planning two events for the coming weeks in and near Atlanta, Georgia – including a first-ever, non-violent protest march onto the project’s construction site.

The action, planned for 13 November and aimed at occupying the Cop City site for a day, could draw a thousand or more people from across the county. This would make it the largest protest to date at the location. The other event is a Black-led “week of action” the week before, aimed at Black audiences.

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Georgia refuses to release evidence from police shooting of Cop City activist

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Experts say decision not to make evidence available to family of Manuel Paez Terán or public sets ‘frightening’ precedent

The state of Georgia is refusing to release evidence tied to the police shooting and killing of an activist protesting a police and fire department training center known as “Cop City”, prompting concern from police accountability experts who say this sets a “frightening” precedent .

District attorney George Christian released a 31-page report earlier this month concluding that the 18 January shooting of Manuel Paez Terán, or “Tortuguita”, was “objectively reasonable”. Paez Terán was one of a small group of “forest defenders” camping in a wooded public park to protest Cop City, planned for a separate part of the forest south-east of Atlanta, Georgia, less than a mile away. Dozens of officers from multiple agencies raided the park; the state claims Paez Terán fired a gun first, prompting six officers to shoot the activist. The activist sustained 57 gunshot wounds and died nearly instantly.

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US has seen increase in domestic threats since Hamas attacks in Israel, FBI says

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Director Christopher Wray cautioned police vigilance and encouraged police chiefs to continue sharing information

FBI director Christopher Wray has reiterated part of an FBI statement that the US domestic security agency does not have “specific and credible intelligence indicating a threat to the United States stemming from the Hamas attacks in Israel”.

Speaking from prepared remarks at the International Association of Chiefs of Police conference in San Diego, Wray acknowledged an increase in domestic threats due to the “heightened environment”, calling for increased vigilance and requesting that police continue to share intelligence.

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New Orleans ex-police officer awaiting execution loses chance at clemency

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Antoinette Frank, the only woman on Louisiana’s death row, was convicted in the 1995 death of a fellow officer and two others

A New Orleans ex-police officer awaiting execution for the murders of a fellow officer and two other people during a 1995 restaurant robbery lost a chance at clemency Friday during a meeting of Louisiana’s pardon board.

Antoinette Frank’s bid for a clemency hearing failed on a 2-2 vote after emotional testimony.

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Elijah McClain: one Colorado officer convicted and one acquitted in 2019 killing

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The 23-year-old Black man was stopped as he was walking home from a store, placed in a neck hold and injected with ketamine

A jury has convicted one Colorado police officer and acquitted another for the 2019 homicide of Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old whose death at the hands of law enforcement while on a walk home sparked international outrage and years of protests.

A jury found Randy Roedema, an Aurora police department (APD) officer, guilty of criminally negligent homicide and third-degree assault on Thursday. A second officer, Jason Rosenblatt, was found not guilty of manslaughter and assault. Both had held him on the ground and ignored his cries saying he couldn’t breathe. A third officer, who was the first to approach McClain, is also facing charges and has an upcoming trial.

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California becomes first state to ban use of ‘excited delirium’ as cause of death

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State prohibits the pseudoscientific diagnosis authorities have frequently cited to justify killings at hands of law enforcement

California has become the first state to ban the use of “excited delirium” as a cause of death, prohibiting the pseudoscientific diagnosis that authorities have frequently cited to justify killings at the hands of law enforcement.

Excited delirium – a term rejected by major medical groups, including the American Medical Association – suggests that people can develop “superhuman strength” due to drug use. Medical examiners and coroners have argued that the condition caused victims of brutal police force to struggle and collapse from cardiac arrest, essentially excusing the role of officers who were holding them down, choking or suffocating them.

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Louisiana police accused of ‘unconscionable’ abuse in ‘Brave Cave’

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Baton Rouge officers allegedly brutalized and disrobed detainees in storage shed once used for anti-street crime unit

Across from an industrial hose and gasket supplier’s office, in a mostly empty and fenced-off lot behind a precinct house belonging to the police department of Louisiana’s capital city, there sits a white storage shed without any markings explaining its purpose.

That single-story warehouse – within a couple of blocks of a daycare center, an eatery specializing in chicken wings and a gasoline station frequented by unwary residents – is now the focus of local and federal authorities examining alarming claims that officers with the Baton Rouge police department (BRPD) took detained people there and brutalized them.

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FBI launches inquiry into alleged abuse by police at Baton Rouge warehouse

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An obscure warehouse known as the ‘Brave Cave’ was used by officers to detain and torture suspects, recent lawsuits claim

The FBI said Friday it has opened a civil rights investigation into allegations in recent lawsuits that police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, assaulted drug suspects they detained in an obscure warehouse known as the “Brave Cave.”

In one case, a man says he was taken to the warehouse and beaten so severely he needed hospital care before being booked into jail. In another, a woman claims she was strip-searched, with an officer using a flashlight to scan her body.

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Ex-officer who left woman in car to be hit by train in Colorado given probation

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Jordan Steinke to serve 30 months’ probation for 2022 incident in which she handcuffed and placed woman in car parked on train tracks

A former Colorado police officer who put a handcuffed woman in a parked police vehicle that was hit by a freight train, inflicting serious injuries to the woman, has avoided a jail sentence and must serve 30 months on supervised probation.

Jordan Steinke, 29, was sentenced on Friday by Weld county district court judge Timothy Kerns, who found her guilty of reckless endangerment and assault for the 16 September 2022 crash near Platteville. Kerns acquitted the former Fort Lupton police officer of criminal attempt to commit manslaughter after her bench trial in July.

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Family demand Mississippi cops fired for arresting Black boy, 10, who peed in car park

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Lawyer for family threaten federal civil rights lawsuit against Senatobia if demand not met after boy detained and placed in cell

The family of a 10-year-old Black boy who was arrested and placed in a cell for relieving himself in a parking lot say they will file a federal civil rights lawsuit against a Mississippi city unless police officers involved in the detention are fired.

Quantavious Eason was detained and taken to a police station in Senatobia after an officer spotted him urinating behind a car outside a law office last month while his mother was inside getting advice on a housing issue.

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By hook or by bike, car, boat and kayak: elusive Vermont robbery suspect caught

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Eric Edson, 52, gave police the slip in multiple ways and was finally caught after he jumped into a river to evade capture

A Vermont armed robbery suspect who police say eluded capture in the past week in a vehicle, on a stolen bike, on foot and in a stolen sailboat was arrested on Thursday after he was spotted in a kayak on a river, authorities said.

Eric Edson, 52, was wanted on accusations of a robbery of a store in Burlington on 24 August, impeding and assaulting two police officers and the theft of a sailboat and vehicles, police said.

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Cop City protesters charged with racketeering as Georgia takes hard line

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Some of 61 defendants charged also face money laundering and domestic terrorism charges for environmental protests

Dozens of activists who oppose a controversial police and fire training facility in Georgia known as Cop City have been charged with racketeering, appearing to confirm fears from civil rights groups that prosecutors are stepping up an aggressive pursuit of environmental protesters.

A total of 61 people – most not from Georgia – were indicted for violating the state’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act last week, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

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New York plan to monitor Labor Day parties with drones prompts outcry

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Police accused of playing ‘fast and loose’ with New Yorkers’ rights to due process and to freely hold peaceful gatherings

New York City police plan to monitor large gatherings and noise complaints over Labor Day weekend with surveillance drones, officials have announced, prompting outcry from privacy advocates.

Police said Thursday that the remote-controlled aircrafts would be deployed to keep tabs on large gatherings, including private events, as New Yorkers prepared to celebrate the weekend heading into Monday’s holiday.

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Ohio: video released of pregnant Black woman shot dead by police

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Ta’Kiya Young, 21, pronounced dead shortly after Blendon township shooting, in which unborn daughter did not survive

Authorities in Ohio on Friday released police body-camera video showing the fatal police shooting of Ta’Kiya Young, a young Black woman who was pregnant. Young’s family had seen the video, the family’s lawyer said.

The footage showed Young slowly accelerating toward an officer in her path as he yelled for her to stop before firing the single bullet that ended her life.

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Ex-Alabama deputy sheriff sentenced to prison for sexual assault on woman in his custody

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Joshua Davidson given sentence of 12 and a half years for attack while on duty as a Dallas county deputy sheriff

A former Alabama deputy sheriff has been sentenced to 12 and a half years in prison for sexually assaulting a woman in his custody.

On 30 January 2020, while on duty as a Dallas county deputy sheriff, 33-year-old Joshua Davidson placed a woman in custody following a traffic stop. He drove her down a dark road to a desolate location where he forced her to perform oral sex on him against her will, the justice department said in a statement.

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