This story on Reason.com is making the rounds on national news circuits today. Can we file a FOIA request for the dashcam tapes? This is my damn tax money at work? Despicable.

Link and full text of story follow: http://reason.com/archives/2010/06/29/police-blackout

Police Blackout

Law enforcement agencies in Northern Virginia say you have no right to know what they’re doing.

Radley Balko from the July 2010 issue

Last November a police officer shot and killed David Masters, an unarmed motorist, as he sat in the driver’s seat of his car on the side of Richmond Highway, a major thoroughfare in Fairfax County, Virginia. Masters was wanted for allegedly stealing flowers from a planter. He had been given a ticket the day before for running a red light and then evading the police, though in a slow and not particularly dangerous manner.

In January of this year, Fairfax County Commonwealth Attorney Raymond Morrogh announced through a press release that he would not be filing any charges against the officer who shot Masters. The shooting, Morrogh found, was justified due to a “furtive gesture” that suggested Masters had a weapon. The only eyewitness to this gesture was the police officer who pulled the trigger.

There exists dash-camera video of Masters’ shooting. There are also police interviews of other witnesses, and there is the police report itself. But the public and the press are unlikely to see those, or even to learn the officer’s name. That’s because the Fairfax County Police Department—along with the neighboring municipal police departments of Arlington and Alexandria—is among the most secretive, least transparent law enforcement agencies in the country.

Michael Pope, a reporter who covers Northern Virginia for the Connection Newspapers chain and for WAMU-FM, filed a series of open records requests related to the Masters shooting with the Fairfax County Police Department. All were denied. In March, Pope asked Fairfax County Police Public Information Officer Mary Ann Jennings why her department won’t at least release the incident report on Masters’ death, given the concerns that some have raised about the shooting. “Let us hear that concern,” Jennings shot back. “We are not hearing it from anybody except the media, except individual reporters.”

Except the media? That’s exactly who you would expect to file most open records requests. Asked why her department won’t even release the name of the officer who shot Masters, Jennings got more obtuse. “What does the name of an officer give the public in terms of information and disclosure?” Jennings asked. “I’d be curious to know why they want the name of an officer.”

Well, for starters, because he’s a government employee, paid by taxpayers and entrusted with the power to arrest, detain, coerce, and kill. And he recently used the most serious of those powers on an unarmed man. Releasing the name would allow reporters to see if the officer has been involved in other shootings or if there have been prior disciplinary measures or citizen complaints against him. It would allow the media to assess whether the Fairfax County Police Department has done an adequate job of training him in the use of lethal force.

Then again, journalists can’t get that other information either. The default position of the Fairfax County Police Department, Pope says, is to decline all requests for information. And not just from the media. When a member of the county SWAT team shot and killed 38-year-old optometrist Sal Culosi Jr. in 2006, it took nearly a year, plus legal action, to get the department to release information about its investigation of the shooting to Culosi’s family. Culosi, who had been suspected of wagering on football games with friends, was also unarmed when he was killed.

In a state that the professional journalism association Investigative Reporters and Editors ranks the fifth most transparent in the country, the police departments in Fairfax County, Arlington, and Alexandria have managed to interpret the open records law in a way that lets them be almost completely opaque. “Part of my daily routine when I worked in Florida was to drive to the police station and get a copy of the previous day’s incident reports,” Pope says. “I was just dumbfounded when I started working in Virginia.” The police rejected all his requests for information—even for incident reports about arrests the same department had described in press releases.

Invoking a phrase that traditionally refers to censorship, Fairfax County’s Jennings told Pope that releasing police reports to the press would have a “chilling effect” on victims and witnesses, discouraging them from coming forward to report crimes. As Pope notes, that doesn’t appear to be the case in cities that routinely release police reports, as nearly all do. When Pope asked Jennings what evidence she has to support her theory, she replied, “I don’t know if there’s evidence or not. All I have is what our investigators and what our commanders and the police administration believe.”

Don’t expect elected officials to correct any of this. “I am in the corner of trusting our police department,” Arlington County Board Member Barbara Favola told Pope. “If they push back I am not going to override them, and I don’t think I could get three votes on the board to override them either.”

Alexandria Commonwealth Attorney Randolph Sengel fired off an indignant letter to the editor after Pope wrote about the secrecy in the northern Virginia police departments. Calling Pope’s well-reported piece a “rant” that was “thinly disguised as a news story,” Sengel declared, “Law enforcement investigations and prosecutions are not carried out for the primary purpose of providing fodder for his paper.” Mocking the media’s role as a watchdog, Sengel added, “The sacred ‘right of the public to know’ is still (barely) governed by standards of reasonableness and civility,” as if those two adjectives were incompatible with a journalist inquiring about the details of a fatal police shooting of an unarmed man.

“The most offensive theme of this article,” Sengel complained, “is the notion that law enforcement agencies decline to release these reports to protect their own, or to conceal corrupt behavior.…Believe it or not, the reporter and his colleagues are not the last true guardians of truth and justice, the attainment of which does not hang on unfettered exercise of journalistic zeal. Last time I checked there were multiple safeguards in place to assure the integrity of the criminal justice system.”

These are remarkably wrongheaded sentiments, especially coming from an elected prosecutor. There have been several cases across the country where police reports haven’t jibed with video evidence or have otherwise turned out to be inaccurate. Journalists and advocacy groups have used public records to shed light on bogus arrests, police cover-ups, poor police training, and wrongful convictions. Sengel seems indignant at the very idea that a lowly journalist might be looking over his shoulder, or over the shoulders of the cops who bring him the people he prosecutes. Fairfax County hasn’t charged a police officer for an on-duty shooting in 70 years. Perhaps that’s because no officer there has deserved to be charged. But perhaps local police and prosecutors have too cozy a relationship. The point is, we don’t know. And northern Virginia’s cops have made it almost impossible to find out.

Radley Balko (rbalko@reason.com) is a senior editor at reason.

Just for completeness sake there have been two other threads on this subject here already:

#1: http://www.fairfaxunderground.com/forum/read/2/270844.html
#2: http://www.fairfaxunderground.com/forum/read/2/325134/325134.html

Tell me who I should contact because I too have some mind blowing stories to tell about FCPD. I contacted ACLU but nothing, I would love some ideas. I believe we deserve full transparancy across the board.

I work for the ACLU, lets hear them.

Taxpayer Wrote:
> Can we file a FOIA
> request for the dashcam tapes?

Yes. You may have to go to court to compel them to turn them over.

Which begs the question: Why hasn't Michael Pope filed a writ of mandamus with the Fairfax General District Court? That's the next step when the County declines a FOIA request.

Arguing with the police spokesperson is a waste of time. Just file in court.


http://foiacouncil.dls.virginia.gov/09law.pdf

I'll make it easy for Michael:

Petition and Affidavit for Good Cause for Injunction of Mandamus-Freedom of Information Act

The form:
http://www.courts.state.va.us/forms/district/dc495.pdf

The instructions:
http://www.courts.state.va.us/forms/district/dc495inst.pdf

Looks like it will cost about $53

This is an outrageous boldfaced fabrication. There's no way "taxpayer" pays taxes on his $5/hr pizza driving salary. You sir, are entitled to the crack of a rabid diseased baboon ass. With ringworm and anal warts.

I am Spunky Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Tell me who I should contact because I too have
> some mind blowing stories to tell about FCPD. I
> contacted ACLU but nothing, I would love some
> ideas. I believe we deserve full transparancy
> across the board.


shut up you paranoid obnoxious fuck. and learn to spell. we thought you had 'inside knowledge' about top secret investigations.

I am Spunky Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Tell me who I should contact because I too have
> some mind blowing stories to tell about FCPD. I
> contacted ACLU but nothing, I would love some
> ideas. I believe we deserve full transparancy
> across the board.

You have to be black or brown, and complaining about something really stupid (Like spilling McD's coffee on yourself), in order to get the ACLU to help you.

==================================================================================================
"And if any women or children get their legs torn off, or faces caved in, well, it's tough shit for them." -2LT. Bert Stiles, 505th, 339th (On Berlin Bombardier Mission, 1944).

...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/11/2011 04:54PM by RCG239.

this article is absolutely illogical. releasing the officer's name does nothing, and there is no reason the media needs it for an "investigation".



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/11/2011 04:50PM by RCG239.

No one "polices" the police in this state. Shooting an unarmed man who had stolen flowers from a planter???? Wow. I wonder if I could get away with such a thing...
If there was no wrong doing, they should release the tape and prove it period.

Here is one of those stoies about Fx Co Police.
A 20 something year old friend of my son's has been having problem with a female Fx Co officer who pulls him over constantly for whatever reason she can come up with.
recently she pulled him over and seareched him, his passenger and the car. She found a small amount of weed on the passenger and arrested him. BUT she didn't stop there. When searching the drviver she took the 2 $100 bills he had in his wallet saying they smelled like drugs to her. He went to the police station immediately to report it and was told she was NOT required to give him a reciept for taking the money nor were they required to give it back...
So I guess now if an officer needs dinner or a new pair of shoes or something and are broke they can pull someone over, search them and just take their money! It is an example of complete abuse of power.
Since she carries a gun, if she were not an officer and did such a thing it would be considered armed robbery...

Teri Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> No one "polices" the police in this state.
> Shooting an unarmed man who had stolen flowers
> from a planter???? Wow. I wonder if I could get
> away with such a thing...
> If there was no wrong doing, they should release
> the tape and prove it period.
>
> Here is one of those stoies about Fx Co Police.
> A 20 something year old friend of my son's has
> been having problem with a female Fx Co officer
> who pulls him over constantly for whatever reason
> she can come up with.
> recently she pulled him over and seareched him,
> his passenger and the car. She found a small
> amount of weed on the passenger and arrested him.
> BUT she didn't stop there. When searching the
> drviver she took the 2 $100 bills he had in his
> wallet saying they smelled like drugs to her. He
> went to the police station immediately to report
> it and was told she was NOT required to give him a
> reciept for taking the money nor were they
> required to give it back...
> So I guess now if an officer needs dinner or a new
> pair of shoes or something and are broke they can
> pull someone over, search them and just take their
> money! It is an example of complete abuse of
> power.
> Since she carries a gun, if she were not an
> officer and did such a thing it would be
> considered armed robbery...


Masters was not a little kid carrying flowers home for mommy. He was leading police in his 2nd pursuit in as many days, and repeatedly ignored firm commands, instead deciding to reach down for something, which made the officer fear for his life. Maybe you could focus a little more on his deliberate movements and behavior that lead to his death, rather than focusing on him having a fresh dozen tulips in his car. This officer will be investigated inside and out before a conclusion is made.
As for your friend's son. Has he tried not carrying drugs?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/11/2011 04:50PM by RCG239.

RCG239, it's wonderful that you could take a break from molesting your nephew to tell us how great the police are. I bet you know all about "a little kid carrying flowers home for mommy."

I am trying to figure out how the police can rip off $$$ and not give a receipt or mention it in a report somehow as to account for it. It needs to come up in court that money, along with "drugs" were confiscated. That money is supposed to go to a public coffer, not the cop's pocket.

And yes, this kids needs to start taking the bus or something, he is a target now if he was not before.

A decorated police veteran told me one time he got his start on being #1 in bringing in the fugitves, because as a patrolman he would stop and check for every minor traffic violation, broken tail light, whatever, and inevitably find an outstanding warrant. People who play fast and loose with the law often are not big on car maitenance either.

It's times like this I like to quote the Ten Commandments and recite my favorite line, DO UNTO OTHERS AS YOU WOULD LIKE OTHERS TO DO UNTO YOU.

==================================================================================
"Why don't you LOSERS just pack your flower print DOUCHE BAGS
and get your stoopid @$$#$ THE FUCK OFF MY INTERNETZ!"

- 'philscamms' (the YT Watchdog) ; internet & YouTube® extraordinaire.

If the police have nothing to hide, why not make these reports available? Everyone needs to remember that this wouldnt be the first time a police report was fabricated or completely inaccurate all together(not saying that is the case here). The thing you people have to remember is that the police work for US, we pay them, we also need to make sure there is some sense of accountability. Like i stated previously, if they have nothing to hide they should release the officers name (because like i said, your tax dollars are paying this person), so that he or she can be investigated, and make sure that this isn't a string of events instead of an isolated incident. The police report and dash cam should also be made available as again, your tax dollars fund this department, in essence the taxpayers as a whole OWN every piece of their equipment. Transparency is always the best process, holding back all of this information will only add to the level of distrust and overall disdain for the police officers. Which in the end will cause more people to die.

Scott Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> RCG239, it's wonderful that you could take a break
> from molesting your nephew to tell us how great
> the police are. I bet you know all about "a little
> kid carrying flowers home for mommy."


haha scott, clearly well spoken---maybe your mind could jump away from its fantasies long enough to type something intelligent. Dutchess, there is def specific protocol for money that is seized, guarantee it does go straight into the pocket of the arresting officer. It was just somebody's paranoid concern that she took the money and pocketed it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/09/2010 02:52PM by RCG239.

What IS the in dash camera FOR if not this type of incident? Release it - and be done with it. Throwing up a wall over this type of thing just invites distrust and reflects negatively upon all Police Officers in Fairfax County. It mimics the behavior of what a dishonest system would do if something wasn't kosher.

If the tape isn't released, all the public has to go on is the fear and distrust that has been created by these actions. Release the tape.

RCG239, you sound like a cop. If you are, I am pretty sure you shouldn't be making any statements about your department or the actions of it, that is the Public Information Officers job.

i simply stated that officers do NOT take the money. that's all. plain and simple. your job is over if you take the money. if u want to know what they actually do, indeed, go ask PIO---they would sure know more than I do.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/09/2010 02:50PM by RCG239.

RCG239
you'll be the next PIO. Not fun to come out at 3 am in the middle of the night to an event. Hope to see you around as a PIO.

239, think about how you present yourself, because it looks like the Fairfax County Police have planted someone in a public forum to steer a conversation away from its logical conclusion and towards conclusions that totally exonerate the FCPD. That makes you all look MORE guilty as far as obfuscating this issue.

Typical actions of an organization that has something to hide.

We need your support check out the web site www.virginiaccpa.org

tell me where I've ever identified myself as anything other than "RCG239", or represented any law enforcement agency on this site. Anybody that ID's themselves with any specific law enforcement agency on fairfax underground is probably NOT an active officer. So I assume somebody that supports Masters was planted by the Master's family to steer the conversation against the police? Robonscanner, shouldn't you be monitoring your scanner to provide Fairfax Underground with play-by-play updates.

ALEXANDRIA - 2 BRAVO) UPDATE E208 HAS FIRE K/D, REQUEST ADD. WATER, CONFIRMING 1 FATALITY INSIDE VEHICLE.
(ALEXANDRIA - 2 BRAVO) VSP ON SCENE VEHICLE MOTOR VEHICLE ACCIDENT WITH 1 VEHICLE ON FIRE WITH 1 TRAPPED INSIDE, REQUEST FIRE RESPONSE

there we go.

Citizens Coalition for Police Accountability Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> We need your support check out the web site
> www.virginiaccpa.org

I'm aboard! Citizen Review Boards are the best defense against trigger happy cops. Most large jurisdictions have them. They make sweeping police murders MUCH more difficult to sweep under the rug.

Send CCPA a donation today!

writing a check Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Citizens Coalition for Police Accountability
> Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > We need your support check out the web site
> > www.virginiaccpa.org
>
> I'm aboard! Citizen Review Boards are the best
> defense against trigger happy cops. Most large
> jurisdictions have them. They make sweeping
> police murders MUCH more difficult to sweep under
> the rug.
>
> Send CCPA a donation today!


Can you also write me a check? I won 3.5 million dollars in the Nigerian lottery and need to pay taxes. I promise we can split the winnings.

Just piss your money away - you won't see anything coming of it. You are naive.

writing a check Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Citizens Coalition for Police Accountability
> Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > We need your support check out the web site
> > www.virginiaccpa.org
>
> I'm aboard! Citizen Review Boards are the best
> defense against trigger happy cops. Most large
> jurisdictions have them. They make sweeping
> police murders MUCH more difficult to sweep under
> the rug.
>
> Send CCPA a donation today!

I'd much rather throw my money at something more useful, like the NVCC tv channel.

Now that we all know RCG293 is either a cop or an idiot I to have a story.

Last year I was pulled over after an officer followed me from my neighborhood on glade to the seven eleven on soapstone where I turned in to turn around and park on the southbound side of soapstone. I did this for two reasons A to see if he was following me and B I was not about to bust a U turn over a double yellow in front of a cop. He passes me by and I pull out and over to the south bound shoulder. As soon as I threw my car into park he lit me up. (he had made a u turn in shadow wood in anticipation of my maneuver. He approached my car from the passenger side and informed me that the tags of my fathers car that I was driving because my car was in the shop had expired. he also expressed that he was of the opinion that the car smelled of weed. I said I did not carry weed in my car and that the smell he was getting was paul malls and five guys. He then asked me what I was doing in seven eleven, to which I responded "well you were following me and I didn't want to make an illegal u turn". he asked where I was going, to which I responded "shadow wood to visit a friend." He asked me what my friends name was. I told him I was not required to provide that information." He then stated that while that was true he no longer trusted me.(Clearly we were way past this asshole trusting me) I said well its my right not to divulge that information and I was not going to. He then informed me h was going to search my car. I told him I was not going to consent to a search unless he detained me. He proceeded to do so and search my fathers car while asking if my father who is employed by a large defense contractor with a top secret clearance to his name smoked weed or used drugs. I said no. When he asked me to step out I saw him pick up a bic pen. five minutes into the search he asked me if the syringe he had found next to my car belonged to me. I asked if I could see it. and he told me it was evidence and that I could not see it. I responded no its not mine. He proceeded to ask (countless times) where each item in my fathers car had come. each time i told him I had taken them out o my jeep when I took it to the shop. he then asked to see my arm to examine me for track marks and found none. after ten more minutes of trashing the car he found a bag of zertec. at this point he could not hide his raging erection. he said what are these and why didn't you inform me of their presence. I told him I forgot they were there and they were over the counter allergy pills. (At this point I had been detained for 45 minutes and was quite irritated.) He said the problem with your story is these pills have numbers on them which makes them prescription and illegal to be in your possession without proper documentation. I then informed the clearly amateur pharmacist that most pills have numbers on them and that he was welcome to look them up in the book I knew he had in his cruiser. after not finding the pills in the book he informed me that he would be taking them to "headquarters" to test. I told him I could care less and asked him if i could go. He told me he had one more question and proceeded to ask if I knew him. bewildered I asked if he meant personally? he said yes. I said I didn't think so. he then asked why if i didn't know him personally I would feel the need to use evasive maneuvers through the seven eleven parking lot.I told him what he wanted to hear and he gave me a warning for expired tags.

this was an hour and forty five minute ordeal and there were three cruisers present. for what? fishing for a possession charge? wasting tax money? intimidating the citizens they are supposed to be serving and protecting? its clear they have no idea what WE pay them to do. excuse the punctuation or lack there of

so what ur saying is we DO NOT pay police officers to train to observe suspicious behavior and ten act accordingly and investigate that suspicious behavior they observed based on their training and experience. Glad we cleared that up that we DO NOT pay police officers to be pro-active and investigate suspicious behvaior.

How dare that $%#&ing cop not know it was YOU driving, how DARE he not know that your dads car was in the shop and thats why the tags were expired, how dare he not do his job and not issue you a ticket for expired tags. Yo are absolutly right, these pigs are out of control, this is a BLATENT example of how F'd up these ffx pigs are! Here they are faced with a CLEAR violation of the law with your expired tags and he just gave you a warning and let you go. I DEMAND JUSTICE, THIS IS JUST ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF THE CORRUPTION RN RAMPANT. How dare that officer disregard a violation of the law, what the hell are we paying them for if they wont do their job!!

The Fairfax County Police Department has no civilian oversight board of any kind which is abnormal for a modern department of it's size. The Virginia Citizen's Coalition for Police Accountability was recently founded by a retired Metropolitan Police detective and is supported by other retired officers from various jurisdictions.

please check it out.

http://www.virginiaccpa.org

Where did he act suspicious when he was attempting a legal u turn or maybe it was when he defended his rights as an american. and if you read the post his own car was in the shop not his dads not only are you a moron but you cant even read go back to first grade