- Police Brutality Watch

By RICK BRUNDRETT
From theState.com
Two veteran prosecutors stand by their decisions not to charge white state troopers caught on videotape using force to subdue black motorists in separate incidents in 2006 and 2007.

In both cases — one man was poked at by a trooper with a shotgun in Orangeburg County and another fleeing on foot in Greenwood County was struck by a trooper driving a patrol car — the officers were disciplined, but solicitors said the troopers’ actions didn’t meet the legal standard needed to file criminal charges. Solicitor David Pascoe said he believed the Orangeburg trooper’s claim that the shotgun incident was an accident, noting, “There wasn’t, like, an angry moment.”

Solicitor Jerry Peace wrote off the Greenwood trooper’s statement — “I tried to hit him” — as “pure bravado.” Overzealous prosecution of officers could jeopardize troopers’ lives if it made them more hesitant than necessary to use force, said Peace, who last year handled a death penalty case in Abbeville involving two officers who were shot to death. “If I got a choice between a defendant getting his head cracked and an officer getting killed, I’ll take the defendant getting his head cracked every time.”

Some black lawmakers, however, wonder if the solicitors are part of what they see as a system that coddles troopers who use excessive force. “It’s despicable at best that these solicitors are covering up for these guys,” said state Rep. Leon Howard, D-Richland, the Legislative Black Caucus chairman. “If you and I went out and hit somebody like that, you and I would be in jail.”

HIGH STANDARD

State and federal authorities are investigating possible criminal charges against troopers in the wake of allegations of questionable behavior that have surfaced since Feb. 29.

That’s when Gov. Mark Sanford ousted Department of Public Safety director James Schweitzer and Highway Patrol commander Col. Russell Roark.

Sanford said Schweitzer and Roark should have fired a white trooper videotaped using a racial slur while threatening to kill a black suspect fleeing on foot after a 2004 Greenwood County traffic stop.

USC criminal justice professor Geoffrey Alpert, a nationally recognized expert on the use of force by police, said charging an officer with using excessive force requires a “very high standard” of evidence.

“As a police officer, they have the authority to use force — up to deadly force,” Alpert said, though, he added, generally, “Once the suspect is under control, any force after that is excessive.”

To prove a criminal civil rights violation under federal law, prosecutors must show the officer willfully used excessive force, said Erik Ablin, a Department of Justice spokesman.

‘PURE BRAVADO’

In the Greenwood County case, Lance Cpl. S.C. Garren is heard on a June 24, 2007, video telling several officers he had intended to hit a man fleeing on foot with his patrol car.

“I nailed the (expletive) out of him,” Garren says on the tape. “I was trying to hit him.”

The unidentified suspect, who jumped out of a car after a chase, kept running after being hit by Garren’s patrol car and escaped.

In his statement to internal affairs investigators, Garren said he did not “set out to intentionally hit the violator with my patrol vehicle,” noting he was driving “parallel” with the suspect when the man suddenly ran across the narrow residential street into the path of his car.

As for his recorded comments later to other officers, Garren said the comments were “taken out of context,” explaining, “I had just been involved in a vehicle and foot chase, and my adrenalin was still pumping...

“The comment ... was made more out of surprise that the violator ran in front of my car and was then struck by my car.”

Peace, whose 8th Circuit covers Greenwood, Newberry, Laurens and Abbeville counties, agreed, dismissing the statements as “pure bravado,” according to a notation in the internal affairs file.

“It’s like locker-room talk,” Peace said last week. “These are volatile situations. ...

“You have to make some allowance for emotion.”

Garren’s actions were out of character, Peace said. “Steve Garren is probably one of the nicest, low-key people you will ever meet.”

He also said he took into consideration the fact that the suspect is seen on the tape cutting in front of Garren’s car, contending the trooper “couldn’t have done anything differently.”

Still, in giving Garren a two-day suspension, Schweitzer in a Dec. 3, 2007, letter said his actions that night “constitute excessive force,” noting Garren didn’t appear to brake until after striking the suspect.

Schweitzer also said Garren’s recorded comments later to other officers were “improper and unprofessional.”

NO REVIEW

The Greenwood County incident was not the only video of a trooper hitting a suspect with a patrol car.

On April 28, 2007, in Columbia, Lance Cpl. Alexander Richardson, who is black, is recorded in his patrol car hopping curbs and speeding through a Plowden Road apartment complex — where children were present — while pursuing a black suspect fleeing on foot after leading police on an earlier car chase.

A video shows Richardson hitting the suspect, Kevin Rucker — who continued running but was caught — though the trooper said in his statement to internal affairs investigators that he didn’t intentionally do it.

Richardson’s internal affairs file didn’t indicate whether the case was referred to prosecutors for review. Babs Lindsay, a spokeswoman for 5th Circuit Solicitor Barney Giese, said last week her office has no record of the case.

The state attorney general’s office also has no record of the case, said agency spokesman Mark Plowden.

The only disciplinary action taken against Richardson was a letter of reprimand. In that June 18, 2007, letter, then-Col. Roark said Richardson’s actions “posed a safety risk to others, including the violator.”

AN ACCIDENT?

In the Orangeburg County incident, then-Cpl. Michael D. Tomson, who is white, is seen on video poking a shotgun toward a black man who was forced to lie on the ground after a fleeing pickup, in which he was a passenger, was stopped Nov. 13, 2006.

The passenger, Demetrius Jones, said Tomson hit him in the face with the barrel of the shotgun — causing his face to bleed and swell — though that is not seen on the tape.

Tomson said in his statement to internal affairs investigators that the barrel of his gun “made contact with his cheek.” Another trooper reported Tomson told him at the scene that the gun “slipped.”

In a Jan. 8, 2007, letter to the State Law Enforcement Division, which investigated the case, Pascoe, the 1st Circuit solicitor for Orangeburg, Calhoun and Dorchester counties, declined to charge Tomson.

“There appears to be no criminal intent on his part to injure anyone,” Pascoe wrote.

“In this case,” Pascoe said last week, “it was an accident. As I recall, there wasn’t, like, an angry moment.”

Pascoe said, though, that Tomson “didn’t use proper protocol,” and that after he discussed the matter with then-Director Schweitzer, “we both were in agreement that ... he needed to be disciplined.”

Tomson was demoted to lance corporal and reassigned. He is appealing that punishment.

In his Feb. 9, 2007, disciplinary letter to Tomson, Schweitzer said the trooper’s actions against Jones were “improper and could have resulted in dire consequences.” [MORE]