Court Digest

Maryland
County settles  discrimination lawsuit with police
UPPER MARLBORO, Md. (AP) — A police department in a Maryland suburb of Washington, D.C., is paying a group of Black and Latino police officers $2.3 million to settle a workplace discrimination lawsuit that alleged white officers used racist slurs, circulated text messages expressing a desire to “reinstitute lynching” and put a black face and Afro wig on a training dummy.

The payment by Prince George’s County represents a fraction of the nearly $18 million officials spent fighting the case over two and a half years, The Washington Post reported. The agreement announced Tuesday includes a host of policy reforms at the department and requires the county to pay $5.8 million in attorney fees and reimbursements to the Washington Lawyers Committee, the ACLU of Maryland and the law firm that represented the plaintiffs.

The lawyers said the money will fund future pro-bono cases.

The plaintiffs, members of the Hispanic National Law Enforcement Association and the United Black Police Officers Association, accused police officials of condoning racist, abusive behavior by white officers and retaliating against Black and Hispanic officers who complained about misconduct.

The lawsuit also said the county’s police chief at the time, Henry Stawinski, allowed racism to “thrive” in his department.

The settlement includes the implementation of new and updated policies to make the promotional process more fair, clearly state possible punishments for those who engage in racist or discriminatory conduct and prohibit officers from using race, ethnicity or national origin to make policing decisions. One revised policy will clarify the “severe discipline” supervisors are subject to if they do not properly fulfill their duties during use-of-force reviews.

Additionally, a new Equal Employment Opportunity policy that covers anti-discrimination, anti-retaliation and bias-free policing will address the timeliness and resolution of investigations into complaints and require additional training for officers and supervisors.

Prince George’s County abuts the nation’s capital to the east. As of 2020, more than 64 percent of the county’s more than 900,000 residents are Black, while slightly more than 27 percent of residents are white and 19 percent are Hispanic. Whites account for 47 percent of the department’s officers, with Blacks accounting for nearly 43 percent, the lawsuit said.


New York
Mayor, husband, plead not guilty to gun charges
ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) — Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren pleaded not guilty Wednesday to charges stemming from a police raid that allegedly turned up a rifle and pistol, and her 10-year-old daughter alone, in the home she shares with her husband.
A grand jury indicted Warren and her husband Timothy Granison last week on a felony count of criminal possession of a firearm, as well as misdemeanor counts of endangering the welfare of a child and having unsecured guns in a home.
Warren and Granison pleaded not guilty during brief court appearances and left without speaking with reporters.

Warren’s attorney, Joseph Damelio, said the mayor didn’t know about the guns and that he was eager to review the prosecution’s evidence.

Authorities searched the family’s home May 19 as part of a cocaine trafficking investigation, investigators said at the time. Granison was charged with drug and weapons counts and pleaded not guilty. Additional charges against him were added last month.

Warren, who has said she signed a separation agreement with Granison years ago, has not been charged in the drug case.

The two-term mayor lost her reelection campaign last month when she was defeated in the Democratic primary for mayor by City Councilmember Malik Evans.

Warren was indicted in October on charges she broke campaign finance rules during her 2017 reelection campaign. She has said any errors were honest mistakes.

Iowa
Judge OKs subpoenas for murder suspect’s medical files
IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — Emergency responders and a hospital that treated a Cedar Rapids man for a gunshot wound after he allegedly killed his parents and sister must share his medical records with prosecutors, a judge ruled Tuesday.

Alexander Jackson, 20, is charged with first-degree murder in the June 15 shooting deaths of his parents, Jan and Melissa Jackson, and 19-year-old sister Sabrina at the family’s Cedar Rapids home.

Prosecutors say that after killing his family members, Alexander Jackson called 911 to falsely claim that a masked intruder had broken into the home and killed his father with an unsecured Jackson family rifle. Alexander Jackson, a University of Iowa student who had recently completed his second year, told police that the man had shot him in the foot during a struggle over the rifle.

Prosecutors say Jackson concocted the story to try to shift blame for the killings of his relatives, whose bodies were each found in different rooms of the spacious home.

The fire department and a local ambulance service responded to the home and transported Jackson to St. Luke’s Hospital for medical treatment. He was discharged several hours later and charged with three counts of first-degree murder.

Prosecutors sent subpoenas to the fire department, the ambulance service and the hospital, seeking all records, audio and video recordings and other files related to Jackson’s treatment.

Lawyers for Jackson asked Judge Lars Anderson to quash the subpoenas, saying they covered privileged medical records. They cited an Iowa law that says medical professionals shall not “disclose any confidential communication” in court proceedings that they obtained from their patients.

Prosecutors argued that Jackson had waived his privilege because police officers called to investigate the homicides were present when he made statements related to his injuries. Eventually, their focus shifted and Jackson became a suspect after speaking with an officer at the hospital.

Anderson sided with prosecutors in a ruling Tuesday, saying that neither Jackson nor medical personnel asked the officers to leave or to give them privacy. That means Jackson waived his privilege, he wrote, citing an Iowa Court of Appeals ruling in a similar case.

Jackson is in custody at the Linn County jail on a $3 million cash-only bond, and faces life in prison if convicted. He’s expected to be formally arraigned and plead not guilty later this month.

Authorities have not revealed a motive for the slayings but say Jackson told police that his father had recently told him to get a job or move out of the home. He denied killing his family in the police interview.

Mississippi
City settles over man’s death in police custody
SOUTHAVEN. Miss. (AP) — The family of a Tennessee man who took LSD at a concert and then died after police stunned him and restrained him facedown has settled their lawsuit with a Mississippi city.

The agreement ended a wrongful death trial this week between Troy Goode’s family and Southaven over his 2015 death, WMC-TV reported.

The terms of the agreement were not immediately released.

Both sides agreed that Goode, 30, of Cordova, Tennessee, took LSD at a concert. Several people called 911 after the show and reported a man acting erratically, authorities said.

Police used a Taser and a police dog to capture Goode, and then tied him with restraints and put him on his stomach on a stretcher. Goode’s family said he suffocated in that position because he had asthma and could not breathe properly with the pressure on his lungs.

Attorneys for Southaven said the LSD contributed to a heart problem that caused his death and police and paramedics had to restrain Goode in that manner so he didn’t hurt himself or others.

The city issued a statement saying the settlement was not an admission of guilt or responsibility but instead was to protect Southaven’s finances.

“The night of this incident our first responders faced many challenges while timely decisions were critical. They served courageously and I will not let them be second-guessed by anyone, including a jury, while doing their job keeping the city and our citizens safe,” Southaven Mayor Darren Musselwhite wrote.


Ohio
Court overturns death penalty conviction in women’s slayings
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — The Ohio Supreme Court on Wednesday overturned a death penalty conviction and ordered a new trial for a man who pleaded guilty to killing three women in a Cleveland suburb.

Justices said a three-judge panel in Cleveland failed to inform George Brinkman Jr., 49, about his right to question witnesses in November 2018 when he initially pleaded guilty to aggravated murder charges with death penalty specifications in the slayings of Suzanne Taylor, 45, and her daughters, Taylor Pifer, 21, and Kylie Pifer, 18.

The judges then held a three-day death penalty hearing. Two days later, realizing their mistake, they held a second plea hearing. Brinkman was sentenced to death in December 2018.

Justices in a 7-0 ruling said Brinkman’s constitutional rights were violated during the first plea hearing.

Brinkman will remain on death row despite Wednesday’s ruling. A three-judge panel in Stark County south of Cleveland sentenced him to death in October 2019 for killing Rogell John, 71, and Roberta John, 64, at their Lake Township home in June 2017.

The couple was found shot to death the day after Taylor and her daughters were found murdered in North Royalton.

Messages seeking comment were left with Brinkman’s lead appellate attorney and the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office.


Georgia
DA’s felony trial over parking lot video set for September
COLUMBUS, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia district attorney is scheduled for trial in September on felony charges related to a campaign video he recorded in a government building parking lot.

Mark Jones, the district attorney in the six-county Chattahoochee circuit, is charged with first-degree criminal damage and interfering with government property. So are four other people who police say gathered in the parking lot of the Columbus Civic Center in May 2020 to record stunt driving moves such as donuts with smoking tires.

Local news outlets report Jones and the other four are scheduled for trial on Sept. 13.

The circuit is centered in Columbus, including Muscogee, Harris, Chattahoochee, Marion, Talbot, and Taylor counties.

The trial will be held in Columbus, but an out-of-town judge and prosecutor have been appointed in the case.

Jones defeated incumbent District Attorney Julia Slater in the 2020 Democratic primary and won the general election with no Republican opposition.

Jones also faces separate felony charges of two counts of driving under the influence and one count of reckless driving following a November 2019 vehicle crash.

Columbus police charged Jones and four other men following complaints by the mayor of the consolidated city-county and others.

The Ledger-Enquirer reports Christopher Breault, Jones’ lawyer in the parking lot case, has filed motions to dismiss charges. Breault argues Slater improperly influenced the grand jurors who indicted Jones by presenting unrelated cases before the out-of-town prosecutor presented evidence against Jones.

Breault also accuses city officials of selective enforcement, noting they haven’t charged anyone else for damaging the civic center’s sprawling parking lot even though tire marks show many other people have pulled similar stunts.

He claimed Jones was prosecuted “because the ‘Good-ole boy network’ in Columbus, GA could not stomach the fact that Mark Jones -- of all people -- would become the district attorney of the Chattahoochee Judicial Circuit -- an ‘unthinkable’ and ‘unacceptable’ outcome.”

Breault said authorities also were provoked by Jones’ pledge to investigate police abuses.

Arkansas
Federal judge blocks trans youth treatment ban
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — A federal judge on Wednesday temporarily blocked enforcement of Arkansas’ ban on gender confirming treatments for transgender youth while a lawsuit challenging the prohibition proceeds.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit in May asking U.S. District Judge Jay Moody in Little Rock to strike down the law that made Arkansas the first state to forbid doctors from providing gender confirming hormone treatment, puberty blockers or sex reassignment surgery to anyone under 18 years old, or from referring them to other providers for such treatment. The ACLU sought the preliminary injunction while its lawsuit proceeded.

The law had been set to take effect July 28.

The ACLU filed the lawsuit on behalf of four transgender youths and their families, as well as two doctors who provide gender confirming treatments. The lawsuit argues that the prohibition would severely harm transgender youth in the state and violate their constitutional rights.

Arkansas’ Republican-dominated Legislature overrode GOP Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s veto of the measure. Hutchinson vetoed the ban following pleas from pediatricians, social workers and the parents of transgender youths who said it would harm a community already at risk for depression and suicide.