Tag: police accountability

Police Investigation of Horrifying Child Porn Ring, Leads Back to One of Their Own

Last month, the Daytona Beach Police Department’s Advanced Technology and Cybercrime’s (ATAC) unit launched an investigation after receiving a tip about a child porn distribution ring that was being run on a social media app. After doing some digging, Daytona cops made a disturbing discovery — the perpetrator distributing images of child sexual abuse on the app — was one of their own.

This week, Officer Brandon Fox, 22, was arrested and charged with 7 counts of possession and distribution of child pornography. According to police, they received information regarding an individual sharing child pornography via a social media app that included images and videos of sexual acts involving children under 10.

During the investigation, police tracked the horrifying images and videos back to Fox. Investigators then executed a search warrant at his residence and noted that additional charges may be filed as they continue their investigation.

After discovering that Fox was the culprit, a judge issued an arrest warrant on the seven counts and Fox was brought in without incident. He is currently being held in the Volusia County Jail on a $70,000 bond.

According to police, Fox had been with the department for two years. He was fired immediately after his arrest.

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Woman Suing Police for Kidnapping, Stripping, and Forcibly ‘Baptizing’ Her During Traffic Stop, Found Dead

Over the years, the Free Thought Project has reported on some utterly bizarre behavior from law enforcement. From judges stealing women’s underwear to police officers offering homeless people sh*t sandwiches, this behavior never ceases to amaze and infuriate. Adding to this long list of “weird sh*t cops do” was a story out of Chattanooga in 2019, in which a police officer stripped to his underwear and forcibly “baptized” a woman he was arresting for having a marijuana roach.

After this story garnered him national attention, an investigation was launched and Hamilton County Deputy Daniel Wilkey who was arrested last year and has been charged with more than 40 counts ranging from rape and sexual battery to oppression and extortion.

As we reported at the time, the case was swarmed in controversy as it would be revealed that during the investigation, the department magically lost months of dashcam footage containing alleged evidence of this extremely bad cop’s crimes.

Now, however, the controversy has become deadly.

This week, Hamilton County deputies found the body of 42-year-old Shandle Marie Riley — the victim of deputy Wilkey — who had brought a lawsuit against the department for what they did to her.

Wednesday night, the Hamilton County sheriff’s department recused themselves from the investigation, given their contentious ties to the case.

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Cops Ruled Justified in Cracking Innocent Elderly Man’s Skull, Leaving Him Hospitalized for a Month

As TFTP reported at the time, a case out of Buffalo, New York received a lot of attention due to the unnecessary and disturbing nature of how it unfolded. A75-year-old man, Martin Gugino was shoved down so hard that his injuries landed him in the hospital for over a month. The two cops who shoved him were suspended and arrested as a result and following their discipline the entire Buffalo Police Department Emergency Response Team resigned in support of those two cops.

In total, 57 officers threw a collective temper tantrum, for their right to attack innocent elderly men with impunity.

And impunity is what they got. Over the weekend, an arbitrator ruled that officers Robert McCabe and Aaron Torgalski violated no policies when they shoved the frail 75-year-old man down so hard that he cracked his skull and began bleeding from his ears.

Arbitrator Jeffrey Selchick wrote, “Upon review, there is no evidence to sustain any claim that Respondents [police officers] had any other viable options other than to move Gugino out of the way of their forward movement.”

As TFTP reported, Gugino was on the sidewalk attempting to return one of the officer’s helmets he had found. The officers then walked up to him and shoved him to the ground. The impact of the elderly man’s head was so hard that he immediately began bleeding from the ears and was knocked unconscious.

After the cops shoved him, they looked down, noticed he was bleeding from the ears and kept walking — leaving the elderly man lying there on the pavement, bleeding.

After the assault, according to WBFO, two medics came forward and treated him. They helped put him in an ambulance and he was taken away. He spent the following month in the hospital as he was treated for a severe head injury.

After the incident made it to the news, Buffalo police put out a ridiculous statement claim the elderly man tripped.

A Buffalo Police spokesman issued a statement saying “a 5th person was arrested during a skirmish with other protestors and also charged with disorderly conduct. During that skirmish involving protestors, one person was injured when he tripped & fell.”

However, after the video was posted online, exactly 23 minutes later by WBFO, department officials changed their tone and said a full Internal Affairs investigation was underway and that Police Commissioner Byron Lockwood had ordered the immediate suspension of the two officers involved, without pay.

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State Passes Bill That Could Jail People for 30 Days for Filming the Police

Frequent readers of the Free Thought Project know that filming the cops is not a crime. Despite this being a widely known provision — held up with multiple court precedents — cops continue to violate the First Amendment protected right of citizens to film the police. Last month, the Arizona House Appropriations Committee approved a bill that would criminalize filming cops on the job, dealing a massive blow to First Amendment rights. And this month, the Senate passed it.

It now moves to Governor Doug Ducey’s desk for signature, where it will become law.

Republican Representative John Kavanaugh, who is a former police officer, is the lead sponsor of the legislation. According to the bill, it is illegal “for a person to knowingly make a video recording of law enforcement activity, including the handling of an emotionally disturbed person, if the person does not have the permission of the law enforcement officer” and is within 8 feet of the cop.

Kavanaugh originally stipulated a 15 foot radius, however it was later amended after multiple objections. But for many, this is still too far.

As Valera Voce, points out, the law also classifies unlawful video recording of law enforcement activity as a petty offense, unless a person fails to comply with a verbal warning of a violation or has been previously convicted of a violation in which case an offense is a class 3 misdemeanor. A class 3 misdemeanor comes with a minimum of 30 days in jail. Finally, the bill explicitly declares that it “does not establish a right, or authorize any person, to make a video recording of a law enforcement officer.”

“It’s crazy thinking about that for a second. The video that led to the criminal conviction of the police officer who killed George Floyd would itself be a criminal act. And that makes no sense whatsoever,” attorney Dan Barr told FOX 10.

“We believe that this bill stacks the deck against the public check on officer misconduct,” Timothy Sparling, a lawyer and legislative advocate for Arizona Attorneys for Criminal Justice, said during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last week. Sparling argued that the bill leaves too much up to the discretion of the officers. “When officers have such wide discretion to determine, say, what is lawful conduct or what is unlawful conduct on the ground and that is not properly defined … it’s ultimately up to whatever the officer wants it to be,” Sparling said.

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65 Teens, Arrested, Shackled, Jailed Because Cops Found a Small Bag of Weed Outside of a Party

House parties among teenagers and young adults are a part of growing up. When kids experience freedom from their parents for the first time, they will often make poor choices and this is a part of experiencing life so one can learn. Poor choices that cause harm to others are certainly not acceptable but when young people are experimenting with substances and make choices which have no victims, they should never have to worry about their lives being ruined over it. Unfortunately, for 65 young people in Cartersville, Georgia, they had no say in the matter when cops arrested all of them — despite none of them making any poor choices.

The nightmare for these 65 teenagers and young folks started back in 2017 as they gathered at a home to celebrate the New Year. As is common on New Year’s Eve, firecrackers can be heard going off all around town. Thought none of the teens involved in this party were popping fireworks, police used it as a reason to enter the home, without a warrant, claiming they heard gun shots.

When police came to the door that night, they had no evidence of a crime being committed, nor did they have reasonable suspicion. Nevertheless, they barged into the legally rented Airbnb, paid for by 21-year-old Deja Heard, who was celebrating her 21st birthday that night.

Officers had no warrant as the shut down the entire party and searched everyone. The only evidence of a crime — which is not a crime at all — was claimed when police found a small bag of weed in the front yard.

Because no one wanted to go to jail over a plant, no one fessed up, or perhaps the person who dropped it, left the party. Regardless, the solution proposed by the officers that night was to arrest everyone and charge them all with possession of marijuana. And they did exactly that.

These teens and young adults were then hauled off to jail, booked into the Bartow County lockup and shackled — for a small bag of weed found outside on the ground.

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Families of Parkland Victims Awarded $127.5 Million for School Massacre Due to FBI Dishonesty and Negligence

The federal government awarded $127.5 million to 16 families impacted by the Parkland High School mass shooting in 2018.

The deadly shooting took place back on Valentine’s Day, Feb. 14, 2018, at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Psychotic killer Nikolas Cruz opened fire, killing 17 people and wounding at least 17 more.

The families accused the FBI of negligence in their lawsuit.

As The Gateway Pundit previously reported — The FBI admitted they did not follow protocol in investigating the violent threats posted online by Nikolas Cruz.

On Jan. 5, 2018, a person close to Florida school shooting suspect contacted the FBI tipline and provided info on the suspect’s “gun ownership, desire to kill people, erratic behavior, and disturbing social media posts, as well as the potential of him conducting a school shooting.”

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The Foilies 2022

Each year during Sunshine Week (March 13-19), The Foilies serve up tongue-in-cheek “awards” for government agencies and assorted institutions that stand in the way of access to information. The Electronic Frontier Foundation and MuckRock combine forces to collect horror stories about Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and state-level public records requests from journalists and transparency advocates across the United States and beyond. Our goal is to identify the most surreal document redactions, the most aggravating copy fees, the most outrageous retaliation attempts, and all the other ridicule-worthy attacks on the public’s right to know.

And every year since 2015, as we’re about to crown these dubious winners, something new comes to light that makes us consider stopping the presses.

As we were writing up this year’s faux awards, news broke that officials from the National Archives and Records Administration had to lug away boxes upon boxes of Trump administration records from Mar-a-Lago, President Trump’s private resort. At best, it was an inappropriate move; at worst, a potential violation of laws governing the retention of presidential records and the handling of classified materials. And while Politico had reported that when Trump was still in the White House, he liked to tear up documents, we also just learned from journalist Maggie Haberman’s new book that staff claimed to find toilets clogged up with paper scraps, which were potentially torn-up government records. Trump has dismissed the allegations, of course. 

This was all too deliciously ironic considering how much Trump had raged about his opponent (and 2016 Foilies winner) Hillary Clinton’s practice of storing State Department communications on a private server. Is storing potentially classified correspondence on a personal email system any worse than hoarding top secret documents at a golf club? Is “acid washing” records, as Trump accused Clinton, any less farcical than flushing them down the john? 

Ultimately, we decided not to give Trump his seventh Foilie. Technically, he isn’t eligible: his presidential records won’t be subject to FOIA until he’s been out of office for five years (releasing classified records could take years, or decades, if ever).

Instead, we’re sticking with our original 16 winners, from federal agencies to small-town police departments to a couple of corporations, who are all shameworthy in their own rights and, at least metaphorically, have no problem tossing government transparency in the crapper.

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