The Legal Arena

“This is what White Castle residents have to deal with.”
Chris Nakamoto is a true professional journalist, giving a deadpanned story lede to his videographer as he was being perp-walked by a burly cop for uncovering small town government corruption.
He’d just uncovered an un-legislated pay raise costing each resident in small town White Castle, Lousiana – each man, woman and child – stuck paying an additional $11 per year in tribute to the elected offical.

Texas prosecutors admitted they can’t prove their contempt of cop case “BARD” against PINAC correspondent David Warden, who recorded video near a Shell Oil Refinery on the outskirts of Houston.
In other words, state attorneys had no way to prove that David Warden interfered with public duties of an officer last December, as charged, because BARD stands for ‘beyond a reasonable doubt,’ and officers couldn’t conceive of a single illegal thing Warden did while recording near the oil refinery as you can see in the legal document below.

Miami’s Civilian Investigative Panel regained subpoena powers after three years in court, winning a landmark appeals ruling over the Miami Fraternal of Police union.
That’s right, a police board whose only enforcement power is to compel testimony, and find facts has actually gone years without any teeth.

 
One day after Gabbi Lemos filed a lawsuit against the California sheriff’s office that had physically abused her during an arrest in which charges against her were already dismissed, prosecutors responded by refiling one of those charges.
Lawyers for the 18-year-old woman are now accusing prosecutors of retaliatory prosecution as they defend her against the new resisting arrest charge, saying they only did so to derail her lawsuit against the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office.

A Fort Lauderdale police officer who slapped a homeless man who had been sleeping on a bench at a bus terminal in downtown Fort Lauderdale was acquitted Wednesday by a jury of the charges despite the assault being recorded by a bystander.
Victor Ramirez, 25, was facing three misdemeanor charges, including two counts of battery and one count of falsifying records.
During the trial, he testified that he was trying to protect his gun from getting into the hands of homeless man, Bruce Laclair, and that Laclair was not complying with his orders to leave the bus terminal.

Daniel Shaver may have had a few drinks in him when he was ordered out of his Arizona hotel room at gunpoint by a group of six screaming police officers last January.
The Mesa police officers were barking all kinds of orders; each one with a different demand, telling him to get down on his hands and knees and crawl towards them, to place his hands over his head, to sit on the floor and cross his legs in front of him.

Cook County DA Anita Alvarez and Cuyahoga County DA Timothy McGinty both lost primary elections on Tuesday, signaling regime change by voters for two of the most hated, worst prosecutors in America.
While much of the country focused on Presidential elections, Chicago area voters dumped Anita Alvarez, whose biggest claim to fame before the Laquan McDonald video cover up was losing the landmark case ACLU vs. Alvarez, which invalidated Illinois unconstitutional wiretapping law.

Patrick Feaster, the California cop who made it his mission to stop drunk drivers, even to the point of shooting and killing one last year, was arrested on drunk and disorderly charges on Sunday.
At least the former Paradise police officer, who has been repeatedly awarded by Mothers Against Drunk Driving, was not driving.

The South Carolina state trooper who pulled a man over for a seatbelt violation, demanding his identification – then shooting the man after he reached into his truck for his identification – pleaded guilty today to assault and battery charges.
Sean Groubert faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted, according to the Washington Post.

An embattled Louisiana sheriff was indicted this week by a federal grand jury following guilty pleas by eight former deputies from his department.
Iberia Parish Sheriff Louis Ackal is facing ten years in prison and a fine of $250,000 for ordering the beatings of five inmates at the notorious Iberia Parish Jail.
The eight former deputies pleaded guilty to the deprivation of civil rights stemming from at least two separate incidents involving the beating of inmates in a plea deal that protects them from future indictments in exchange for their testimony against the sheriff.