Georgia police shooting sparks ‘Justice for Caroline’

[Suzanimal]

Georgia police shooting sparks ‘Justice for Caroline’

The 18 church friends who gathered at Karen McGehee’s ranch house here this summer came from all walks of American life — former school teachers, lawyers, government employees, a lobbyist and a pastor. “Old-time, white middle class people,” as one described, the kind of people who trusted police to do the right thing.

Not any more.

This summer, they read the AJC/Channel 2 Action News report about how two Glynn County police officers shot and killed Caroline Small, McGehee’s daughter and a woman many had known since she was a girl in church with their own children. Some watched the dashcam video that showed the police surrounding Small’s car and firing eight times through the windshield as the unarmed 35-year-old was pinned against a utility poll, and heard them compare their marksmanship after shooting her in the head and face.

Last month, they formed “Justice for Caroline Small.” The initial 18 members has swelled to 50 and they held their second meeting last week.

Their anger over the shooting was palpable when they met this month with AJC and Channel 2 reporters at McGehee’s home. Most knew Caroline as a little girl and watched her grow up. Many are now grandparents and empathize with her mother and their friend, and grieve for the two children Caroline left behind.

Did Caroline Small have to die?

“To see those bullet holes appear in that windshield and know that Caroline is in that car…” said Bob Apgar, choking back tears.

Wayne McDaniel, a family friend who counts two former county sheriffs among his family, summed up his outrage this way:

“Any officer that wants to play Clint Eastwood and shoot people and then has that attitude really don’t belong in law enforcement anywhere,” He said. “They are supposed to be protecting and serving. They didn’t protect Caroline and they didn’t serve her.”

Revelations about the 2010 case, including how the officers escaped consequences and the local district attorney manipulated the grand jury, have shaken their confidence in the legal system. They say they are just coming to grips with truths that had been hidden from them for years. They now believe a gross injustice occurred in Brunswick and they are making those beliefs public.

They’ve created a Facebook page with videos, news reports and information about the shooting, and have started an online petition to gain support for their cause. They hope to press Georgia authorities and federal officials to reexamine the case, investigate the Glynn County Police Department and review whether the two officers who killed Small should keep their state police certification.

Galvanized to action

In July, the AJC and Channel 2 reported that Glynn County police interfered with the GBI’s investigation of Small’s death and created a misleading video animation of the shooting that was shown to the grand jury. The retired GBI supervisor who oversaw the case told the AJC it was the worst police shooting he’d ever investigated.

The report also highlighted the unprecedented latitude that the local district attorney granted the officers and their attorneys, allowing them to question grand jury witnesses and gain prior access to the state’s evidence.

The grand jury voted to clear the officers in 2011 and a federal judge dismissed a civil lawsuit last year. Yet even five years later, grand jurors told the AJC that a local trial jury deserved to hear the case.

On the surface, the group organizing around Small’s shooting looks nothing like the waves of demonstrators who have taken to the streets following the fatal police shooting of an unarmed black man in Ferguson, Mo., to protest police violence against African Americans. Many are white-haired retirees who spent their careers working in government and civic institutions. Several have personal or professional ties to law enforcement.

But like those demonstrators, the troubling facts surrounding the shooting of an unarmed woman has frayed their willingness to give police the benefit of the doubt, and transformed them into activists.

“It changes in some ways the way that you view the police and just thinking they are there to protect you,” said Kay Allen, a family therapist. “And it’s kind of like ‘Well, maybe not. Maybe there’s another side to things that we don’t always know about.’”

Bonds forged in Fla.

Religion pulled Caroline Small’s family to Tallahassee in 1976 when her father, Mike McGehee, became senior minister of Faith Presbyterian Church. The church was central in her life growing up in this Capitol city just 20 miles south of the Georgia line. Even after her parents divorced in 1982 and her father left Florida, Caroline and her mother and younger brother, Michael, continued to attend the church, forging bonds through the church and its youth program. Those relationships are now the foundation of the “Justice for Caroline Small” campaign.

A church elder and former youth program leader, Wayne McDaniel remembers Small as a teenager full of life and laughter who grew up with his kids. He remembers driving her and others by bus to youth conferences in Montreat, N.C., or spending time at all night lock-ins during high school.

When he learned that Small had been shot, he and his wife, Carol, drove to Savannah to offer Karen McGehee and her family support as they held vigil over Caroline in the hospital. Despite the severity of the bullet wounds to her head, Small clung to life support for a week as the McDaniels and other friends and family prayed for recovery.

He said the sting of her loss still effects the families who were close to her.

“When you are going through old pictures of the church groups and talking to your kids and all that, she’s there,” said McDaniel, a retired deputy secretary with Florida’s department of health. “She’s a person that we watched and loved.”

Carol was in the hospital room and prayed with Karen and her family after Caroline slipped away into death. She said her friends were more focused on helping Caroline’s family cope with their grief than questioning the official police version of how and why she was shot.

“Karen is one of the strongest people I’ve ever known,” said McDaniel, a retired first grade teacher. “She’s grieved unmercifully and missed her daughter tremendously. It’s sad. It’s very sad. It’s very troubling. I grieve for her.”

For her part, McGehee said she was either oblivious to the facts surrounding the case or in such shock that she wasn’t able to critically examine the police officers’ actions. Many of the details in the AJC/Channel 2 investigation were revelations to her. She said while painful she’s thankful she now knows the full story.

“It was like going through the grief process again but it’s worse this time because I knew what happened,” she said.

McGehee, a retired first grade teacher, said she was particularly troubled by the way the case was handled by Glynn County Police and by the local prosecutor, Jackie Johnson.

“I was just stunned,” she said. “You want to believe the best in the legal system. You want to believe the best with your officers. We taught first graders to respect the law, that these were your friends and everything. But the way the whole (thing) took place it just astounded me these things could actually happened in the ways that they did happen.”

A call to action

Most of McGehee’s friends had heard about the June 18, 2010, shooting shortly after it occurred.

If they knew anything of the details, it was that police had been called to a shopping mall in Brunswick after someone suspected Small of doing drugs in her parked car. They knew she had led police on a low-speed chase and that they had shot her when they claimed she tried to run them over with her car. Even though her friends knew about her struggles with addiction, several also believed that the official version of what happened didn’t add up.

The idea that Small would try to run over police didn’t square with the person they knew and watched grow up. They had never seen Caroline act violently.

For some, the dashcam video was particularly haunting.

“I watched it and had the same response as everybody else — just complete shock and really kind of horror this all happened,” said Allen.

Recent publicity drew national attention to the case, but has not attracted protests in Georgia. A Facebook post detailing the AJC’s story in July caught the eye of Drin Apgar in Tallahassee.

She showed it to her husband, Bob, an attorney. They asked Karen if there was something they could do to help.

“Word just started spreading about it and that’s how it basically started,” said Bob Apgar, who along with his wife brought the original nine or 10 families together for the Aug. 18 meeting.

‘They were angels’

The first meeting was held over homemade cookies and coffee at McGehee’s tidy one-story home, where family photos and Caroline’s artwork line the walls. The group has delegated tasks with the efficiency of a church fundraising drive.

They plan to contact Gov. Nathan Deal and the U.S. Attorneys office in South Georgia as well as build support with local people in Brunswick who may also think the case deserves a fresh look and a new grand jury to consider it.

The group says they respect police and recognize they have a difficult job. But they share collective disbelief at what happened in Brunswick five years ago and a frustration that it took so long for the details to come out.

“It’s shocking,” said Frank Walper, a retired educator. “It sounds like something out of the past that they used to make movies about. It just doesn’t seem the way things should be handled today in the United States of America. It’s just not right.”

At a recent meeting, it’s clear there’s familiarity and trust forged by decades of church and social gatherings and neighborly acts of kindness. They talk about how Karen has helped others get through difficult times. Now, it’s their turn.

“This was such a horrible thing that shouldn’t have happened and they wanted to do something about it,” said Karen McGehee. “It’s hard to describe the feeling in that room, but there was such love and care and concern for Caroline and for me and my family from these longtime friends. I felt like they were angels.”

...

http://www.myajc.com/news/news/stat...olin/nncQx/?ecmp=ajc_social_facebook_2014_sfp

 

[SeanTX]

As has been pointed out here many times, justice can't be had in *their* courts. Even if you can get these cops charged with something, the system will do everything in its power to select grand juries and trial juries that will give them the outcome they want (like the federal case of the cop who paralyzed the Indian man in AL -- it just takes one cop/cop family member/cop sucker to cause a mistrial).

However, it's good that they haven't given up on bringing attention to this case -- at least it seems like maybe public attitudes are starting to change (which is why they have to propagandize every case of an officer that is "targeted" as a sympathy ploy, which unfortunately seems to work on many people who might be on the fence).

 

[phill4paul]

It was said by Judge Sol Wachtler that a D.A. had so much influence they could get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich. If that is the case, and it is, then certainly the opposite is true. The D.A. has so much influence they can get a non-indictment for murdering police scum.

‘THIS WAS A MURDER AND IT WAS COVERED UP.’
– EX-GLYNN COUNTY PROSECUTOR

BRUNSWICK – The prosecutors who watched the fatal police shooting video of Caroline Small had more than a century of courtroom experience — from murder cases to child molestation to rape.

Still, the violence that unfolded on the computer screen shocked them into silence. The video showed eight police bullets piercing the car windshield of the unarmed Georgia mother as she was pinned against a utility pole and surrounded by police cars.

The consensus in the courthouse conference room was that the two Glynn County police officers who pulled their triggers had committed a crime. One DA called for more investigation. A second said it was manslaughter. Another said it was aggravated assault.

Several called it murder.

“We were just stunned,” said David Peterson, one of the prosecutors. “We just said, ‘That’s a killing.’ We thought the officers used improper force. There was a sense that something bad here has happened.”

Almost to a person, the prosecutors believed the officers should be indicted by a criminal grand jury. A jury trial seemed certain to follow.

What happened instead derailed the case and fundamentally shook their beliefs in the justice system and the rule of law.

Brunswick District Attorney Jackie Johnson fired one prosecutor for his outspoken determination to prosecute the 2010 shooting, and she excluded the others who best knew the evidence. The case languished for a year before Sgt. Robert C. Sasser and Officer Michael T. Simpson were cleared by a civil grand jury in 2011 amid a series of questionable and irregular legal maneuvers. Sasser and Simpson remain in law enforcement today.

Now four former prosecutors in Johnson’s office have come forward to tell their story of how the case unraveled. They said they were emboldened to speak out after The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Channel 2 Action News reported in July that Johnson took extraordinary measures to aid the two officers in their defense.

Read more about the "Just-Us" system and how it works...http://investigations.myajc.com/overtheline/#da-misconduct

 

[tod evans]

Justice will not be found in their courts.

 

[Suzanimal]

2 Investigates: New questions about handling of GA police shooting

...

Caroline Small had been sitting in her car in a hotel parking lot when an officer approached and thought she was using drugs. She wasn't, but she took off anyway.

The low-speed chase lasted more than 15 minutes, stop sticks flattened her tires, and a state trooper finally got her stopped up against a telephone pole.

In the officers' dashboard camera video, you can see the trooper, Jonathan Malone, run around Small's car to try to help diffuse the situation.

"Let me get out here and get her out," Malone is heard saying on the video.

But when Malone looked up, the Glynn County police officers had their guns pointed in his direction.

Small repeatedly jerked her car back and forth between the pole and the patrol cars.

"If she moves the car, I'm going to shoot her," Simpson is heard yelling.

Then, 2 seconds later, eight bullets enter Small's windshield.

The Glynn County police chief called in the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to review the shooting.

Special Agent in Charge Mike McDaniel supervised the case, which he can now speak freely about, since he's recently retired.

"Most GBI agents that were working on the case felt like it was a bad shoot," McDaniel told investigative reporter Jodie Fleischer. "This is the worst one I've ever investigated.”

He found the officers' statements right after the shooting especially troubling.

"She's D-O-A (dead on arrival). I got her right between the eyes," Simpson tells an eyewitness, who was a former emergency medical technician who wanted to render aid.

But instead of checking to see if Small was alive, the officers discussed their marksmanship.

"I hit her right in the face," Sasser remarks on the recording.

Simpson replies, "I watched the bridge of her nose. I pulled the trigger and I watched it hit her at the same time."

Small lived for five more days without ever waking up.

"They were acting more like they shot a deer or were out hunting," said McDaniel. "It's not what I would expect an officer's reaction to be after they were in fear of their lives and shot somebody."

A Tainted Investigation?

At the same time the GBI conducted its investigation, Glynn County police were doing their own and questioning the witnesses, as well.

"Looking back at it now, I'm pretty sure they were trying to interfere with us and keep us from doing our job," said McDaniel.

He remembers one officer telling him the department only called in the GBI for public perception.

That's something Glynn County Police Chief Matt Doering firmly denies.

"If an officer said that, it's inaccurate," said Doering, "I don't call the GBI in for public appearance. Now if they felt that, that might have been what they felt, but I never expressed that to anybody."

GBI Director Vernon Keenan said he's never seen another agency behave like the Glynn County Police Department.

"They wanted to argue with us about investigative steps that we were taking, and they were criticizing agents' actions," said Keenan.

Keenan says he changed the state agency's policy as a result of the conflict and controversy in this case, and he now keeps local departments at arm's length during these kinds of cases.

Doering said his agency has a good working relationship with the GBI, but he did complain about how one investigator treated his officers.

"You have to be impartial and you have to make certain that you don't become accusatory when you interview an officer, even if you personally feel an officer's actions was unreasonable and inappropriate," said Doering.

The chief also defended an animated video his department created, which shows Small easily steering her car through a gap between the patrol cars and running over officers in the process.

McDaniel says it was misleading. "Those measurements in that cartoon are not correct. They've got the car turning coming through at the officers, which you and I know can't happen," McDaniel said.

Plus, Simpson's patrol vehicle, which was parked somewhere in that gap, was moved before the GBI arrived at the scene. It's not pictured in the animation at all.

But Doering says that's not relevant.

"I felt the officers following the law, as I know the law to be, were justified," said Doering, "That's what I ruled then and I rule now."

A year after the shooting a grand jury agreed and, in a split decision, voted to clear the officers.

But when Channel 2 Action News and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution started digging through the records, there were contradictions.

"There was nothing in my mind that justified them shooting her," said former Waycross District Attorney Rick Currie, who reviewed the case as a second opinion for the Glynn County district attorney.

He cites Trooper Malone's heroic actions, indicating he was not in fear for his life at that time, or he wouldn't have run up to Caroline's car. He only retreated when he looked up and saw officers Sasser and Simpson pointing their guns in his direction.

"They should have been prosecuted, there's no doubt about that," said Currie, "Everything was right there on the tape; I really don't know how the grand jury didn't indict."

Court Questions

Glynn County District Attorney Jackie Johnson refused repeated requests for an on-camera interview regarding her handling of the Caroline Small shooting.

Records show she signed deals with officers Sasser and Simpson before the grand jury proceeding, and agreed not to show the grand jury the indictment she'd drafted.

It listed 5 counts: felony murder, voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter(2) and violation of oath.

"We were not handed anything like this," said grand juror Byron Bennett, while examining the court records he'd never seen, "That's not right, this should have been presented to us."

Bennett says there was no deliberation; the grand jury took one vote by show of hands. It's haunted him from the moment he left the courthouse.

"I voted the wrong way," said Bennett, "We failed that lady, we failed the process."

Bennett says he always hoped Johnson would take the case to another grand jury, and he still does.

"We need to hear the whole side, it should have went to regular court," said Bennett.

Grand juror Chuck McManus says he wishes Johnson had presented an indictment and described elements of the listed crimes, as she had in each of the other cases they heard.

In Caroline Small's case, Johnson only asked the grand jury to decide whether the officers' actions were justified.

"She definitely wasn't pushing for an indictment, no question about that," said McManus, "It kind of seemed like she wasn't trying to prove anything."

Court records also show that Johnson handed over copies of the evidence in the case to the officers' defense attorneys two months prior to the grand jury proceeding, which is almost unheard of when there hasn't been an arrest or indictment.

District attorneys have complete discretion over whether to present a case to a grand jury or not, and which witnesses or evidence to use.

Johnson allowed a Glynn County police officer to testify as a rebuttal witness to the GBI; he presented details from the internal affairs investigation which cleared the officers and included the animation the department created.

When asked why his department would give the district attorney an inaccurate animation video to be used as evidence, Chief Doering replied, "The DA had the choice to accept that and present it, she didn't have to present that."

Civil court records show Doering and Johnson had discussed the Caroline Small case before she was appointed as district attorney, he even wrote the governor a letter supporting her for the job.

"That's not any kind of grand jury I've ever been a part of or ever heard of," said the GBI's McDaniel, who still believes the officers should have somehow been held accountable for their actions.

He things the grand jury did not hear a fair representation of the case.

"There's no question [Caroline] bears a great deal of responsibility for what happened to her," said attorney Bill Atkins who represented the family in a civil case filed against the county, "She deserved to go to jail, she didn't deserve to die."

That civil case never made it to trial either.

Judge Lisa Godbey Wood concluded that Small's death was not 'necessary', but that the officers did not violate her constitutional rights. Wood threw the case out, citing that given the circumstances, it did not meet the standard that 'every objectively reasonable officer standing in the defendants' place' would have known that those actions were clearly unlawful.

The appellate court upheld her decision.

"It never sounded right, never ever," said Gaby McGuire, while sitting on the porch of her transitional house now named Caroline's. She wanted to honor the close friend she lost.

"She loved life, and she wanted to help others that were struggling like she had struggled," said McGuire.

She believes Caroline was suffering from a mental health episode during her encounter with police.

"I talked to her the night before she was shot, she was not okay in her head," said McGuire.

Even five years later, she wants the truth to be told, "Bringing it out to light is the best thing. Will it save Caroline's life? No. But it might save somebody else's life."

Jackie Johnson sent a statement to Channel 2 Action News:

“As District Attorney, I do not want my words used to compound the tragic nature of this case for our community. I respect the Glynn County Grand Jury’s finding that the officers acted lawfully as well as the findings of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Georgia which specifically addressed the reasonableness of the officers’ use of deadly force.”

http://www.wsbtv.com/news/2-investigates/2-investigates-new-questions-about-handling-ga-pol/33412061