DeltaElite
Member
Four of eleven cops convicted in Miami.
I am still have no idea why no homicide chargers were filed on these guys.
I find their actions far beyond unacceptable.
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/5595351.htm
Posted on Wed, Apr. 09, 2003
4 Miami cops guilty in conspiracy trial
BY LARRY LEBOWITZ
[email protected]
A federal jury toiled for more than three weeks with the largest police-corruption case in decades before rendering a split decision on Wednesday: convicting four veteran Miami police officers, acquitting three more and deadlocking on four others.
The 11 officers were accused of conspiring to plant guns on unarmed suspects or lying to investigators about four police shootings between November 1995 and June 1997. Three men were killed and one was wounded in the four incidents.
The jury issued guilty verdicts against officers Arturo Beguiristain, Jorge Castello and Oscar Ronda and former officer Jesus Aguero, who were fired in 2001.
All four were accused of taking part in the coverup of a police shooting that wounded an unarmed homeless man in Coconut Grove in June 1997. Beguiristain and Aguero were also implicated in the March 1996 case in which a gun was planted to justify Aguero firing three shots at an unarmed purse-snatcher near the Miami Design District.
The jury acquitted officers Rafael Fuentes, Eliezer Lopez and Alejandro Macias, all members of the Miami SWAT team, who were charged in the April 1996 fatal shooting of Richard Brown, a 72-year-old Overtown resident. The officers were serving a drug search warrant when the incident occurred.
Another defendant, Sgt. Jose Acuña, was also acquitted on two counts in connection with the SWAT shooting. But the jury deadlocked on two additional counts against him: his alleged participation in the overall conspiracy as well as his role in the Grove incident.
The jury also could not reach unanimous verdicts on officers Jorge Garcia and Jose Quintero and Lt. Israel Gonzalez. They were accused of participating in a coverup following the fatal 1995 shootings of two fleeing tourist robbery suspects near Interstate 395 in Overtown.
U.S. District Judge Alan Gold declared mistrials for those three defendants plus Acuña on the two deadlocked counts. It is unclear if prosecutors will retry them.
Their status with the department remains uncertain. They had been relieved of duty with pay since the 2001 indictments.
Gold scheduled sentencing for the four convicted cops for Aug. 22. They remain free on $100,000 personal surety bond and are required to wear ankle monitoring bracelets.
Macias, one of the acquitted officers, still faces trial for his alleged role in another fatal shooting. That trial is slated to start later this month.
Prosecutors also could seek to retry Garcia, Castello and Aguero on civil rights charges in connection with the beating of a career criminal. Another federal jury failed to reach unanimous verdicts on those charges as well.
The conspiracy trial, which began Jan. 20 with jury selection, was the highest profile police corruption case since the mid-1980s trial of the infamous Miami River Cops.
The 11 officers and their supporters decried the federal investigation as a witch hunt. They said all four shootings were justified and had been cleared by both internal inquiries and judicial inquests.
But the minority community saw a different picture.
For years, they said, police had been firing shots with impunity and planting guns and other evidence to justify bad shootings by police.
The three people who died in the four shootings were African American. A fourth person who was shot at, but not wounded, was also black.
Black community leaders leaned hard on the acting U.S. Attorney at the time, Guy A. Lewis. A veteran prosecutor who had served as interim U.S. attorney, Lewis was a candidate for the permanent position as well as a federal judgeship at the time.
The police and their supporters said the entire prosecution was a politically motivated witch hunt aimed at bolstering Lewis' aspirations.
The circumstances of the cases exacerbated those racial tensions. All 11 defendants were Hispanic officers.
The two other officers who were originally indicted with the 11 but chose to plead guilty and testify were white.
The same tensions entered jury selection.
Eleven of the original 12 jurors were of Hispanic or white. Only one black deliberated the entire case.
In the wake of the shootings, city officials agreed to create a civilian review board that has the ability to oversee police misconduct, civil rights complaints and other issues of internal discipline.
I am still have no idea why no homicide chargers were filed on these guys.
I find their actions far beyond unacceptable.
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/5595351.htm
Posted on Wed, Apr. 09, 2003
4 Miami cops guilty in conspiracy trial
BY LARRY LEBOWITZ
[email protected]
A federal jury toiled for more than three weeks with the largest police-corruption case in decades before rendering a split decision on Wednesday: convicting four veteran Miami police officers, acquitting three more and deadlocking on four others.
The 11 officers were accused of conspiring to plant guns on unarmed suspects or lying to investigators about four police shootings between November 1995 and June 1997. Three men were killed and one was wounded in the four incidents.
The jury issued guilty verdicts against officers Arturo Beguiristain, Jorge Castello and Oscar Ronda and former officer Jesus Aguero, who were fired in 2001.
All four were accused of taking part in the coverup of a police shooting that wounded an unarmed homeless man in Coconut Grove in June 1997. Beguiristain and Aguero were also implicated in the March 1996 case in which a gun was planted to justify Aguero firing three shots at an unarmed purse-snatcher near the Miami Design District.
The jury acquitted officers Rafael Fuentes, Eliezer Lopez and Alejandro Macias, all members of the Miami SWAT team, who were charged in the April 1996 fatal shooting of Richard Brown, a 72-year-old Overtown resident. The officers were serving a drug search warrant when the incident occurred.
Another defendant, Sgt. Jose Acuña, was also acquitted on two counts in connection with the SWAT shooting. But the jury deadlocked on two additional counts against him: his alleged participation in the overall conspiracy as well as his role in the Grove incident.
The jury also could not reach unanimous verdicts on officers Jorge Garcia and Jose Quintero and Lt. Israel Gonzalez. They were accused of participating in a coverup following the fatal 1995 shootings of two fleeing tourist robbery suspects near Interstate 395 in Overtown.
U.S. District Judge Alan Gold declared mistrials for those three defendants plus Acuña on the two deadlocked counts. It is unclear if prosecutors will retry them.
Their status with the department remains uncertain. They had been relieved of duty with pay since the 2001 indictments.
Gold scheduled sentencing for the four convicted cops for Aug. 22. They remain free on $100,000 personal surety bond and are required to wear ankle monitoring bracelets.
Macias, one of the acquitted officers, still faces trial for his alleged role in another fatal shooting. That trial is slated to start later this month.
Prosecutors also could seek to retry Garcia, Castello and Aguero on civil rights charges in connection with the beating of a career criminal. Another federal jury failed to reach unanimous verdicts on those charges as well.
The conspiracy trial, which began Jan. 20 with jury selection, was the highest profile police corruption case since the mid-1980s trial of the infamous Miami River Cops.
The 11 officers and their supporters decried the federal investigation as a witch hunt. They said all four shootings were justified and had been cleared by both internal inquiries and judicial inquests.
But the minority community saw a different picture.
For years, they said, police had been firing shots with impunity and planting guns and other evidence to justify bad shootings by police.
The three people who died in the four shootings were African American. A fourth person who was shot at, but not wounded, was also black.
Black community leaders leaned hard on the acting U.S. Attorney at the time, Guy A. Lewis. A veteran prosecutor who had served as interim U.S. attorney, Lewis was a candidate for the permanent position as well as a federal judgeship at the time.
The police and their supporters said the entire prosecution was a politically motivated witch hunt aimed at bolstering Lewis' aspirations.
The circumstances of the cases exacerbated those racial tensions. All 11 defendants were Hispanic officers.
The two other officers who were originally indicted with the 11 but chose to plead guilty and testify were white.
The same tensions entered jury selection.
Eleven of the original 12 jurors were of Hispanic or white. Only one black deliberated the entire case.
In the wake of the shootings, city officials agreed to create a civilian review board that has the ability to oversee police misconduct, civil rights complaints and other issues of internal discipline.
