Posted on 05/04/2018 3:20:22 PM PDT by TBP
The police department in Douglas County, Colorado, has finally apologized to Joshua McCay for arresting him in 2017 and charging him with driving a car during a police chase, despite having no evidence against him.
It took months for the police to arrest another suspect and drop their case against McCay, and the case raises some huge questions about how police handled the situation. Meanwhile, McCay is stuck with the cost of thousands of dollars in legal fees from battling a charge he should never have faced in the first place.
On Aug. 31, police arrested three people who had initially eluded law enforcement in a high-speed police chase but were later tracked down through their license plate number. When they were taken into custody, the trio reportedly concocted a plan to stay out of prison: They would invent a non-existent person and accuse this imaginary culprit of driving the car.
One of the suspects involved later told Colorado’s KCNC-TV, “Someone said ‘Oh, since the cops do not know who was driving, let’s just come up with a fake name, and we’ll tell them it was him, and they’ll never be able to catch the guy because he isn’t real.’”
This completely fabricated criminal was described as a homeless man the three had met at a King Soopers supermarket and for some reason had let drive their car.
McCay recalled afterward that he saw in the police report that the suspects couldn’t even agree on a name: “I was reading through the statement, the one guy said ‘We think the driver’s name is Josh or he might have been Eric and his last name is McCune or McCoy or McCay.’”
After getting the faulty information, the police searched for someone with that name in the DMV database, found Joshua McCay — who was not homeless, lived 80 miles away, and had an alibi (which the police did not check until two days after news about McCay’s plight broke on KCNC).
The police then showed a single photo of McCay to the three suspects without offering any other photos to verify accuracy. Two of the three suspects agreed that McCay was the person from their story.
But one of the three told KCNC that she did not even think the photo was real.
“It didn’t look like a real picture,” she said. “It looked like something that they had thrown together, like a Photoshop picture with what we had said.”
A felony warrant was issued for McCay, but no arrest was initially made. The next month, during a routine visit to the DMV, McCay found out that there was a warrant on his record. He went to the police station to clear up what he assumed was a glitch and was arrested.
“That was the first night I spent away from my son, and it was in jail,” McCay told KCNC.
Months would pass before the case against McCay was eventually dropped and the real driver of the car from the chase was arrested — one of the original three suspects who had fabricated the story about McCay. The other two original suspects have also been arrested for lying to police.
McCay has since had the records of his arrest sealed, to prevent a crime he never committed from appearing on his record in the future.
What did the police say? On Thursday, Douglas County Undersheriff Holly Nicholson-Kluth admitted that her department had made a mistake.
“I do not know what we will do to make it right, but we will sincerely apologize, I know that,” she told KCNC.
“We want to go back and look and find out how this happened because we don’t want it to happen again,” she said, adding that there was an internal investigation ongoing and that “we will get to the bottom of that.”
But McCay, who described himself as a “blue collar, 9-to-5” worker, is now in debt thanks to eight months of legal fees. He was told that he does not have a case to sue the county for wrongdoing. McCay and his wife are now using a GoFundMe campaign to try to raise money to cover some of their losses.
“We just want our life back. Financially, we are in a mountain of debt over it. But on top of that we want Douglas County courts and sheriffs to do better,” McCay said.
... Says no lawyer ever.
There should be a way to have the county reimburse the legal fees.
Or just have all court costs reimbursed and the lawyers write it off as pro bono work.
He has no case. This only happens to black people.
“But McCay, who described himself as a “blue collar, 9-to-5” worker, is now in debt thanks to eight months of legal fees. He was told that he does not have a case to sue the county for wrongdoing.”
Now that is just wrong right there! This guy needs to get appearances on any TV news channel he can get on in order to tell his story. Let the public decide on the above.
Well, not exactly.
The difference is that when it happens to blacks, there is a multimillion dollar eight-figure payout, and Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton are involved, and legions of snowflakes at Evergreen, Goddard, and Oberlin will "march" and have "sit-ins" and demand "Justice for McCay!". "McCay's Life Matters!". "McCay the Gentle Giant!".
Oh well, mistakes happen, no reason to lose your FEARFUL OBEDIENCE to government. I mean he got out, right?
Lawyers are overpaid.
Sue and financially gut Douglas County, Colorado to serve as an example for other counties.
Wow. No investigation done, just believe the criminals.
“He was told that he does not have a case to sue the county for wrongdoing.”
???????????????????????????
Why are there so many moron cops? Not to mention just out and out asshole cops... Too bad. Can’t stand these terrible cops anymore. Maybe we need to bust their stupid union and kick out all the lousy and criminal ones.
Then the police wonder why some people just snap. That whole unit would have to enter witness protection if this happened to some people I’ve known in my life.
Rank and file in action.
I went for a driver’s license a few years back in another State. A big ol’ black lady (race is part of the story) leans back in her chair and asks me, a wonder bread white guy, “Have you ever been black? Now, take your time and think about it.”
It turns out, a black guy with my exact name, born 2 days after me, and with 1 digit difference in our social security numbers, was wanted for murder.
Blue Lives Matter
So the lazy cops, found an even lazier Judge to sign the arrest warrant? You would think this Judge would personally stand up for his mistake and personally pay the innocent mans legal fees. The problem here is moronic Judges who rubber stamp every thing put in front of them. There should be public accountability for every warrant requested. This should include the name of the cop requesting the warrant. This is all part of the process of a public trial, where one has the right to face ones accusers. If the cop doesn’t have the confidence to be held publicly accountable, then perhaps he should not expect the public to fund his paycheck. The Judge and the cop should be eager to show the public their actions.
Should have looked at her real serious and say that you are not Michael Jackson.
Oh my gosh!!!
...and then grabbed my nose like it was falling off!
LOL!
In too many jurisdictions, civil service selection and hiring procedures favor affirmative action for protected classes, and psych evals in the hiring process tend to select against independent thinkers in favor of “follows orders”...
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