City Attorney Says Charges Could Be Dropped Against (KMart) Arrestees

HOUSTON -- Houston's Police Chief C.O. Bradford addressed concerns Wednesday about a Kmart parking lot raid earlier this month in which dozens of people were arrested.


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The raid happened Aug. 19 in the parking lot of a Kmart department store, located in the 8400 block of Westheimer Road, in southwest Houston.

HPD officials had previously said that it conducted the crackdown in response to numerous complaints from citizens and previous police surveillance regarding street racing and large crowds forming in the area.

Police said that these crowds impeded the access to and from businesses and that as a result of the operation 278 people were arrested with the majority being charged with criminal trespass.

"Zero tolerance does not override the need for probable cause to issue citations or to make arrests, nor does it mean to arrest everyone in sight," Bradford said.

Bradford answered some tough questions Wednesday for more than two hours by some members of the City Council.

He admitted that the parking lot raid arrests may be illegal, if people were never told they were trespassing and given a chance to leave.

Bradford said that if that's true, then he wonders why his officers followed an illegal order to arrest everyone.

"No officer in the Houston Police Department has ever been cited with insubordination or any other offense for their refusal to obey an unlawful order nor will they be on my watch," Bradford said.

Councilman Mark Ellis and others said that they wondered why no one blew the whistle before this raid, because a smaller sweep was done the night before at a James Coney Island eatery in which 25 people were arrested.

"Friday night, I didn't know. A chief in charge of the department didn't know, because no one reported it in a significant event report that it had occurred," Bradford said. "So, therefore, there was not that opportunity to intervene before the next night occurred."

The city attorney told the council that if an internal affairs investigation reveals that the arrests were illegal, the city will dismiss all of the charges against all of the people and even overturn the convictions for those who pleaded guilty to get out of jail.

Thirteen officers have been suspended in the wake of the raid, including the officer in charge of the operation, Capt. Mike Aguirre.

One of those people arrested has filed a $100 million lawsuit against the city, accusing Aguirre and the city of falsely arresting him for "attempted trespass."

Heck they don't have the money now to hire the appropriate people to do the job. Leepee OuttaTown Brown spends city money on more important things, such as:

$5,000 for a class on public speaking so he can give a "State of the City Address" (and this after he had been mayor for 3 years)
An all expense paid trip to Africa for himself and his wife (visiting a sister city, so they claimed)
$15,000 (I believe) for a Welcome to Houston sign at the major airport, it has his picture and name on it, and the way it is designed it cannot be changed when he is no longer in office.
Pamphlets out of the Education Department on bettering education and indorcing higher learning.... It was filled with spelling and grammar errors.

The list is endless. Should this city survive Brown and his 3 terms, without going into bankruptcy, I will be highly surprised.

For a year the people at Wal-Mart have been complaining to the police to get rid of these people who are blocking traffic and generally causing havoc.

Nice to know you spent so much time and effort informing yourself to arrive at your opinion. Go read the rest of the posts before jumping to the wrong conclusions.

Kmart wanted the problem dealt with -- loiterers and drag racers.

Unfortunately, HPD went nuts. Rather than going after the loiterers and drag racers, they just started swooping in, blocking exits, and arresting every single person present, including legitimate customers, on bogus charges.

The James Coney Island raid was conducted on adults who had been meeting for ten years with the blessing of the owner of the establishment and were doing absolutely nothing wrong.

Because the police made no effort to separate legitimate patrons from loiterers in either raid, they destroyed their own credibility.

The drag racers and loiterers need to be dealt with, but that probably isn't possible now.

The police have been warning them to stop the drag racing on the streets and causing havoc in the parking lots.

If only that were true. An editorial by a nearby resident said that the police only dispersed the crowd "two or three times in the past six months". The HPD let this grow into a big problem, then responded with military tactics.

If they had been patrolling the area, dispersing crowds, handing out tickets for loitering, and arresting people that actually committed a crime over the past six months, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

Now when the nut case kids get killed while drag racing the parents of my johnny does no wrong sues Wal-Mart and the policee from not protecting their kids from themselvs.

Only 42 of the 278 arrested were juveniles. The rest were legally adults. Are you going to blame their parents, too?

Most of us are questioning the actions of the police, which are very likely to be found illegal under Texas law. That doesn't mean that there wasn't a problem: only that the response to the problem was inappropriate.

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