Posted on 08/21/2002 9:34:08 PM PDT by niki
Raid at hot dog joint preceded Kmart bust
By ROMA KHANNA
Houston police Capt. Mark Aguirre, the man who ordered the arrests of 278 people at a westside Kmart last weekend, prodded a local restaurant to allow his officers to conduct a similar raid of its parking lot Saturday in a sting that netted 25 arrests.
Officials with the James Coney Island at 5745 Westheimer said they felt used after police swept in and arrested 25 people, some of whom were customers, for criminal trespass.
"We were cooperative with the idea (of the raid), but are not necessarily happy with the execution," said Darrin Straughan, a vice president with the restaurant chain. "We are victims here, too. We never imagined that this is the way it would be handled or that legitimate customers would be arrested."
Straughan said Aguirre approached the company two weeks ago and told restaurant officials that illegal drag racing along Westheimer had caused several fatal accidents and prompted neighborhood complaints. Aguirre asked the company to post four no-trespassing signs in the parking lot and to sign paperwork allowing police to make the arrests on the restaurant's property.
Company officials went along with Aguirre's plan, Straughan said, thinking their actions would be part of a subdued enforcement of city trespassing ordinances.
Instead, a swarm of officers backed by a police helicopter descended on the restaurant about 1:15 a.m. Saturday, rounding up customers and other people gathered in the parking lot. Police said the arrests continued until 4:30 a.m.
Most of those arrested, Straughan said, were among a group of motorcyclists that has gathered at the restaurant every weekend for nine years without problems.
Monica Coello, 36, was finishing a meal in the parking lot with her brother, sister, sister-in-law and 2-year-old niece when she was arrested.
"We were almost ready to leave when all the patrol cars came in and started blocking the entrances and exits," Coello said. "I wanted to lock my car, and they would not let me. They told me to shut up and walk to the back."
Coello's sister-in-law and niece were left behind, stranded. Police took Coello, her brother and sister to jail. Eventually, their mother shelled out $900 in bail, and the three siblings were freed.
Coello says she intends to sue the city.
"I don't see how they can call it trespassing when we were eating at the restaurant," she said. "We kept trying to explain that to police but they would not let us."
Coello's complaint is similar to that of dozens, if not hundreds, of people arrested at a Kmart and Sonic Drive-In in the 8400 block of Westheimer just after midnight Sunday.
In that incident, dozens of police -- led by Aguirre and again targeting illegal drag racing -- raided the businesses' parking lots about 12:30 a.m. Several officers said that when no evidence of drag racing was found, Aguirre ordered the arrests of the 278 people gathered there.
Those arrests prompted complaints that police failed to discriminate between loitering teens and legitimate customers when making arrests.
Straughan said James Coney Island has received about 50 customer complaints about the arrests, and the company believes that the police violated their agreement with the restaurant.
"We signed a trespass affidavit that said `James Coney Island requests on our behalf that the Houston Police Department requests all persons who are not patrons in the normal course of business to immediately leave the property or be arrested,' " Straughan said, quoting the agreement.
But no one had the opportunity to "immediately leave," Straughan said.
"From what we have learned, nobody that HPD arrested was asked whether they were there as a customer," he said. The police "just showed up, blocked off entrances, and arrested everybody."
Straughan declined to comment on Aguirre, but he said the company plans to file a complaint with the Police Department. Officials with Kmart did not respond to calls for comment.
Police spokesman Robert Hurst said Wednesday that he couldn't speak about Straughan's concerns because police are investigating Sunday's arrests in the Kmart parking lot. Hurst declined to say whether the incidents at James Coney Island would be part of that investigation.
As police and the district attorney's office attempt to sort out Sunday's mass arrests at Kmart and Sonic Drive-In, local defense lawyers say such raids are "arrest them first and ask questions later" situations that leave room for many legal challenges.
Lawyers questioned whether the no-trespassing signs posted before the arrests are sufficient warning for a criminal trespassing arrest.
"When you have got 400 kids in a parking lot, signs are obscured," said Chip Lewis, a Houston defense lawyer. "The best notice would have been to give them formal citations. There was no reason for this to come to this many arrests."
Citations would have provided adequate warning that arrests could follow, said lawyer Anthony Osso.
"It is extremely indicative of the mentality of whoever was in charge that when they had the option of giving a citation in lieu of arresting someone, they chose to make arrests," Osso said. "Those arrests were unnecessary."
Several lawyers interviewed Wednesday said those who pleaded guilty after their arrests Sunday can request a trial, arguing that their pleas were made under duress. Many of those who pleaded guilty, some of whom were teenagers, said they did so to avoid spending another night in jail.
"They were still under the shock that many of them were arrested without just cause," said Osso. "If you have never been in trouble before, and you believe the police are there to protect you, you will plead if they say you can get out."
Members of City Council said Wednesday that they had received many e-mails and phone calls regarding the weekend arrests and that the public seems outraged about the operation.
"You have young kids whose lives are now forever marked by having been arrested for criminal trespassing ... in what seems like it wasn't an appropriate endeavor," said Councilman Gabriel Vasquez.
Councilman Gordon Quan said he was worried about young people having to report the arrests when applying to college or for jobs.
"We could have resolved this with citations more easily," Quan said. "I'd like to see if there's any way that possibly can be changed."
Mayor Lee Brown said he has asked the city's Office of Inspector General to speed up its investigation.
"They are looking at all aspects of what happened that night," Brown said. "There are still a lot of questions."
Unbelievable! Do you have a link to the story? If that were my sister she would have been dead before letting her kids go with them.
I am actually glad they did the mass arrest at Kmart otherwise their misdeeds would not be coming out.
That should include every asshole who had ANYTHING to do with the operation. Don't you think the dispatchers and jailers share some guilt too?
They'll all make great mall cops if they get fired.
But the pigs got wood. Besides that, all that money came back. (As well as fines and court costs.)
The poster there suggested that this was all being driven by the mayor's office.
Also, in an interesting aside, Mark Aguire just had a traffic accident while driving a city owned car.
Callers are almost as mad as they can get over the entire incident, but they are especially mad because the police took many innocent bystanders who were eating and placed them in jail along with this very normal mom and child.
FILE THE LAW SUITS! Impeach the mayor!
Im very pro cop, but Im only pro good cop. Those who abuse our trust are worse than the criminals they persue.
If a conviction can be accomplished, then civil actions - due to the lower standard of proof - become mere haggling over how much the settlement will be.
In all candor, I find this deeply disturbing. It seems like something one would read about from the old USSR, or the People's Republic of China. And there isn't any real accountability. Aguirre may (may!) get fired; but we have lots of officers, jailers, magistrates, and tow truck drivers who simply went along with the flow and didn't say or do anything to stop it. How far would they go? Is there a subset that would "disappear" certain malfactors, ala South America? Or even some who would agree to something more systematic? I wonder - truly - just how far we are from being like the "good Germans who were only following orders." Would we risk the wrath of the police to stop...whatever?
This is also interesting in that it provides a perfect laboratory for understanding how totalitarian regimes survive. Businesses and everyone else cooperates (or should that be written "capitulates"?)...would they dare do otherwise? Innocent people are arrested, and then - if they aren't prepared to work the system, or cannot afford to do so - they wind up with a conviction for criminal trespass. If the penalty were a week in jail instead of a night, would we react? What if it were a month? A year? Life? Or...death? A few people write about it. A few talk. The investigation will drag on, a statement will be released that mistakes were made, an insincere apology will be read, and I suspect that will be the extent of it. Nothing will happen, and nothing will be done.
Worst of all, there seems to be no outrage among the elected officials. No righteous anger. And that, I fear, is telling.
Houston chief accused of perjurySorry if I missed any profanity in the above. The original text is linked if you can't decipher the changes.Capt. Mark Aguirre, who recently received a written reprimand from the Houston police chief for allegedly using profane language to subordinates, said Houston chief C.O. Bradford lied while testifying before an independent examiner at a grievance hearing in May about the reprimand.
Bradford, when asked if he’d ever used foul language to subordinates, said ‘no,’ reported the Houston Chronicle. Police union officials said another administrator testified the chief had used such language with subordinates.
Aguirre asked the Harris County District Attorney to investigate the discrepancy, and Harris DA Chuck Rosenthal, always eager to pander to the powerful police unions as in the Torres case (above), responded by requesting a transcript of the hearing and initiating an investigation.
And.... Curses, Foiled Again!
DATELINE 07/21/2002
A captain makes dog patties out of HPD's punishment for his profanity
BY GEORGE FLYNN -HOUSTON ARTICLE
The reprimand issued to an embattled Houston police captain has been overturned by a judge, who noted that the department's vague rules about profanity and conduct could have been applied against the police chief himself.
Captain Mark Aguirre received the written reprimand from Chief C.O. Bradford in November after some officers under Aguirre's command complained that he used obscene and allegedly threatening language during a stormy staff meeting on August 21,2002.
But last week grievance examiner Tina Snelling -- the equivalent of a judge in the city's appeals process -- issued 13 pages of findings and recommendations that rejected Bradford's discipline of the captain. She concluded that the department had invoked a rule, known as a General Order, that was so vague it could be misused by police officials and applied arbitrarily.
In Aguirre's May 22 hearing to appeal the punishment, Bradford testified that he did not use harsh profanity in his position as chief. Then J.L.Breshears, executive assistant chief, testified that Bradford had once called him either a "MF" or a "stupid MF" during a meeting in the chief's office (see "HPD Blue," by George Flynn, May 30).
Snelling found that it is "undisputed that profanity is routinely spoken among and by HPD officers." Referring to Breshears's testimony that Bradford had sworn at him, Snelling concluded that Breshears "by his own admission is a victim of the General Order's violation -- that is, if the General Order were uniformly and equally applied to every violator."
The examiner appeared to endorse the arguments made by Terry W. Yates, attorney for the controversial captain. Yates, whose family includes law-enforcement officers and who worked closely with cops as a special crimes prosecutor, said coarse and colorful words have long been an accepted part of the internal police vernacular.
"The captain feels very good about being vindicated of these allegations," Yates said after Snelling's ruling.
Aguirre has been hit with numerous complaints since he took command of HPD's South Central Station three years ago and instituted the aggressive Operation Renaissance program to cut crime (see "The War Within," by Richard Connelly, June 27). Snelling's findings noted that Aguirre claimed the "extreme opposition" of some of his command sergeants was owing to his insistence that sergeants monitor patrol officers "at all times."
As friction mounted and crime rates began to edge up again, Aguirre ordered about 30 sergeants and lieutenants to attend the August meeting, where he says he "chewed ass."
A sergeant secretly recorded portions of the session, then sent the tape with an initially anonymous complaint to the Internal Affairs Division.
Aguirre acknowledged using standard curses -- such as "SOB's," "sh!t," "GD'it" and "lazy bustards." But IAD investigators soon had 15 statements from cops who said he also told them, "I will grind you into dog patties and I will stomp you into pancakes."
The captain swore he hadn't said that, and the incomplete tape did not contain the statement. As for the complaints that he said he'd "chop heads, starting at the anuses," Aguirre said he told them "ankles," not anuses.
The discipline committee recommended five days' suspension, accusing Aguirre of violating the "sound judgment" rule against conduct that discredits or embarrasses the department, and the rule requiring police officers to treat peers and the public with respect and courtesy. Bradford reduced the punishment to a reprimand.
The hearing examiner stated that the department and the city flip-flopped to some extent on what role the profanity played in the overall decision to discipline the captain, although it dominated the testimony.
Calling Aguirre's style "Pattonesque," Snelling noted that the evidence reflected that the captain never used commonly accepted "fighting words" -- language that would incite immediate violence. She also pointed out that his swearing and perceived threats were not directed at any one officer, and that they came during an internal meeting with no civilians or outsiders involved.
However, the examiner hardly defended Aguirre's four-letter preferences or his leadership style. She called it unfortunate that he punctuated the speech "with despotic and unsavory vernacular." Snelling even recommended that he attend management classes at HPD's expense.
Her primary beef was with the absence of specifics in the rules used to punish Aguirre. With everyone acknowledging that profanity is common among police, the department had issued Aguirre no guidelines on what language might be taboo. Police officials suggested that the listeners should be the ones to determine what might be objectionable (Breshears, for example, says he didn't really mind the "MF" from Bradford, because they're longtime friends).
But Snelling explained that it would be unfair to leave people guessing at what might be offensive. And she indicated in the ruling that police officials shouldn't be able to pick and choose who gets disciplined under a vague regulation.
Bradford has filed to appeal the ruling to the Civil Service Commission, saying the findings were not supported by the evidence. And the contradictory testimony about whether the chief swore in his own staff meeting has prompted a perjury review by the district attorney'soffice.
So the case against the captain is back to the beginning, even after a lengthy grievance hearing. And it's still unclear which words Aguirre is now on notice not to utter. Snelling herself touched on that in a footnote that reads:
"Except and perhaps, that is, the words 'anus,' 'stomp into pancakes,'or 'grind into dog patties,' although these seemingly non-profane words have been previously categorically denied."
I'm sure Capt. Aquirre would tell you that he is just applying the law equally to the populace in the same way the department rules have been applied to him. I don't suspect that the Chief, outtatown, or the populace, will see it that way though. He's toast, but he may get a large retirement settlement.
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