We-the-People
Regular Member
New hearing is January 9th at 9:30am in the Medford Municipal Court.
News?
I attended the hearing from 9:30am until approximately 11am after which further matters ended up taking until about 11:30am to resolve.
Basically:
The city's witnesses were allowed to testify
The defense was denied the ability to call their only witness (The reporting party who is a former city police officer and current non LEO city employee).
The court denied all motions to suppress
A trial date will be set (probably in the spring from what the judge said)
The city argued, and the judge agreed, that even though the first officer to arrive observed no unlawful activity, only the defendant with a holstered gun and a sign in his hand, he was justified to draw his weapon, point it at the defendant, and then have backup officers disarm and cuff him.......FOR OFFICER SAFETY.
I will leave it at that for reasons of discretion.
OCDO was well represented considering the time/day and relatively small number of us from the area. Also present was a representative from the press (the U.S. Observer out of Grants Pass).
I attended the hearing from 9:30am until approximately 11am after which further matters ended up taking until about 11:30am to resolve.
Basically:
The city's witnesses were allowed to testify
The defense was denied the ability to call their only witness (The reporting party who is a former city police officer and current non LEO city employee).
The court denied all motions to suppress
A trial date will be set (probably in the spring from what the judge said)
The city argued, and the judge agreed, that even though the first officer to arrive observed no unlawful activity, only the defendant with a holstered gun and a sign in his hand, he was justified to draw his weapon, point it at the defendant, and then have backup officers disarm and cuff him.......FOR OFFICER SAFETY.
I will leave it at that for reasons of discretion.
OCDO was well represented considering the time/day and relatively small number of us from the area. Also present was a representative from the press (the U.S. Observer out of Grants Pass).
What the cop observed when he arrived isn't really enough to settle this point. If the cop had RAS before he arrived, say by way of a phone tip that met the minimum standards for indicia of reliability of the tipster, then the court would be following the law on Terry Stops.
See Terry vs Ohio and Florida vs JL.
The thing to do will be to get your hands on the radio traffic recording and see if the cop had RAS before he arrived, or just a bare bones MWAG doing nothing illegal.
Saint John in New Mexico got $25,000 for the unlawful siezure by law enforcement in Alamogordo and they didn't even arrest him.
The young man in Virgina took the city to task several times for cha ching (and did it Pro Per)
In both cases, the city and LEO were "educated"....because cities don't like paying out settlements. Unfortunately, that's the only way to "educate" our "protectors". You'd think showing "law enforcement" the LAW would be sufficient but alas.
Things like this is why I laugh at the people who laud cops as heroes. These are not brave individuals we are talking about. They have a system for returning you your property through a thick bullet proof window and a concrete wall without ever even having to make contact with you and yet they're still too afraid to give me back my ammo. It's hilarious and sad all at once.