©2012 Lou Reiter, Co-Director, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) Witnesses: A critical element in administrative investigations When your law enforcement agency conducts an administrative investigation you usually have a complainant and your agency employee.  Frequently, the complainant has a witness or two.  Your employee often has other agency employees, such as a partner or back-up officer, supervisor and the dispatcher. Other witnesses with little or no allegiance to either the complainant or employee are commonly referred to as “disinterested witnesses.”  These witnesses might be the difference between a investigative outcome that is not sustained, or one which you [...]

©2012 Lou Reiter, Co-Director, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) Generally law enforcement agencies have operated their IA/OPS system with little oversight.  That’s coming to an end.  More communities, particularly those in large urban areas, are instituting some form of external review.  In some communities it’s a form of civilian review.  Since 1997, numerous police agencies have come under the scrutiny of the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, by consent decree, memorandum of understanding or technical assistance agreement.  Several others have come under similar oversight by local groups and State Attorney Generals. An integral part of these [...]

An area which raises a great many questions among law enforcement supervisors and administrators is how far may a department go when restricting, through policies, an officer’s use of social media, and under what circumstances can a department discipline an officer without violating the officer’s First Amendment Right of free speech. There is a basic framework for analyzing any public employee’s claim of first amendment protection with respect to freedom of speech. The right of public employees to engage in speech on matters of public concern without fear of retaliation is clearly established. [i]   The determination as to whether speech [...]

©2012 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) On January 30, 2012, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals decided Terrell v. Smith[i], which serves as an excellent review of the law regarding the Fourth Amendment and use of force when officers are shooting at moving vehicles.  Before stating the facts of the case, it is important to note, that when considering a motion for qualified immunity, the court is required to view the facts in the light most favorable to the non-moving party (here, the plaintiff’s version of events).  Therefore, the facts presented here are those stated by Mr. [...]

©2012 Jack Ryan, Attorney, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) In Howes v. Fields, the United States Supreme Court examined a case where a federal trial court and the United States Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit concluded that a convicted prisoner, while in prison and moved from the general population to an interview room, was “in custody” for Miranda purposes.[i] The United States Supreme Court reversed the lower courts holding that there is no per se rule that a person who is in prison is automatically in custody for purposes of requiring Miranda warnings before questioning on a crime unrelated to their [...]

©2012 Brian S. Batterton, Attorney, PATC Legal & Liability Risk Management Institute (www.llrmi.com) On September 30, 2011, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals decided the United States v. Glover [i] which serves as an excellent review of the constitutional law as it applies to the admissibility of evidence found during vehicle inventories.  The facts of Glover are as follows: On December 13, 2009, Chuwan Boros, an officer of the DeFuniak Springs, Florida Police Department was surveilling a Toyota truck in the Wal Mart parking lot because its owner, Caleb Andrew Glover, the defendant, was suspected of being involved in the robbery of a [...]