Two former Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies have been charged with planting guns at a medical marijuana dispensary when they were on the force in 2011. Julio Cesar Martinez, 39, and Anthony Manuel Paez, 32, were charged with one felony count each of conspiracy to obstruct justice and altering evidence as a peace officer. The charges could result in seven year stints. The two officers allegedly turned off the electricity and a security camera system inside the dispensary as they planted guns later cited as the basis for the arrests.
The officers wrote a report that they spotted a drug deal involving a person with a gun. They said that the followed the suspect, Antonio Rhodes, into the dispensary and found two guns: one near a trash bin and another on a desk next to some ecstasy pills. They arrested two individuals, Rhodes and Johnny Yang, who were charged with possession of an unregistered gun and the second for possession of a controlled substance while armed with a gun. However, a video from inside the dispensary was later found to be “inconsistent” with their accounts — a rather mild way to put it in a gun planting case.
Martinez was a 15-year veteran of the Department and Paez was an 7-year veteran. Prosecutors say that Paez crawled under a desk to shut off a video surveillance system before planting two handguns on top of a desk and withdrawing one from a drawer and placing it on a chair. Martinez allegedly shut off the electricity.
Notably, Yang entered a plea of no contest and was sentenced April 27, 2012, to a year in jail. Consider what would have happened if this video did not exist. Once again, cases of this kind show the value of videotape evidence. We have been following the continuing abuse of citizens who are detained or arrested for filming police in public. (For prior columns, click here and here). Despite consistent rulings upholding the right of citizens to film police in public, these abuses continue. The video contradiction of the police account is all too familiar on this blog. Of course, in Dallas, Dallas Police Chief David Brown revealed a new policy that would require officers involved in a shooting to wait 72 hours before making a statement. The policy came after a scandal where a surveillance video showed one of Brown’s officers shooting a mentally ill suspect for no apparent reason. The video contradicted the officer’s testimony and undermined the charge against the victim. Brown’s solution was not greater disciplining and monitoring of officers but to impose a delay to allow officers to craft their statements. I would have thought that such a proposal would have resulted in the termination of Brown but he continues to run a major police department.
Presumably, Yang will now consider a civil lawsuit as well as Rhodes.
We seem to have a fair number of controversies generated by the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department or the Los Angeles Police Department lately. Notably, when officers were recently found to have disabled cameras on police cars, the Chief of Police decided not to pursue the officers for criminal charges or termination.
Source: LA Times
Paul, Highest murder rate and the most draconian laws for law abiding citizens to legally arm themselves. Illinois was the last state to allow conceal carry. My home state of Wi. was the 49th. Nanny states don’t like their law abiding citizens armed. The police are there to protect you!!!!
Mr. Keebler,
Exactly! Now who are the criminals? Governmental officials. Those charged with the public trust. This is the most egregious form of corruption; violation of the public trust. From this and another recent article herein, we can KNOW that corruption exists.
We can know that criminal corruption is the fire creating the smoke that is Lois Lerner. We can theorize that Ms. Lerner followed the direction of her superiors and that her superiors followed the direction of their superiors. We cannot theorize that they went rogue and did not follow direction.
Ms. Lerner took the 5th which protected her from self INCRIMINATION indicating that Ms. Lerner understands that a crime occurred and that she has potential culpability. The theory that she appropriately followed direction leads ultimately to the highest governmental officeholder in the land. What are we waiting for? Justice or something other than justice?
If this article regarding criminal, corrupt sheriff’s deputies is worth discussion, the potentially criminal activities of the highest officeholders in the land are also.
Darren, I have had Chicago cops tell me they always have a throwaway gun w/ them. I never asked where they got them. I know what questions NOT to ask.
Considering the high murder rate in Chicago lately I am not surprised.
“L.A. Secret Police. Inside the LAPD Elite Spy Network”
amazon.com: Secret-Police-Inside-Elite-Network
Now who are the criminals?
Send in Bernie Kerik
There is an important detail that hasn’t been addressed here. That is, where did the planted firearms come from?
A police corruption practice that happened more often in the 70’s and earlier was the notion of the “throw away gun”. Such a gun was one that was usually taken from an offender and the gun was not checked into evidence but was instead kept by the officer for a future need. The gun was preferrably untraceable, or at least to the local capability of the time. The gun served as as a sort of protection to the officer who kept it hidden until the time of need. The usual situation was where an officer committed a “bad shoot” against somone and the “throw away” was then brought out and put next to the “suspect” so the officer could later falsely prove the offender was armed with a gun and the shooting was justified.
The other use of the Throw Away Gun was to plant it on a suspect to enhance the crime. Firearms in proximity to illegal drugs are sentencing enhancement in most states and are much moreso in the United States Code, which then would convert a case such as this from a state charge to a potential federal charge. I don’t know if this is the case here, but with the feds recent crackdown on medical marijuana dispensaries the introduction of a firearm makes it more tasty to a US Atty.
Which brings me back to the question of where these guns came from. My question would be where these throw aways came from. It is possible either way if the accused deputies had them only to themselves or if these came from a source within their department. If it came from the department there is a potential for a very big corruption that should be investigated.
One would think LA County Sheriff’s Office would have learned from the city’s Rampart Scandal
Darren – I think they said at least one gun came from a drawer, not sure why that would have made a difference. “Prosecutors say that Paez crawled under a desk to shut off a video surveillance system before planting two handguns on top of a desk and withdrawing one from a drawer and placing it on a chair”
‘The House Is Clean … We’re Gonna Spike Him’
http://www.courthousenews.com/2014/04/21/67198.htm
Excerpt:
While Ross was being held outside, she says, she overheard a deputy say that they had been denied a search warrant for the home.
Because the deputies failed to find any drugs in the home, “they planted narcotics which were kept in one of the sheriff’s vehicles. Statements to this effect can be heard over the vehicle dash camera on one of the defendant’s vehicles,” the lawsuit states.
The Incident Report states that two bags of white powder were found and confiscated. However, pursuant to the vehicle dash camera video and transcript, the officers are heard on the recording saying: ‘the house is clean, there is no meth in the house’, ‘we’re gonna spike that and we’re gonna spike him.’ ‘I got the meth in the ——- car,’” the complaint states. (Epithet deleted in complaint.)
Land of the free? Ha!
Makes you wonder how many of our 2,250,000 inmates are actually guilty of a crime worthy of incarceration.
Thank god for cameras.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yin_and_yang
I am so sick of government over site, military police and the Injustice System we have.
Infantile. Planting two guns is not going to turn away the massive national push for decriminalization. As Dredd observes, cop evangelist, which is to say, an idiot.
Knowing cops I think this was a spur of the moment thing. It may have the tacit approval of their poque’s or they may even condone it. If that is what you consider “conspiracy” then I concur. But, if you think there was an unwritten policy to do this, I doubt it.
I am with Al on this one. Smells of a bigger conspiracy. If they have the same jail sentences that LA has, 1 years is actually 18 minutes. Isn’t even enough time to get processed.
I agree with Jane except she is being rough on Alabama. Planting guns to use to charge someone with a crime is a conspiracy under the civil rights statute. All who are involved in the conspiracy are liable for civil damages in a civil rights suit. So, where did they get the guns? Superiors involved? Chief? If the two cops are criminally charged then they might implicate the superiors in order to cop a deal so to speak. Then in the civil suit the plaintiffs can go after the superior officers and the Chief and the town. So, the feds need to pursue a criminal action against these igPays.
Reblogged this on CITIZENS MILITIA OF MISSISSIPPI.
Reblogged this on Reality Check and commented:
Bad COP!
The citizens of California are from Venus. While the police of California are from Alabama.
Police and prosecutors in SoCal, particularly LA, Orange, and San Diego, have never accepted medical cannabis and have been @ war w/ the industry since it began. It is much more righteous in NoCal.
Once again cops are proving they have not adjusted to the ubiquity of cameras. Lying is a tough habit to break.
Evangelist cops furthering their cause … but not the cause of justice.