Judge exonerates Lanier in whistleblower case
A D.C. judge exonerated Police Chief Cathy Lanier in a whistleblower case, ruling that a jury erred when it concluded that she unlawfully retaliated against a police officer while she was a district commander, Attorney General Peter Nickels said Wednesday. Officers filed a suit in 2005 claiming that the department punished them after they complained that the department’s off-duty reimbursable overtime policy was illegal. The jury in August identified Lanier as the only official within the department who engaged in the retaliatory conduct. But Superior Court Associate Judge Franklin Burgess ruled that “the Court could not punish Lanier because … there was not any evidence to hold her personally responsible.”
D.C. officer guilty of excessive force
A D.C. police officer pleaded guilty to using excessive force against a District man. Kisha Coley, 35, agreed to resign and faces up to 180 days in jail. Prosecutors said Coley was on an early-morning patrol in March when she struck a man in the back of the head with her baton. The man ran to another officer, who put the man up against his patrol car. Coley ran up and swung her baton, striking the man in the hand and her fellow officer in the knee. Both the officer and the man were taken to a hospital.
Meat salesman arrested
An 18-year-old door-to-door meat salesman was charged with burglary.
Fairfax County police said Devyn Shea, of Fredericksburg, knocked on a woman’s door Tuesday afternoon offering meats for sale. The woman turned him away, went to another part of her home, then heard her front door slam. She looked outside and saw the man walking to his van with her purse.
-Scott McCabe
