Many circuit courts have said that law enforcement can hold your property for as long as they want. D.C.’s high court decided last week that’s unconstitutional.
The Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures extends to the length of a seizure, a federal court ruled last week, significantly restricting how long law enforcement can retain private property after an arrest.
“When the government seizes property incident to a lawful arrest, the Fourth Amendment requires that any continued possession of the property must be reasonable,” wrote Judge Gregory Katsas of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in a unanimous ruling.
Most courts of appeal to pass judgment on the issue—namely, the 1st, 2nd, 6th, 7th, and 11th circuits—have held that, once an item is seized, law enforcement can retain the item indefinitely without violating the Fourth Amendment. These precedents have allowed police to retain personal property without clear legal grounds, effectively stripping people of their property rights merely because they were arrested. The D.C. Court of Appeals’ ruling complicates this general consensus.
Though law enforcement does not have to return property “instantaneously,” Katsas wrote, the Fourth Amendment requires that any “continuing retention of seized property” be reasonable. So while police can use seized items for “legitimate law-enforcement purposes,” such as for evidence at trial, and are permitted some delay for “matching a person with his effects,” prolonged seizures serving no important function can implicate the Fourth Amendment, the court ruled.
Given that the D.C. court finds itself in the minority on the question, some say that the case may be primed for the Supreme Court if the District chooses to appeal. “This case has potential to make national precedent,” Paul Belonick, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco law school, tells Reason. “The influential D.C. Circuit deliberately intensified a circuit split and put itself in the minority of circuits on the question, teeing it up cleanly for certiorari.”
The plaintiffs each had their property seized by D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD). Five of the plaintiffs were arrested during a Black Lives Matter protest in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of D.C. on August 13, 2020.
As they were arrested, MPD officers seized their phones and other items. Though the protesters did not face any charges and were, in Katsas’ words, “quickly released,” MPD retained their phones for around a year. Some of the plaintiffs had to wait over 14 months to get their property back.
In the meantime, the plaintiffs say that they were forced to replace their phones and lost access to the important information on the originals, including personal files, contacts, and passwords. “The plaintiffs have alleged that the seizures at issue, though lawful at their inception, later came to unreasonably interfere with their protected possessory interests in their own property,” Katsas explained.
“MPD is aware of the ruling and will continue to work with our partners at the United States Attorney’s Office to ensure that our members are trained appropriately to ensure compliance with recent rulings,” a spokesperson for MPD tells Reason.
“Practically, this case is important because police have been exploiting a gap in the Fourth Amendment,” Andrew Ferguson, a professor at American University’s Washington College of Law, tells Reason. “In situations where there is a lawful arrest, but no prosecution, there are no clear rules on retaining personal property. In these cases, police have been confiscating phones to punish protestors.”
Michael Perloff, the lead attorney for the plaintiffs, agreed that the D.C. Circuit’s decision could set an important precedent going forward.
“Nationally, we’ve seen litigants attempt to challenge similar practices only to fail because the court concluded that the Fourth Amendment does not limit the duration of a seizure,” he tells Reason.
“Moving forward, we are hopeful that the D.C. Circuit’s opinion will lead courts to reconsider those rulings and, instead, enforce the Fourth Amendment as fully as the framers intended.”
Will the Democratic National Convention in Chicago next week face a well-managed series of polite, if messy protests? Or will the city become a war zone?
Things are quickly heating up in Chicago. Nervous Democrats are wondering if the city might come under siege by swarms of pro-Palestinian protesters and/or if they will face riots by extremists – with the explicit goal of defeating Kamala Harris. Public estimates are that between 30,000 to 50,000 protesters are expected to enter the city.
A vast coalition comprising of more than 200 Palestinian, Marxist, anti-imperialist and progressive organizations have signed on to join the “March on the DNC 2024” which is planning marches and rallies between August 19 and 21.
Meanwhile, Chicago authorities have opened a defunct courthouse to streamline arrests and have cleared 30 additional courtrooms if there are mass arrests, according to NewsNation.
The city has postponed all criminal jury trials scheduled for next week and “criminal judges from other divisions of Cook County have been asked to clear their calendars in case they need to be called into action to help process those arrested,” according to the news channel.
The convention grounds now are officially considered a “national special security event.” This means the Secret Service will oversee security inside the convention grounds.
The security size of the massive police perimeter around the DNC “is based off a bomb assessment and blast radius,” according to Chicago police Deputy Chief of Counter-Terrorism Duane DeVries.
The Chicago Tribune reports today that the city has inflamed the protesters who “are crying foul after Mayor Brandon Johnson’s administration issued last-minute denials of requests to set up stages and sound systems for rallies in parks near the United Center.” The United Center is the main hall for the Democratic delegates.
Further upsetting the radicals was Tuesday’s federal court decision by U.S. District Judge Andrea Wood, an Obama appointee. She denied any additional new permits for the protesters to get them to the convention hall. She upheld the city’s limitations on the demonstrators.
Hatem Abudayyeh, a Palestinian radical and the spokesman for the “March on the DNC,” was evasive on Tuesday about whether they would forcefully expand their presence near the convention.
He told the Chicago Sun-Times after the judge’s verdict, that he “could not say whether the protest groups would abide by Wood’s decision.”
The crowds are believed to be at a minimum, unruly and at worst, riotous. The single largest part of the coalition, of course, are scores of radical Palestinian solidarity committees, which uniformly call for the end to Israel.
The march’s organizational leadership is a Who’s Who of well-known militant groups throughout the United States including Code Pink, Democratic Socialists of America and ANSWER.
But there also is a fringe feeling to the coalition, which includes such seemingly antiquated ‘60’s groups as the All Afrikan-People’s Revolutionary Party, the Malcom X Center for Self-Determinations, Denver Communists, and the Proletariat Representation USA. There are plenty of fringe groups listed by the coalition.
Meanwhile, Democrats are trying to stop demonstrations actually inside the United Center where the delegates are scheduled to meet. According to the New York Times, “as of now, the delegates are still planning to make their presence at the proceedings known, threatening the overwhelming display of unity that Democrats hope to project heading into the fall campaign.”
Social media posts show that the “March on the DNC” will bring together pro-Palestinian Islamicists with self-proclaimed Marxist-Leninists, anti-imperialists, anarchists as well as some progressive groups. All are determined to viciously denounce Harris and the Democratic Party.
Ryan Mauro, a decades-long expert of extremist groups who is with the non-profit research group, the Capital Research Center, says the really interesting development in today’s radical world is about how “the era of the selfie” can excite and motivate activists to do crazy things.
“Don’t underestimate the power of the selfie,” he told me in an interview.
“It’s apparent when you see their social media accounts, the majority of these participants are young,” he continued. “They want to look to their peers of influence, that they’re willing to sacrifice for a cause, and in their mind, show how righteous they are by acting as aggressively as possible and creating as much of a public display of martyrdom as possible – without getting killed of course – because then you can’t later enjoy Instagram ‘likes.’
“They want to enjoy the aftermath, and the pictures and the praise and being the ‘cool one’ in their social circle,” he notes.
Mauro adds another observation: that the alliance between Islamicists and radical Marxists is a new and a potentially dangerous development and next week this alliance will be seen on full display throughout Chicago.
“I can’t think of another time in recent years when the Islamicists network and basically the entirety of the Marxist-Leninist and anarchist networks have come forth and shown themselves. So, we have an actual identifiable multi-layered network.”
I clearly remember the “street energy” of radical protests when I was one myself in the 1970’s. I was the roommate with Chicago 8 defendant Rennie Davis who was a New Left leader during the 1968 riots in Chicago.
Later I was a member with Rennie on the May Day Collective that organized mass civil disobedience in Washington, D.C. in 1971. Thousands were arrested. I’ve become more conservative over time but vividly recall the energy and excitement of that era.
So my impression is that street war does seem to be in the offing in Chicago.
Based on both the character of the coalition and on their rhetoric, this is one very mean group of people.
“For at least six months radical leftwing and pro-Palestinian activists have routinely called President Biden, “Genocide Joe” over his Israeli policies.
Now they are calling Kamala Harris, the apparent Democratic Presidential candidate, “Killer Kamala.”
And that’s the polite part.
One particularly menacing radical group coming to Chicago is called “Behind the Lines.” It openly expresses a willingness to use violence in the name of “resistance.”
They write on their website, “We envision a resistance that is willing to break through the police barricades, both metaphorically and physically.”
Their war cry to the masses is: “Escalate for Gaza! Shut down the DNC!”
Behind the Lines also challenges the idea that protests should be peaceful and safe.
“All of this begs the question: Who says protesting should be safe,” they ask on their website.
“Let’s be fucking serious here: why do people in the US have the right to prioritize their own safety? How is any protest going to be successful if it doesn’t challenge and disrupt business as usual to disturb the normal functioning of a society that is aiding and abetting a genocide? And why should any of that be safe,” they ask.
This brings me to Saul Alinsky, a New Left radical who was our political guru in the 1970’s. He advised activists in his 1971 book titled “Rules for Radicals.” I have a four-part series on Alinsky on Substack.
“Rules” is still the handbook for today’s pro-Palestinian radicals who, as the Wall Street Journal reported, are being advised by many aging New Left radicals.
Disturbingly, Alinsky makes it clear that tactics can be very fluid, depending on your circumstances. He particularly notes that morality and ethics are elastic when it comes to making revolutionary history.
“You do what you can with what you have and clothe it with moral garments,” he advises radical leaders.
Alinsky is quite clear that flexibility is important during “the struggle.” He writes, “If weapons are needed, then are appropriate weapons available? Availability of means determines whether you will be underground or above ground; whether you will move quickly or slowly; whether you will move for extensive changes or limited adjustments; whether you will move by passive resistance or active resistance; or whether you will move at all”
The March on DNC’s rhetoric isn’t much different than Behind the Lines. Its main web site is filled with unremitting anger towards the Democratic Party. ‘We recognize the Democratic Party as a tool of billionaires and corporations,” the coalition statement begins.
They continue: “Their actions, such as financing genocide in Palestine and war in multiple countries; continuing the mass incarceration of Black and brown people; deporting millions of immigrants; and neglecting campaign promises made to the oppressed communities who represent their voting base, show that the Democratic Party only serves the agenda of the rich and powerful.”
The coalition’s opposition to Harris is clear. Abudayyeh, the coalition’s spokesman, said the switch to Harris “doesn’t change the policies of Democratic Party leadership, specifically their support of the genocide in Palestine, so our movement must continue to apply pressure.”
He added, “When it comes to the genocide in Gaza there is no difference between Biden, Harris, or any of the likely candidates for the nomination. They are all complicit. This is why the coalition will still be marching on the DNC in the tens of thousands.”
The Democratic establishment now is in a quandary. They know they can’t fulfill the radical’s agenda. But dissing them also could cost them the election.
Mauro notes that these anti-imperialist, Marxist and pro-Palestinian activists were never part of the Democratic party. “The reality is, they were never part of the Biden-Harris base to begin with. And they cannot be won over. Their demands are too high.”
The protesters, he says, “want to give an impression that this is a segment of the Democratic voting base that was lost because of Biden and Harris being too moderate and especially for being too supportive of Israel.” From a sterile political calculation, he says these are voters they never had and will never have.
Nevertheless, the image of violence in the streets and disruption among the delegates could both spoil the sense of political unity of the party and could permanently end Harris’ political momentum.
So today, the Democrats can’t count out a person like Jae Yates, 31, an organizer with the Twin Cities Coalition for Justice. His coalition is a progressive Minnesota group that operates in the state governed Vice President-designate Tim Walz.
Ordinarily, Yates should be a pretty ardent supporter of the ticket. But instead, he plans to bring two busloads of protesters to the Chicago anti-Democratic Party march.
“People feel more betrayed by the Democratic Party because Republicans have sort of always been naked in their support for war and repression abroad,” Yates said to the Chicago Sun-Times. “But the Democratic Party has been promising people for years to do so many things that they’ve never delivered on … I think people are exhausted and sick of the runaround from the Democrats.”
Will it 2024 become 1968? The Olympics are over. So, America probably will be watching.
Grandmother strapped to wheelchair was forced to watch grave being dug before ex killed her: cops
By
Olivia LandA Missouri man with an alleged history of domestic abuse is accused of strapping his ex into a wheelchair and forcing her to watch him and his new girlfriend dig her grave before killing her, investigators said.
Tony Charboneau, 36, was charged with the murder of his former girlfriend, Amy Hogue, 43, and other crimes related to her death after she vanished on June 20, Washington County Prosecuting Attorney John Jones announced last week.
Charboneau supposedly got into an argument with Hogue, which led to him punching and stomping on her as she was leaving his home on the day she went missing, according to the probable cause arrest affidavit.
Amy Hogue, 43, was murdered on June 20, 2024.GoFundMeTony Charboneau (left) had been accused of abusing Amy Hogue (right) at least twice in the past before allegedly killing her.Facebook / Tony Charboneau
Charboneau and his current girlfriend, Brandi Luffy, then allegedly forced Hogue into a manual wheelchair and tied her arms and feet using ratchet straps, police said.
Luffy, 40, and Charboneau left Hogue strapped in the wheelchair while they gathered “shovels, tarps, pickax [sic], and a firearm,” cops said.
With the items and Hogue in the back of Charboneau’s car, the couple then allegedly drove from Charboneau’s home in Sullivan to a wooded area.
Once the pair found an isolated spot, Hogue was forced to watch while Charboneau dug a shallow grave, authorities said.
Charboneau then allegedly took Hogue out of the wheelchair and shot and killed her.
He “spent the rest of the day burying [sic] her in the grave, covering her with large rocks and tree limbs,” the affidavit said.
Luffy supposedly stayed with the car and served as a lookout for any passersby.
After leaving Hogue’s body in the makeshift grave, Charboneau and Luffy then burned the ratchet straps and tarp.
Charboneau, 36, was arrested after police found Hogue’s purse.
They also disposed of the victim’s purse in a river in nearby Jefferson County, police said.
Hogue — who had three children unrelated to Charboneau — was reported missing by her family around the time of the attack.
She appeared to have been trying to leave Charnoneau’s residence when she was attacked, Washington County Sheriff Zach Jacobsen told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
“She was just ready to leave the residence, and that’s when the brutal assault took place,” he explained.
Hogue’s purse was found by authorities in mid-July, which was when “we realized she was probably dead,” Jacobsen added.
Charboneau was immediately a suspect due to his history of allegedly abusing Hogue — including a May 2023 incident when he supposedly hit her so hard from behind that she passed out, Jacobsen said.
Another case from October 2023 was also pending at the time of Hogue’s disappearance, Law & Crime reported.
Brandi Luffy admitted to police that she and Charboneau killed Hogue and buried her body.
After police found Hogue’s purse, they requested an arrest warrant based on the May 2023 incident and took Charboneau into custody on suspicion of murder.
Despite having their prime suspect in custody, the investigation initially struggled to gain ground due to the limitations of the rural area, Jacobsen told the Post-Dispatch.
“We are trying to piece this together with no cell service, so it’s hard to ping phones,” Jacobsen said.
“So it’s old school police work, knocking on doors, interviewing everybody that we encounter, executing search warrants. They are literally boots on the ground. No technology in God’s country. And with no cell service, you’re not leaving a digital footprint.”
On Aug. 2, Luffy admitted to helping Charboneau kill Hogue and dispose of her remains, according to the probable cause affidavit.
Amy Hogue vanished just a few days after the birth of her first grandson.Facebook / Corbin Crider
Investigators dug up Hogue’s remains, which were “partially decomposed with an obvious bullet wound” to the head, the document added.
In addition to first-degree murder, Charboneau was charged with domestic assault, kidnapping, abandonment of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence, and conspiracy to commit kidnapping, prosecutors said.
Luffy was charged with second-degree murder, first-degree kidnapping, abandonment of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence, and conspiracy to commit kidnapping.
Both remain behind bars on $1 million cash-only bond.
“That makes it even worse, the fact that she finally got enough and she was ready to leave and get away from this situation, and she was killed for it.”
The isolated area made it even harder for Hogue and other domestic violence victims to seek help, he added.
“There’s hardly any cell service here. So if you do need help, it’s pretty hard to get help. There’s a lot of things that could have changed in this situation,” he said.
Washington County Prosecuting Attorney John I. Jones IV said in a statement that his office would “not rest” until the suspects were brought to justice.
Hogue was remembered by her family as a loving mother and brand-new grandmother.
Hogue vanished just four days after her first grandson was born, her daughter-in-law wrote on the family’s GoFundMe page.
Because her son and his family live in Louisiana, Hogue never got to meet the baby before she was killed, the grieving relative added.
“She was a mother and my best friend. She did not deserve this,” Hogue’s son, Corbin Crider, wrote in a Facebook tribute.
“There are truly monsters in this world we live in,” he added.
The Illinois sheriff’s deputy who gunned down Sonya Massey in her home last month is now listed as suspended on a statewide registry of officers who have been fired, forced to resign or had their law enforcement licenses revoked due to misconduct.
The suspension of former Sangamon County Sheriff’s Deputy Sean Grayson’s law enforcement certificate came only after he was fired and charged with murder.
On July 6, Grayson responded to a report of a prowler at Massey’s home. Bodycam footage from another deputy showed Massey saying she rebuked Grayson, and the former deputy threatening the 36-year-old woman. The encounter ended with Grayson shooting Massey in the head and failing to render aid.
After being discharged from the Army for serious misconduct and a history of driving under the influence, Grayson was employed since 2020 by six Illinois law enforcement agencies – at three of them, as a part-time officer, employment records show.
Grayson is part of what law enforcement officials and experts call America’s legion of “wandering officers” who drift from police department to police department – sometimes even after having been fired, forced to resign or convicted of a crime.
“The shooting again underscores the critical need for police agencies to thoroughly vet potential hires,” the International Association of Chiefs of Police said in a statement Tuesday. “The pattern and nature of frequent job changes by a police officer should raise flags about their suitability for the policing profession.”
The professional association of prominent police leaders called Massey’s death “a devastating and avoidable tragedy.”
The absence of an exhaustive, national database for tracking and weeding out rogue cops – along with a lack of coordination among the more than 18,000 law enforcement agencies in the country – has allowed officers like Grayson to get hired without their checkered histories sounding an alarm, according to policing officials and experts.
“There’s no question that … officers getting rehired after they’ve been let go under whatever circumstances is a huge problem and appears to be responsible for a grossly disproportionate number of tragic incidents,” said Christy Lopez, a former deputy chief in the special litigation section of the civil rights division at the Justice Department during the Obama administration.
In addition, Lopez said, part-time law enforcement positions – like those Grayson held – tend not to attract the best candidates or get the most training.
“It’s never a good sign when a police department is hiring officers on a part-time basis,” said Lopez, a Georgetown University law professor.
A police misconduct registry funded by US Justice Department, and known as the National Decertification Index (NDI), already lists nearly 55,000 officers who had their law enforcement certificate or license revoked because of misconduct. But its coverage is spotty, according to policing officials and experts: Not every US police agency submits data to the registry or checks it before making hiring decisions. The names in the database are not public. And Grayson had never been decertified.
“That certification index on its own is not enough,” Lopez said. “It wouldn’t have caught Sean Grayson. It’s not going to catch a lot of your problem officers.”
Military discharge should have been ‘red flag’
Grayson, 30, was indicted by a grand jury on three counts of first-degree murder and one count each of aggravated battery with a firearm and official misconduct. He has pleaded not guilty and was denied pretrial release, according to court records.
Grayson’s attorney Daniel Fultz declined comment on Saturday.
Sangamon County Sheriff Jack Campbell fired Grayson after the shooting, saying in a statement: “Sonya Massey lost her life due to an unjustifiable and reckless decision by former Deputy Sean Grayson.”
“Grayson had other options available that he should have used. His actions were inexcusable and do not reflect the values or training of our office.”
Campbell, in a separate statement, said no law enforcement agencies reported problems with Grayson before he was hired in Sangamon County, though previous employers had commented he “needed more training.” Grayson received 16 weeks of academy training after being hired, according to Campbell.
“This is not unusual for deputies with Grayson’s experience, and is standard procedure for Sangamon County deputies,” Campbell’s statement said. Grayson’s personnel file included “references from people I know well,” said the sheriff, adding those “insights are invaluable in making informed hiring decisions.”
Grayson was discharged from the US Army in 2016 due to “misconduct (serious offense),” according to a Department of Defense document included in Grayson’s personnel file during his time at the Kincaid Police Department in Illinois. The personnel file was obtained by CNN affiliate KSHB.
Sean Grayson, a deputy with the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office, faces multiple charges in the shooting death of Sonya Massey. – Sangamon County Jail/WISC
“A red flag would be his military” discharge, said Brian Grisham, deputy director of the nonprofit International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement Standards and Training and chair of the National Decertification Index. “That’s a potential disqualifier in most states.”
The DOD document said Grayson was separated from the Army under a general discharge after he served as a private first class at Fort Riley in Kansas. The alleged misconduct was not disclosed.
Army spokesperson Bryce Dubee, in response to a CNN request for more detail, wrote: “Sean P. Grayson was a 91B (Wheeled Vehicle Mechanic) in the Regular Army from May 2014 to February 2016. He had no deployments and left the Army in the rank of private first class.”
Grayson was charged with two DUI misdemeanor offenses in Illinois’ Macoupin County – one in 2015 and the other in 2016, court records show. The website of the Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board, which sets professional standards for law enforcement and correctional officers, does not list driving under the influence as a “decertifiable misdemeanor.”
The first incident occurred in August 2015. Grayson’s vehicle was impounded after he was charged with driving under the influence. He pleaded guilty and paid more than $1,320 in fines, according to court records.
In July 2016, Grayson was charged with another DUI. Again, he pleaded guilty and paid more than $2,400 in fines, court records show.
Grayson acknowledged the DUI charges when he applied to be an officer at Auburn Police Department in Illinois in 2021. He worked there from July 2021 to May 2022. CNN’s review of Grayson’s records there did not reveal any major problems or disciplinary issues.
In May 2022, Grayson started working at the Logan County Sheriff’s Office in Illinois, records show. He wrote the sheriff a brief letter detailing his “terrible decision to drink and drive.”
Grayson’s letter also said he lost his driving privileges for one year after pleading guilty to his second DUI, in 2016.
A background check was performed prior to Grayson’s hiring in Sangamon County, Campbell said. Prior DUI convictions “are not disqualifying criteria for a deputy,” Campbell said.
‘We can’t have you in our uniform’
Grayson worked at six Illinois law enforcement agencies over a four-year period.
He started working part time with Pawnee police in August 2020, followed by the Kincaid and Virden police departments. Then he started working full time with Auburn police, the Logan County Sheriff’s Office, and finally the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office in May 2023.
His employment records from the Auburn Police Department indicated why Grayson said he left previous positions: In some cases, he wanted to work full time but could only get part-time hours. In another, he said he didn’t want to move.
Grayson was on the Kincaid police force for only three months before he was let go “because he refused to live within a 10-mile radius,” KSHB reported.
“The decertification index originally was created to keep problem officers from moving from state to state but the reality is they move from agency to agency,” Grisham said.
“I do think there have been rogue officers that have gone all over the place and inadequate background checks let them continue on with potential bad acts in other jurisdictions.”
Grayson did not appear to have disciplinary issues as an Auburn officer but records from the Logan County Sheriff’s Office recommended he take “high stress decision making classes.” The records said Grayson failed to slow down after his boss called off a vehicle pursuit. Grayson was driving about 110 mph before striking a deer, according to the records.
A Logan County chief deputy wrote that Grayson “failed to show due caution while driving through stop intersections.” Grayson’s supervisor “terminated the pursuit” and the deputy turned off his emergency lights, the report stated. But Grayson “continued at a high rate of speed (110/55 mph zone) prior to striking the deer.”
Audio recordings that appear to coincide with Logan County’s internal review of the incident captured the chief deputy admonishing Grayson for describing it inaccurately in his report despite previous orders to check for accuracy.
“If we can’t trust what you say and what you see, we can’t have you in our uniform,” the chief deputy told Grayson.
“I’m getting goosebumps. This is extremely concerning,” the chief deputy said later. “Everybody likes you. I gotta be able to trust you. Was this a purposefully done lie?”
“No,” Grayson responded.
“Deputy Grayson acknowledged he lacks experience,” the report said. A series of recommendations included “additional traffic stop training, report writing training, high stress decision making classes, and needs to read, understand and discuss issued Logan County Sheriff’s Office Policy.”
It was not immediately clear if Grayson followed through with the recommendations. In April 2023, he resigned from the Logan County Sheriff’s Office. The next month, he joined the sheriff’s office in Sangamon County, where his encounter with Massey more than a year later resulted in murder charges.
A psychological examination before his was hired by Sangamon County said Grayson was “a suitable fit for the position” but also noted a low score on a cognitive assessment. “He knows he can move too fast at times. He needs to slow down to make good decisions,” read the report of the March 2023 examination.
On Friday, a spokesperson for the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office said the agency did not receive a complete disciplinary report from Logan County about Grayson, including his reprimand for an inaccurate report of the traffic incident.
Campbell did not respond to CNN’s request for comment, but he told CNN affiliate WICS that “we need to take a look at” more thorough background checks of job candidates.
“We did not receive all the information from some of his previous employers that came out afterward,” the sheriff said.
The Logan County Sheriff’s Office has not responded to a request for comment.
The union representing Illinois law enforcement officers said it will not challenge Grayson’s termination. After an evaluation of the deputy’s grievance, “the union has determined that it will not be proceeding any further,” the Illinois Fraternal Order of Police Labor Council said in a statement, which expressed sympathy “for the family and loved ones of Sonya Massey.”
“If you look at it, an individual can push the envelope over and over and never get to the point of being disciplined on their license, but they’ve left a cloud everywhere they’ve been,” Grisham said.
‘There are agencies cutting corners’
Massey’s death has led to renewed calls for passage of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, the failed legislation targeting racial bias and use of force – including the creation of a more robust nationwide police misconduct registry.
George Floyd, the act’s namesake, was another Black person killed by police. The 46-year-old died in police custody on May 25, 2020, after Derek Chauvin, a White police officer, was filmed kneeling on Floyd’s neck and back for nearly nine minutes as Floyd pleaded for help and said he couldn’t breathe.
Chauvin was convicted of murder and manslaughter in a state trial in 2021 and sentenced to more than 22 years in prison. He later pleaded guilty in federal court of depriving Floyd of his civil rights.
Chauvin had 18 prior complaints filed against him with the Minneapolis Police Department’s Internal Affairs before his fatal encounter with Floyd, according to the police department. Another officer on the scene also had a history of complaints.
Floyd’s killing sparked a wave of protests around the world, along with a spate of legislative measures intended to address police brutality and racial bias. But the Floyd bill has languished for years amid partisan differences that are especially heightened today. At the same time, many police agencies have struggled in recent years to hire and retain quality officers given the low pay, dangerous work and a perceived lack of respect from the public.
“There are agencies cutting corners and they always have,” Grisham said. “But with the recruitment and retention issues we have today, where agencies nationwide, on average, used to receive hundreds of applications for vacancies and they get dozens now … they’re having to dig deeper into the hiring availability. So there could be a slight uptick in misconduct.”
Lopez, who led the team that investigated the Ferguson Police Department in Missouri after the 2014 killing of unarmed teenager Michael Brown, said having “potentially thousands and thousands of bad apple officers” on the streets “can wreak havoc” in communities.
“We saw in this case, for example, there were two officers on the scene. Only one of them shot Sonya Massey,” she said. “You will see that in many of these incidents. Everything’s fine. Most officers are handling it fine, but it just takes one officer to send it spiraling off into the wrong direction.”
Lopez recalled that, while investigating police in Ferguson, local officials spoke about “the muni-shuffle” where officers often sauntered “back and forth” between jobs in the 91 municipalities and 50 or so police departments in St. Louis County.
“An officer at Ferguson complained to me about accidentally hiring a really terrible officer from another agency because he wasn’t aware about the officer’s misconduct history,” she said.
“Agencies sometimes – especially when they’re under pressure to hire, hire, hire – will hire officers from other agencies and they don’t have to go through all the same training that a brand new officer would have to go through. So it’s sometimes seen as a cost efficient way to hire new officers when, in fact, it is a really dangerous way to hire new officers.”
Smaller cash-strapped agencies often end up hiring an experienced officer who may have a checkered past instead of paying to train and hire a new officer, according to Lopez and other experts.
Police brass are ‘now on notice’
In 2015, a report by President Barack Obama’s task force on 21st century policing called on the Justice Department to partner with the International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement Standards and Training to expand its decertification database to help remove the worst cops from the streets. National and standardized reporting, the report said, would ensure that “officers who have lost their certification for misconduct are not easily hired in other jurisdictions.”
“There’s no requirement that anybody, any local jurisdiction that has a Sean Grayson situation … send information to that central clearing house,” Laurie Robinson, a professor at George Mason University and co-chair of Obama’s task force, told CNN. “It’s something that has been going on as long as I’ve been around policing, which is 25 years.”
Decertification and other employment records are kept by the Peace Officers Standards and Training (POST) boards in each state, but not all boards report the information to the national registry. Only California, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Tennessee, New York, New Jersey and Texas require that records be reported to the national index, Grisham said.
“We are not a government agency. We can’t mandate usage of it,” he said, noting the registry is still “averaging over 200 new actions added monthly” and more than 1,000 new user requests per month.
“We’ve got documented cases where officers are pretending like they’ve never been in law enforcement before and applying for jobs and this system has caught them,” Grisham said.
In 2020, a Yale Law Journal study titled “The Wandering Officer” said the scope of the problem in American policing is unclear. That remains true today, according to policing experts.
“Not all those who wander are lost, but in policing, many are,” the researchers concluded.
“These officers, we have shown, are subsequently fired and subjected to ‘moral character’ complaints at elevated rates relative to both officers hired as rookies and veterans with clean professional histories. And we likely underestimate the prevalence of the phenomenon nationwide.”
The researchers found wandering officers “tend to migrate to agencies with fewer resources in communities with slightly higher proportions of residents of color.”
“Police administrators are now on notice. Even when well intentioned — as a second chance for a hard-working cop — hiring a wandering officer is risky business,” the study said. “Beyond their own misbehavior, wandering officers may undermine efforts to improve police culture, as they carry their baggage to new locales.”
CNN’s Holly Yan, Bill Kirkos, Amanda Musa, Andy Rose, Chris Boyette, Brad Parks and Dakin Andone contributed to this report.
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One solution: require officers to carry personal malpractice insurance, similar to doctors. Bad cops won’t be able to afford insurance.
Another is that of starting up a Police ROTC like the Military ROTC programs. Maybe that would bring in some good folks into the ranks?
But the huge problem is the American people and their attitude towards Cops. I mean who in his right mind would want the job? So the standards will keep sliding down and you will see stuff like this more & more in the future.
