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Title: Michael Brelo Shoots Through Windshield at Unarmed Couple 15 Times: Found Not Guilty
Source:
Reason
URL Source: http://reason.com/
Published: May 23, 2015
Author: Brian Doherty
Post Date: 2015-05-23 18:48:37 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 22262
Comments: 92
Some people in Cleveland back in November 2012 thought they heard a gun firing. It was a car backfiring. So they chased the car from which they imagined the gunshot came at high speeds, often reaching 100 mph, for 20 miles, themselves shooting at or into that car 137 times. One of the shooters, named Michael Brelo, leapt on the hood of the car after it was halted and shot 15 times. The people inside the car, Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams, were, predictably, murdered in this barrage of 137 gunshots all told. They were unarmed. Do you think Brelo committed a crime? Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge John P. O'Donnell didn't think so. This morning a trial for Brelo (the only one of the group of 13 people responsible charged with any crime, in this case "voluntary manslaughter") ended with a verdict from the judge of not guilty. Why? How? Oh wait—did I forget to mention Brelo was a police officer? Never mind! But the reasoning was, according to the Columbus Dispatch report: There wasn't any way to be sure beyond a reasonable doubt that it was the specific bullets that Brelo fired that ended Russell and Williams's life, after a nearly hour-long summation of his conclusion, an involved explanation of the decision that involved mannequins marked with the gunshot wounds that the two motorists suffered. As NPR summed up: it was impossible to determine beyond a reasonable doubt that either suspect would have survived if not for Brelo's shots. He also determined that Brelo's use of force was constitutionally reasonable given that he and other officers perceived that Russell and Williams posed a threat. "It is Brelo's perception of a threat that matters," O'Donnell said. Have a great weekend, Cleveland. Ed Krayewski blogged about this case in January, last November (about the $3 million civil wrongful death suit payout from the city over the murder, er, "incident"), and June. Brian Doherty is a senior editor at Reason magazine and author of Ron Paul’s Revolution: The Man and the Movement He Inspired (Broadside Books).
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 24.
#3. To: Deckard (#0)
(Edited)
Wow! Judge John P. O’Donnell!! So, Judge O'Donnell was decider of Brelo verdict. The prosecution and the defense could not have asked for a better judge. O'Donnell has reputation as a careful jurist. He doesn’t cut corners from the bench, his deliberativeness means taking all steps necessary to arrive at a legal answer. O'Donnell tries so hard to represent both sides, looking for a middle ground,” Like a true judge, O;Donnnell analyzes and assesses almost every move and every statement.
Brelo's attorney Pat D'Angelo filed the voluminous motion late Monday asking that O'Donnell be disqualified from hearing the case. "The actions of Judge O'Donnell in selecting the trial date of October 22, 2014 was purely for his own personal gain and personal interest in seeking election in his Ohio Supreme Court judicial race, against a sitting Ohio Supreme Court Justice," D'Angelo said, laying out his argument in 17 pages. (See the first 17 pages of the filing in a document viewer below or click here.) "The exposure the trial of this case will provide will personally benefit Judge O'Donnell with free publicity, and free publication of his name and image throughout the State of Ohio, conveniently for 13 days leading to election day." The Ohio Supreme Court, which will decide the case, will first give O'Donnell a chance to respond, a court spokesman said. The motion includes hundreds of pages of pre-trial transcripts, dockets from other O'Donnell cases and sworn statements from two other defense attorneys also representing Brelo. D'Angelo says they prove the judge is treating Brelo differently than other criminal defendants, who were arrested before his client and don't have trial set until after his – despite the fact many of their cases are less complex. He said the judge refused to consider the schedules of the defense attorneys despite doing so in other cases. O'Donnell "has demonstrated by his actions that he has an agenda and it has nothing to do with providing Officer Brelo a fair trial," D'Angelo says in the filing, which is the only time he's asked for a judge to be removed from a case in his 37-year career. Pretrial for Michael Brelo and other Cleveland police officers involved in deadly chase The case stems from the Nov. 29, 2012 cross-city police chase after which 13 Cleveland officers fired 137 bullets toward a car driven by Timothy Russell, killing him and his passenger, Malissa Williams. Police thought the pair was armed but an investigation later determined they likely were not. Actions of 12 of the officers were ruled justified and all but 15 rounds fired by Brelo were ruled justified as well. It is the final 15 rounds on which prosecutors are basing their case. O'Donnell has not responded to calls for comment on the filing. His Nov. 4 opponent, Justice Judi French, a Republican, declined through a spokesman to comment. Monday night, the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's office called D'Angelo's move a tactic to delay the trial. In an emailed statement the office said D'Angelo, "has resorted to the only low road remaining: personal and cheap attacks on the integrity of a fine judge, without evidence or basis in fact." Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty has asked that D'Angelo be removed from representing Brelo. He has argued that D'Angelo has a conflict of interest in representing Brelo and the police union he belongs to, including 23 other Cleveland police officers who are potential witnesses in the case. D'Angelo also notes in the filing that the amount of evidence prosecutors have provided to defense attorneys need to review is the equivalent of 37 2-hour high definition movies, 74,285 high definition photos or more data than the entire Wikipedia encyclopedia. The information took a police union official more than 70 hours to transfer electronically so Brelo's other attorneys could access it, D'Angelo said. McGinty has responded to D'Angelo's arguments about the volume of evidence in the case previously, saying most of the evidence has been public since shortly after the shooting occurred, after Attorney General Mike DeWine released it in February 2013. McGinty also said D'Angelo was present when most officers gave statements. D'Angelo, in the filing, also takes umbrage with the trial being set on Oct. 22, which is also the a national day of protest by the "Oct. 22 Coalition to Stop Police Brutality, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation." Demonstrations are planned in cities across the country as part of the effort, according to the website October22.org. "These matters are not a mere coincidence," D'Angelo said in the filing. McGinty responded in an email specifically to that portion of D'Angelo's filing saying, "If the defense attorney actually believes that a judge would purposely set a trial date to coincide with a totally obscure organization that no one in this courthouse has ever heard of, then the poor guy is obviously suffering from a touch of paranoia." Good judge huh??
Looks like O'donnel should be tried as an accessory to murder. Then executed.
#25. To: A K A Stone (#24)
He does kinda look like he's a few cards shy of a full deck.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest...Judge John P. O’Donnell...
#23. To: Gatlin (#3)
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Free publicity motivated Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge John P. O'Donnell to set an unreasonable Oct. 22 trial date in the voluntary manslaughter case of Cleveland Patrolman Michael Brelo, according to an affidavit filed with the Ohio Supreme Court.
#24. To: CZ82, Gatlin (#23)
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End Trace Mode for Comment # 24.
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