Bad Apples, April 19, 2015, Freddie Gray

 

When Freddie Gray briefly locked eyes with police at 8:39 a.m. on a corner of an impoverished West Baltimore neighborhood two weeks ago, they seemed to recognize each other immediately. As three officers approached on bicycles along West North Avenue, the 25-year-old Gray was on the east corner of North Mount Street chatting with a friend, according to Shawn Washington, who frequents the block.

"Ay, yo, here comes Time Out," a young man on the opposite corner yelled, using a neighborhood term for police.

Gray swore, taking off on foot as the officers began hot-stepping on their pedals to catch up. One officer jumped off his bike to chase Gray on foot, police said.

…

Michael Robertson, 27, said his friend — who had a record of drug arrests — ran because he "had a history with that police beating him" (Rector “Mystery” 1).

On April 12, 2015, Freddie Carlos Gray Jr. was arrested in the Gilmor Homes housing development in West Baltimore by three officers on bike patrol. Less than an hour later, a medic was called to the Western District police station, where Gray, 25, was unconscious and not breathing. On April 19, Gray died from complications due to a cervical spine injury.

Baltimore resident Kevin Moore captured some of Gray’s arrest on video that was widely shared. The video showed Gray screaming as he was restrained on his belly by a heavyset bike officer, Garrett Miller, and then loaded into a police transport van, his legs dragging. “I hear the screams every night,” Moore later said.  "I can't breath, I can't breathe, I need help, I need attention.'  This is the shit that play in my mind over and over again." …

At a press conference the day after Gray died, the Baltimore Police Department revealed that the transport van that picked him up made several stops, including to pick up another prisoner. Deputy Commissioner Jerry Rodriguez also insisted, “We have no evidence—physical or video or statements—of any use of force.”

 On May 1, street protests turned into celebrations when State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby filed charges against six officers in Gray's death.  The charges--ranging from misconduct in office to manslaughter and second-degree depraved-heart murder--pertained to the officers' failure to put Gray in a seatbelt or call for timely medical assistance.

  In September 2015, Baltimore reached a $6.4 million settlement with Gray’s family. But Mosby’s cases ended up failing in criminal court. After one mistrial and three acquittals on all charges, Mosby dropped charges against the remaining three officers in July 2016 (Barron 1-3). 

[Here are the identities of and information about the six officers charged]

[William G. Porter] was requested twice by Gray for a medic, but did not call for one. He was charged with involuntary manslaughter; second-degree assault; misconduct in office.

Caesar R. Goodson Jr. …, the driver of the van, was charged with second-degree depraved-heart murder; involuntary manslaughter; second-degree assault; manslaughter by vehicle (gross negligence); manslaughter by vehicle (criminal negligence); and misconduct in office.

Garrett E. Miller and Edward M. Nero ...caught Gray after he fled, and, after apprehending him, handcuffed Gray with his arms behind his back. Miller was charged with two counts of second-degree assault; two counts of misconduct in office; and false imprisonment. Nero was charged with two counts of second-degree assault; misconduct in office and false imprisonment.

Brian W. Rice, who initially made eye contact with Gray while on a bicycle patrol, … was charged with involuntary manslaughter; two counts of second-degree assault; manslaughter by vehicle (gross negligence); two counts of misconduct in office; and false imprisonment.

Alicia D. White … was accused of not calling for medical assistance when she encountered Gray, "despite the fact she was advised that he needed a medic". She was charged with involuntary manslaughter; second-degree assault; and misconduct (Death 4-5).

The Appeal obtained evidence from the discovery file in the criminal case against the officers that, along with the police department’s Internal Affairs investigation, sheds light on what occurred during Gray’s arrest. The evidence includes video and audio interviews conducted by investigators with eyewitnesses, officers, and medics, as well as the police department’s full Internal Affairs investigation.

The new files reveal numerous unreported eyewitness accounts of force by officers, particularly at the van’s second stop. Witnesses told investigators that they saw Gray thrown headfirst into the van at that stop. Several witnesses also described him becoming quiet and motionless at this stop, after screaming loudly for several minutes.

According to the autopsy report, Gray’s fatal injury, usually seen in “shallow water diving incidents,” was caused by a “high-energy” impact of his head against a hard surface.

But the medical examiner testified in court that she relied on the accounts of police officers, who were the primary suspects in the case, to make her conclusions about when and how Gray died. She made no mention of any civilian witnesses to force in her autopsy report or trial testimony. She also said the state’s attorney’s office determined which statements she received. The newly obtained evidence supports and broadens the investigation that journalist Amelia McDonell-Parry and I conducted into Gray’s death for the 2017 podcast “Undisclosed: The Killing of Freddie Gray."

STOP ONE: GRAY’S ARREST

Kevin Moore’s video brought international attention to Gray’s arrest on Presbury Street in West Baltimore, which became known as “stop one” of the police van’s six-stop journey. But the new files reveal that throughout April 2015, police and prosecutors took numerous statements from eyewitnesses who reported accounts of excessive force before Moore started filming. With some variations in their accounts, these witnesses described officers forcefully restraining Gray, putting a knee into his upper back, and dragging him aggressively across the concrete.

And Gray’s body showed signs of trauma, including a fresh-looking wound on his shoulder that was never accounted for or investigated by police:

Some witnesses also described Gray being beaten and/or shot with a Taser during his initial arrest. Moore can be heard on his own video screaming, “That was after they tased the fuck out of him.”

Despite Gray’s apparent physical distress during stop one, police, prosecutors, and the medical examiner ruled out the possibility that he had been fatally injured during his arrest. They pointed to his ability to lift his neck, speak, and bear weight on his legs when entering the van in Moore’s video. …

Gray’s specific type of fatal injury, a “jumped facet” of his C4 and C5 cervical spine, was caused by an “abrupt deceleration” of his rotated head against a hard surface, according to the autopsy. Even Officer Miller, who weighed 240 pounds, could not cause that specific injury by putting pressure on Gray’s spine from above, according to Dr. Leigh Hlavaty, professor of pathology at the University of Michigan. “Even if Freddie had his head down and turned to the side, the knee to the back of the neck was not going to be the force to create this jump lock facet type of fracture,” she explained on the “Undisclosed” podcast.

…

STOP TWO: AROUND THE CORNER

According to the police, Lieutenant Brian Rice and the other bike officers decided to send Gray directly to Central Booking rather than question him at the station. After stop one, they met up with the van driver around the corner, at Mount and Baker streets, to complete the arrest process away from the crowd of observers. There, officers shackled Gray’s ankles.

Gray can be heard screaming on the van driver’s dispatch call between stops one and two, and the accounts that witnesses provided to investigators about stop two are consistent. These stories mostly went unreported by the media, leaving a piece of the history of what happened to Gray out of the public narrative.

Moore, who took the cell phone video of stop one, was the first witness to report to police about stop two. He did so mere hours after Gray’s arrest.

… “They pulled him out the paddy wagon, tased him again, and then threw him back in.” He clarified this later: “They lift him up, wet noodle, throw him in the back of the paddy wagon.”

“Feet first or headfirst?” one detective asked.

“Headfirst,” Moore responded.

Moore told detectives that one officer threatened him and other witnesses: “You’d better get the F away from here,” he reported the officer saying. “Jail, jail, jail.”

The detectives pressed Moore for details about the alleged Taser shooting.

“They got the prongs that shoot out,” Moore said, gesturing toward his right knee. “They’re on him. You know?”

“You can physically see the prongs?” the detective asked.

“I can physically see the prongs in his leg,” Moore answered.

Baltimore police officials denied that Gray was ever shot with a Taser. During the April 20 press conference, Deputy Commissioner Rodriguez said that there was no evidence of any use of a Taser, neither “physical nor any of the statements.” But Moore provided his statement about Gray’s alleged tasing on April 12.

…

In total, there were 11 known witnesses to stop two. Nine reported that Gray was thrown into the van, many saying “headfirst.” Most reported Gray screaming loudly and then becoming quiet and/or motionless at this stop. Police asked three witnesses to give longer videotaped interviews on the record. Prosecutors asked just [Brandon] Ross and [Jamel] Baker [two friends of Gray] to testify in court. Their testimony was mostly limited to identifying Gray in videos. Neither was asked about Gray being thrown headfirst into the van.

The prosecution’s case was that Gray was still alive and well leaving stop two, based on the autopsy report. To support this claim, prosecutors actively disputed claims that Gray was injured during the first two stops during the four trials. While ostensibly holding the officers accountable in Gray’s death, the state relied mostly on what law enforcement said that morning.

STOP TWO: ACCORDING TO THE POLICE

Over four trials, the officers present at stop two offered consistent accounts about what happened there: Rice and Miller pulled Gray out of the van, Miller shackled his ankles, and Gray acted like a “dead fish” in order to resist arrest. Rice pulled Gray into the van, and Nero helped by lifting his legs. Then, the officers laid Gray flat on the van’s floor and closed its doors. Each officer testified that Gray then suddenly got up and started banging, yelling, and shaking the van back and forth, despite being shackled at the hands and feet.

But the accounts presented by officers in court changed significantly from what they told investigators during the afternoon of Gray’s arrest. Their original stories were not consistent and did not include what Ross’s video showed: Gray’s motionless body hanging out of the van.

The officers’ first-day statements were especially contradictory and confusing about how they put Gray back into the van—notable, given the clarity of witness claims that he was thrown. “We lifted him up and actually put him back up into the wagon,” Lt. Rice said. Nero said that all of the officers worked together to “push” Gray in the van. Miller believed that Rice pulled him in alone. …

Lt. Rice’s account of Gray’s arrest differed most starkly from the other officers. He said that Gray was “shaking the van violently” throughout stops one and two. Miller mentioned the shaking, but only at the end of stop two.

Rice’s account was important, because the van-shaking story became a pillar of the Freddie Gray case narrative. The shaking, which only Rice had reported, is mentioned in the autopsy report as occurring throughout stops one and two. It became the defense’s story in court for how stop two concluded, repeated by all of the officers present at the scene. It also became central to the media narrative about the case.

But Rice’s van-shaking story was not corroborated by any civilian witnesses.

…

During his first-day interview, Rice also repeatedly said that Gray was “hitting his head” against the van walls after the doors were closed at stop two. “When he got back into the wagon, the wagon began shaking violently, and he was hitting his head, and kicking the door,” he said.

But Rice’s account of Gray’s head striking the van’s walls never made it to trial. It wasn’t supported by the physical evidence: Gray’s head only had one point of major impact, not surface injuries. …

…

Investigators heard this account one more time on April 12 from Donta Allen, who was a passenger in the van with Gray. The bike officers had placed Allen on the other side of a metal partition from Gray at stop five, the last stop before the Western District. Allen told investigators, “It sounded like he was banging his head against the metal, like he was trying to knock himself out or something.”

In media interviews, Allen later changed his statement, saying that he only heard “light banging.” During the July 2016 trial of Officer Goodson, he also testified that he had spoken to Novak ...

During Goodson’s trial, Judge Barry G. Williams scolded prosecutors for failing to turn over to the defense evidence of two private meetings they held with Allen. “I’m not saying you did anything nefariously,” Williams said. “I’m saying you don’t know what exculpatory means.”

The story that Allen heard Gray banging his head in the police van was repeated throughout the media.  But the public never learned that Lt. Rice was a primary source.

Prosecutors largely did not hold the officers accountable for their confused and changed stories about stop two. The state’s case was based on the autopsy, which determined that Gray was fatally injured sometime between stops two and four while the van was in motion. Dr. Allan’s report, however, was not conclusive: “Therefore, the time the injury most likely occurred was after the 2nd but before the 4th stop of the van, and possibly before the 3rd stop,” she wrote (Barron 4-19).

Happenings at the Remaining Stops, According to the Officers

Video indicates at around 8:56 am, while Officer Goodson was transporting Gray in the back of the wagon from Stop 2 to central booking, he made a wide right turn onto Freemont Avenue from Riggs Street, and briefly crossed over the double yellow line in the roadway. He then made an unannounced stop near Freemont Avenue (Stop 3). While there, Goodson got out of the wagon, walked to the rear of the vehicle, and disappeared from camera view for approximately 10 seconds. Goodson then got back in the van and drove away. It is unclear whether Goodson had any interaction with Gray at the back of the wagon at this stop, or what Goodson might have observed or heard. Goodson declined to provide a statement to state investigators about Gray or about that day. There is no other evidence of what occurred at Stop 3.

At approximately 8:59 am, after leaving Stop 3, Officer Goodson radioed to request that a police unit meet him at Druid Hill Avenue and Dolphin Street (Stop 4) for the purpose of checking on Gray. Officer Porter answered Goodson’s call and later provided two statements to investigators. He also testified at trial about his version of events. As Goodson has never given a statement in the criminal case, and could not legally be compelled to do so, Porter’s accounts offer the only evidence of what occurred at Stop 4. According to Porter, when he arrived at Stop 4, he met Goodson at the rear of the wagon, and Goodson opened the doors without discussion. There, Porter observed Gray lying on his stomach on the floor of the wagon with his head toward the front of the wagon, his feet toward the door, and his hands cuffed behind him. Gray asked for “help,” prompting Porter to ask what was wrong with him. According to Porter, Gray did not immediately reply, and then stated, “Help. Help me up.” In one of his statements to investigators, Porter is alleged to have also heard Gray say “I can’t breathe,” although he later denied having heard that.

After Gray asked for help, Officer Porter entered the wagon, pulled Gray up, and placed him on the bench. According to Porter, Gray used his own legs to assist Porter in placing him on the bench. Once there, Gray sat normally and supported his own head. Porter asked Gray if he wanted to go to the hospital, and Gray replied that he did. Gray did not complain of pain or of a specific injury, and Porter did not see any visible injury. Gray spoke in a regular tone of voice and breathed normally. According to Porter, because there were no signs of genuine medical distress, Porter did not believe that Gray was actually injured, despite Gray’s complaints. Porter allegedly believed that Gray was either lethargic from banging against the wagon, or was feigning a medical issue in order to avoid going to jail. However, because of Gray’s complaints, Porter told Goodson, who was standing at the rear of the wagon, that Gray was not going to “pass medical” at central booking. Goodson agreed, and Porter suggested that Goodson take Gray straight to the hospital. However, at that moment, at approximately 9:07 am, Lieutenant Rice radioed a request for available police units and a police wagon to respond to a different location. In response, Porter left the wagon, got back into his car, and responded to Rice’s dispatch. Goodson responded to Lieutenant Rice’s request as well and did not take Gray to the hospital. Again, neither officer seat-belted Gray.

Video surveillance reveals that the wagon arrived at Lieutenant Rice’s location (Stop 5) at approximately 9:11 am. When Goodson arrived, he parked the wagon near Lieutenant Rice and Officers Miller and Nero, who were standing on the sidewalk with a new handcuffed arrestee. It was decided that the new arrestee would be transported in the wagon back to the Western District police station for questioning. The doors to the rear of the wagon were opened, and at some point, another officer who had arrived at Stop 5 observed Gray kneeling in the wagon in a posture that resembled a praying position while facing the bench. In addition, Sergeant Alicia White arrived in order to investigate a complaint that an anonymous caller had made earlier that day about an altercation in the area. According to a statement later made by Sergeant White, she looked into the wagon, and while she could not see Gray’s face, she saw him kneeling on the wagon floor, facing away from her, and leaning over the bench with his head down. White attempted to question Gray, believing that he might know something about the complaint she was investigating. He gave no verbal response, but made an audible noise. White interpreted Gray’s silence as an indication that he did not want to cooperate with the police. Porter also attempted to speak to Gray at Stop 5, and asked Gray again if he wanted to go the hospital. Gray answered, “Yes.” According to Porter, he told Sergeant White that Gray wanted a medic, and in response, Sergeant White told Porter to follow the wagon back to the Western District to drop off the new arrestee, and then escort Gray to the hospital. At 9:16 am, Goodson left for the Western District station with Gray and the new arrestee in tow. The new arrestee later told investigators that the ride to the police station was smooth and lacked rapid accelerations, decelerations, or turns. The arrestee also stated that he heard loud banging from the other side of the wagon, and that he believed, based on the sound alone, that Gray was knocking his head against the wagon’s middle partition.

Upon Gray’s arrival at the Western District station (Stop 6), at approximately 9:18 am, Officer Porter, Sergeant White, and another BPD officer found Gray to be unconscious. Porter noted that Gray’s eyes were shut, his neck was limp, and he appeared not to be breathing. Sergeant White observed that Gray was drooling. Two officers, one of whom was Sergeant White, called for paramedics. Once the paramedics arrived, they observed that Gray was not breathing, had a small amount of blood coming from his nose, and had frothy vomitus discharge around his mouth. Gray also smelled of feces, indicating incontinence.

The paramedics took Gray to the hospital, where he remained comatose for days. During that time, he underwent multiple rounds of surgery. CT and MRI scans revealed that he suffered from a fractured neck and pinched spinal cord. Medical experts who analyzed the injuries later determined that they were akin to those sustained by a person who dives into a shallow pool and hits his head on the bottom, causing the neck to break when his head rotates forward. Those experts largely concluded that sometime in between Stops 2 and 6, Gray’s head forcefully impacted the interior surfaces of the wagon, such as the walls or doors, causing the injury. On April 19, 2015, Gray died as a result of medical complications accompanying those injuries (Federal 4-7).

The Civilian Witnesses

At least 15 civilians reported that Gray was the victim of excessive force by the Baltimore police. Many of the witnesses were elderly residents of row houses across the street from Gilmor Homes. Their accounts were consistent; they can also be seen on CCTV cameras that recorded Gray’s arrest, which definitively places them at the scene. But, at most, they were interviewed for a few minutes outside their homes and forgotten.

Some of the witnesses say they remain frustrated by the investigative process. “They asked a few questions, but they act like they didn’t believe what I was saying.” Alethea Booze, who witnessed stop one, told The Appeal. “Everyone that saw what happened wanted to appear in court, but they didn’t call any of us.”

Five years later, [Jamel] Baker, who did appear in court, still feels let down by the prosecutors. “They made it seem like we was going to get justice, but nothing really happened,” he told The Appeal. He described the trials as “a waste of time.”

When the police department officially closed the Gray case in 2017, it released several binders of documents and photographs to the Baltimore Sun in response to a Public Information Act request. (The Sun has since removed the documents from its website.)

The newly obtained evidence reveals that significant pieces of the case were not included in the police’s 2017 release. The binders included official transcripts from officers’ statements but none from any civilian witnesses. Witnesses were reduced to mugshots, criminal histories, and scant notes by investigators. The 2017 release represented the police’s final word on the Gray case, but it mirrored the department’s investigation, which suppressed witness statements and minimized the lived experiences of people in the Gilmor Homes community (Barron 20).

The outrage surrounding Freddie Gray's death is rooted in concerns about how cops handle themselves in the city. Not only have police allegedly abused other detainees in their custody, but they have hurt people by placing them in vans without seat belts — similar to what Gray went through, suffering some sort of medical emergency in a police van while not buckled in, then being rushed to the hospital.

The Baltimore Police Department has long been subject to allegations of brutality. A September 2014 report by the Baltimore Sun’s Mark Puente found that the city had paid about $5.7 million since 2011 to more than 100 people — most of whom were black — who claimed that officers had beaten them.

…

Baltimore police have also been accused of taking people in “rough rides in which handcuffed detainees are driven in a reckless manner while they're not wearing seat belts — all to purposely cause injuries. The Baltimore Sun’s Puente and Doug Donovan documented several cases in which people were injured in police vans, some of whom won lawsuits against the city. One of them, a 27-year-old assistant librarian who was arrested following a noise complaint, described the experience: "They were braking really short so that I would slam against the wall, and they were taking really wide, fast turns. I couldn't brace myself. I was terrified."

…

The protests over Freddie Gray's death in Baltimore were part of the "Black Lives Matter" movement that has become prominent since the police shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, in Ferguson, Missouri. Since Brown's death, the rallying call of Black Lives Matter has been pushed in protests over several other police killings — of Eric Garner in New York City, Tamir Rice in Cleveland, and Walter Scott in North Charleston, South Carolina. These deaths and others have fed into the idea in black communities that their own — even their own sons — could be the next victims of police brutality. (Lopez 1-3).

BALTIMORE— The U.S. Supreme Court denied an appeal on Tuesday from five Baltimore police officers in a case in which they alleged they were wrongfully prosecuted for the death of Freddie Gray by Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby.

The decision brings the case to an end, in Mosby’s favor. It leaves intact a May decision by a Richmond, Va.-based federal appeals court that blocked the officers’ lawsuit on the grounds that prosecutors have immunity from such charges. The officers appealed that court’s decision to the Supreme Court in October.

...

… Mosby filed criminal charges against six Baltimore police officers involved in Gray’s arrest. Three were acquitted at trial, after which Mosby dropped all charges against the other three. None of the officers were found guilty of administrative violations by the department.

Five of the officers — Lt. Brian Rice, Sgt. Alicia White and Officers Edward Nero, Garrett Miller and William Porter — sued Mosby afterward, alleging she defamed them, lacked evidence for the charges she brought against them, and only charged them to ease the unrest. The sixth officer charged in the case, Officer Caesar Goodson Jr., did not join the lawsuit.

…

Despite her lack of convictions in the case, she said “justice has prevailed because every single Baltimore police officer is being held accountable for the actions of a few” through sweeping reforms that have been implemented in the department since Gray’s death (Rector “Supreme” 1-2).

[Paste the following to Google to watch video of Gray being put initially into the police van]

New video shows arrest of Freddie Gray in Baltimore - YouTube

Works cited:

Barron, Justine. “Freddie Gray, Five Years Later.” The Appeal, April 23, 2020. Net. https://theappeal.org/freddie-gray-five-years-later/

“Death of Freddie Gray.” Wikipedia. Net. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Freddie_Gray#Officer_William_G._Porter

"Federal Officials Decline Prosecution in the Death of Freddie Gray.” Department of Justice News, September 12, 2017. Net. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/federal-officials-decline-prosecution-death-freddie-gray

Lopez, German. “The Baltimore Protests over Freddie Gray’s Death, Explained.” Vox, Updated August 18, 2016. Net. https://www.vox.com/2016/7/27/18089352/freddie-gray-baltimore-riots-police-violence

Rector, Kevin. “The 45-Minute Mystery of Freddie Gray's Death.” The Baltimore Sun, April 25, 2015. Net. https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/crime/bs-md-gray-ticker-20150425-story.html#page=1

Rector, Kevin. “Supreme Court Denies Appeal by Officers in Freddie Gray Case.” Police 1, November 14, 2018. Net. https://www.police1.com/freddie-gray/articles/supreme-court-denies-appeal-by-officers-in-freddie-gray-case-EK92hCZLL7knhQ4g/