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Satanica

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http://www.al.com/news/index.ssf/2015/08/alabama_deputy_charged_by_feds.html#incart_river
Federal authorities today arrested a former Madison County deputy for his role in the roadside arrest and brutal beating of a Tennessee handyman in August of 2012. Deputy Justin Watson, who quit the force in April, was the only one named in the federal indictment.

Watson has been charged with five counts, two related to the stop and beating, one related to lying about it under oath and two more related to intimidating witnesses, including aiming an unloaded gun at a fellow deputy and pulling the trigger.

Robert Bryant last year sued Sheriff Blake Dorning and seven deputies, including Watson, arguing he was stalked, stopped, beaten and wrongfully charged with assaulting an officer in revenge for a barroom scuffle with Watson.

Madison County settled the suit for $625,000 last summer without calling a witness and the FBI announced an investigation into the stop.
[....]
The beating of Bryant would largely pass without public scrutiny for nearly a year, until Bryant's wealthy advocate, Jason Klonowski, was found shot three times in the back of the head at his home just outside Huntsville.

Klonowski, who had employed Bryant as a handyman, had printed t-shirts supporting Bryant and helped pay for his lawyers. Klonowski in September of 2013 grew impatient with the legal process, built a stage in his front yard, hosted a rally and publicly promised to see Watson and other deputies imprisoned.

One month later, Klonowski's body was found posed in a chair near his barn. The execution remains unsolved, but would set in motion a chain of events that led to the federal grand jury.
[....]
Watson is now charged with corrupt persuasion of a witness that relates to his effort to track down Bryant's identity after the fight.

"Specifically, defendant Watson instructed A.B. to 'Keep your mouth shut' about both a fight between defendant Watson and (Bryant), and defendant Watson's subsequent efforts to identify and locate (Bryant)."

Police records show that Watson pressured dispatcher Amanda Billings for information about Bryant's identity.

A second charge of witness intimidation involves a fellow deputy, as Watson tried to cover up that the man beaten during a traffic stop was the same guy from the pool hall.

"Specifically, after defendant Watson admitted to J.C. on or about August 22, 2012, that he recognized (Bryant) from a previous incident, he warned J.C. not to tell anyone."
[....]
It's not clear if the deputy J.C. in the indictment is Jake Church. But the indictment lists some specific acts of intimidation by Watson against this fellow deputy.

"In or about 2014, J.C. noticed that his head had been cut out of a photograph of deputies with the Madison County Sheriff's Office. When J.C. asked when Watson had altered the photograph, defendant Watson responded, 'When did you go talk to the FBI?'

"In another incident in or about 2014, defendant Waston pointed his unloaded handgun at the back of J.C.'s head and pulled the trigger."

Immediately after the stop of Bryant, Watson's supervisor, then Sgt. Chad Brooks, had become suspicious. He'd heard rumors that Watson had been in a bar fight. Brooks was the one who documented Watson's efforts to learn Bryant's identity by pressuring a dispatcher.

In late 2012, Brooks and Lt. Mike Salomonsky would then document that Watson had not been truthful when testifying in a criminal hearing against Bryant. Bryant faced a felony charge of assaulting an officer. Watson denied having seen Bryant at the pool hall during the preliminary hearing.

Watson is now charged with obstruction of justice for his misleading testimony at the hearing in December of 2012.
[....]
The Department of Justice issued a statement this afternoon saying Watson faces a maximum sentence of 11 years in prison for the two civil rights charges. He faces up to 60 years in prison on the three obstruction counts.

Watson's supervisors, according to their own reports, were told to drop their investigation in late 2012 by senior officers in the sheriff's department. And that may have been the last of the case if not for Klonowski.

A neighbor found Klonowski's body on Nov. 3, 2013. Madison County dropped the criminal case against Bryant 10 days later. On Nov. 20, Bryant's attorney, Hank Sherrod, wrote an open letter calling for an outside investigation into Klonowski's death, saying deputies had motive to harm him.

On Nov. 21, Sheriff Blake Dorning asked the state for help investigating his own men. The state took over the Klonowski murder but declined to investigate the Bryant case.
[....]
Watson turned himself into federal authorities today and his initial appearance was held in U.S. District Court in Huntsville this afternoon.

Prosecutors told the court they were willing to allow Watson's release on a $25,000 unsecured bond.

But U.S. Magistrate Harwell Davis said that after reading the charges he had questions about whether Watson presents a danger to the community. He cited the fourth count against Watson, related to the allegation that Watson pointed an unloaded gun at another deputy's head and pulled the trigger.

Davis said he hadn't made up his mind about Watson's release and set a detention hearing for 3 p.m. Tuesday to determine if Watson should be released on bond and under what conditions.

Watson, who sat at the defense table wearing handcuffs, will remain in federal custody until the hearing.
[....]
"We do not condone this type of behavior," said Dorning, mentioning the department had added body cameras and ethics courses to improve community policing.

But Dorning also emphasized that Watson is innocent until found otherwise and talked about the challenges faced by his officers, of having to handle the mentally ill and drug addicted. "It's the things other people do not want to face."

That was one crazy-ass cop! :eek:
 
All this becoz of a bar fight he more than likely started and lost. What a jerk and even worse he was a cop. What is so hard about the concept to protect and serve?
 
@Satanica
January 6, 2017

The former Madison County deputy who pleaded guilty in federal court to lying under oath about a brutal traffic stop in which he was accused of assaulting the driver reported to prison Thursday.

Justin Adam Watson, 32, began a three-year prison term at the low-security federal prison in Butner, N.C., according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

U.S. District Judge Karon Bowdre sentenced Watson in November but allowed him to remain free until after the holidays before beginning his prison term.

At Watson's sentencing hearing, FBI agent Susan Shimpeno testified that on the night of Aug. 22, 2012, Justin Watson pulled over Robert Bryant, a handyman from Tennessee, "struck him in the face, knocked out his teeth, beat him with a baton and choked him until he was unconscious."

Shimpeno said the stop and beating were revenge for a bar fight weeks earlier.

In a plea bargain with prosecutors, Watson pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice (misleading conduct) in exchange for four other charges being dropped.

During that November hearing, Watson acknowledged enacting a traffic stop on Bryant, then striking and choking him. But Watson maintained he was acting in self-defense.
https://www.al.com/news/huntsville/index.ssf/2017/01/alabama_deputy_begins_prison_t.html
 
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