| Two Broward cops get probation after guilty verdict |
| A Broward judge today sentenced two former Lauderhill police officers each to a year of probation for falsifying reports to say a driver was a belligerent aggressor who tried to kick out a patrol car window during a Feb. 8, 2008, traffic stop. Miranda Decker, 23, and Emanouel Legakis, 28, were each convicted in July by a Broward County jury of official misconduct and falsifying reports. The jury acquitted the pair of battery. Decker stopped driver Clayon Jones for running a stop sign. The traffic stop turned ugly, prosecutor Jeannette Camacho said, when Decker became hostile after Jones asked why he was being stopped, questioned the officer's rude demeanor and asked to read the citation. Jones, 30, of Pompano Beach, testified during the trial that although he remained calm, Decker slammed the car door on his leg, grabbed him, cuffed him, squeezed his throat and threatened him with additional charges. When Legakis arrived, Jones said the officer punched him near the jaw. In their police reports, the officers downplayed their aggression, Camacho said, and sought to justify their actions by portraying Jones as an argumentative aggressor who refused to obey commands and tried to kick the window out of a patrol car. The Police Department terminated Decker and Legakis on March 14, 2008. Before sentencing, both defendants professed their innocence and despair at losing their law-enforcement jobs, careers they had yearned for their entire lives. "Police officers don't normally drive around and pick on people," Legakis said. "We are trained to react, not to act. [Jones] reacted in a certain way, and we reacted in a certain way." Circuit Judge Cynthia Imperato withheld formal felony convictions from the former cops' criminal records, saying she was troubled by the case. She did not believe Jones' version of the events, Imperato said, but would not go against a jury's verdict. "It hurts that she didn't believe me," Jones said afterward. "I don't feel too pleased with the outcome, but it is what it is, and the judge made a decision. To me, this is like a slap on the wrist." Jones' wife, Michelle, 39, said she believed the judge let her former career as a police officer influence the sentences she chose to impose. "They say cops are like a brotherhood," Michelle Jones said. "It makes you wonder who is there really to protect you, if the ones sworn to serve and protect you are abusing you. Who do you turn to?"
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Posted By Brett Schwartz on September 09, 2009 11:55 am | Permalink  |