*(This is local so I'm well versed with this particular case. Since STL has made world news due to the Ferguson riots and the introduction of the
BLF movement. The Judge in the bond reduction hearing from the excerpt below, I know personally prior to him being appointed because he was a divorce attorney.
)
This morning, the St. Louis police officer charged with killing another cop in a bizarre game of Russian Roulette faced a judge, who sharply criticized...
www.riverfronttimes.com
Nathaniel Hendren did kill Katlyn Alix which is undisputed. St. Louis Metropolitan PD came under fire by the Circuit Attorney's office due to a quick rush to publically declare this as an 'accident'. Also, a request from the CA's office to collect a blood sample from the defendant was denied stating that this was being handled by their internal affairs.
In her letter on Monday, Ms. Gardner said her office had asked the police to take a blood sample from Officer Hendren and his partner, who was present in the home at the time of Officer Alix’s death, for use in a criminal investigation. But the police declined to do so, she said.
Ms. Gardner said the Police Department had told her office that local hospitals would not honor a search warrant asking them to take a blood sample — even though that is a common practice in criminal investigations, the prosecutor said.
Instead, Ms. Gardner said, she was told that the Police Department’s internal affairs division had taken a urine sample and conducted a breathalyzer test on both officers, even though a blood test is a “more exact” way of determining the presence of drugs or alcohol.
To make matters worse, she said, the tests were conducted under Garrity rights, which her office described as a form of assurance given to officers that statements they make to internal affairs will not be used against them in court.
“This is a serious problem in objective investigative tactics” for a case that the police had been told was a continuing criminal investigation, she wrote.
“Taking these tests under the cover of Garrity appears as an obstructionist tactic to prevent us from understanding the state of the officers during the commission of this alleged crime,” she wrote in the letter. “We have the expectation that those test results will be turned over to our office immediately as part of the ongoing investigation.”
Ms. Gardner also expressed alarm over the Police Department’s quick assessment — both in public and in private conversations with her staff — that Officer Alix’s death was accidental.
When her office was first notified of the shooting, she wrote, two of her staff members were told over the phone by the head of the Force Investigative Unit, which investigates officer-involved shootings, that Officer Alix’s death was an accident.
A death originally described as an accident that happened while one police officer was playing Russian roulette with another.
www.nytimes.com
krdo.com
