Another day, another two Black men shot by police (one who is dead, one who is fighting for his life, despite seven bullets in his back). Possibly by coincidence, possibly inspired by those shootings, I happened to see two different public defenders post long threads about their own personal experiences being harassed (or worse, really) by police. Not shootings or physical violence, but intimidation and lack of justice for sure.
The first is from a Twitter account called Public Defendering, and I think she is located in Georgia, though I am not totally sure about that. She is part of a nonprofit called Gideon's Promise, which is based in Atlanta:
Thread about my retaliatory arrest:
6 police units arrived at my mom’s house at 5:30am, 3 different police agencies showed up, all exits from my mom’s house were barricaded, had officers surrounding the house, my mom saw through the ring speaker that two officers were sniffing through their license plates under the carport.
Mom: “May I help you?”thru the ring. They said they had a warrant for me but refused to say what for. Mom told them that I was a public defender and at court.
I immediately leave my house so not to put my husband or my dog at risk should they get the right address. Driving on the road, I’m anxious that I’ll be targeted and stopped to execute the warrant.
Make it to my office, immediately start hiding out in my colleague's office who has no fucks to give should shit go sideways — there we plan to stay in the office to avoid arrest while figuring out exactly what is going on. My colleague begins by calling the police department with the warrant— the officer who answered the phone knew me and that they were out trying to execute a warrant for me. When asked what the warrant was for they said they didn’t have to say. When asked for a copy— they said they did not have authorization to provide us with one.
The conversation switched drastically after those two questions to — “where is she? At her office. Bring her to us so we can execute the warrant and arrest her.” My colleague told the police officer that would not happen without more information on the warrant. About 5 minutes later the phone rings, my colleague answers and hands the phone to me. The guy who was trying to execute the warrant was on the phone telling me that this will get ugly if I continue to avoid arrest. Again, I am at my office and in court at 2pm. At this point their refusal to come to the courthouse to arrest me or arrest me at my office—was making me think something really sketchy was going on.
I was working on a attempted murder of a police officer case representing the defendant. It seemed far fetched but I was starting to think it was retaliation for that. I called a few ADAs I knew would do favors for me and asked them to look into it. They later reported that the police wouldn’t give them any information about what the warrant was for— nothing. The ADAs checked the warrant system and a warrant for me didn’t exist. When the ADAs called me back they said the same thing: “Don’t know what’s going on but this is retaliation about that case. They won’t tell us anything about the warrant but it doesn’t exist. You need to stay somewhere other than your house tonight. Don’t let them arrest you. I don’t know exactly what is going on but I do know they intend to not release you and fuck with you. The cop mentioned 30 days but they are going to try to hold you for as long as they can.”
At this point in the story it’s about 9:30am. The ADAs call me back to tell me that since the police who attempted to execute the warrant (agency 1) won’t give any information they have called the District Attorney to help it figure out. The DA places a call to the Chief of another police department that was there to execute the warrant (agency 2) but he tells him that his officers were never at that location and they know nothing about executing a warrant this morning. The DA then calls the chief of the 3rd agency (agency 3) and the story was the same— never there, know nothing about the warrant.
Once this information is relayed back to me with the DA’s explanation that it must be all a big misunderstanding...they were looking for someone else. I immediately contact my mom for the video recorded by her Ring showing clear video of officers from all three agencies present at my mother’s house that morning attempting to execute a warrant— giving my name.
The ADA working opposite on the case in question calls me back— at this point he’s the only one still trying to find answers for me— he tells me that the officer he spoke to (agency 1) made a remark about the ADA being unable to “save” me because it’s outside his jurisdiction.
This is where it gets complicated— though he still was unable to find out what the warrant is for— he was able to find out that the warrant was issued in a much, much smaller county— outside of the jurisdiction of the DA's office. At this point, the ADA working the case in question joins me in my suspicions that whatever's going on is retaliation and a direct attempt to threaten/pressure me into not providing a defense to my client.
My boss gets involved and calls the Chief of the police department (alleged victim in my case), “did your officer really try to have defense counsel arrested this morning?” The chief’s response was just “let me call him but he worked night last night so it won’t be until later.”
He never called my boss back and didn’t answer my boss’s phone calls the remainder of the day. In the mean time, now that we know where the warrant was issued, my boss starts calling the mayor, the Chief of police, the magistrate (because it was issued in a small small county so no courthouse, no judge, no DA's office— only a magistrate) but no one would answer his phone calls.
From around 12:30 - 3pm everything just stopped, no information came in, cops didn’t show up to arrest me. Despite knowing where I am. Even though the hysteria stopped around me, it wasn’t over for me. If I went home I knew I would be arrested. I was worried about my mother she, so worried she had to go home and take a nerve pill— she was petrified that while in jail “something” would happen to me and she would never be able to find out how. I was worried about my dog— I didn’t want the police coming to my house— he would be scared and I was worried “something” would happen to him.
But I was ENRAGED for me. Livid. Seething. Ready to fight. My boss finally got through to the magistrate who acknowledged that he had seen the warrant, signed it, wouldn’t give any other information but verified its existence. My boss asked for him to hold the warrant until the next magistrate court date so I could go in and all of this could be figured out. The magistrate said he did not have the authority to do that (he did).
All of this effort, all of these resources, all of these officers/agencies, and determination to have me in custody told me one thing— I was onto something. It all clicked.
Just days prior to officers’ show of force at my mother’s house I had a preliminary exam scheduled in the case where I represented a man accused of attempted murder. The alleged victim, a cop, was subpoenaed to appear. He was late but the investigating agency was present. The ADA called they officer who said he was on his way, just running late. The judge demanded that we begin the preliminary exam. Though I objected I was forced to proceed with some evidence I uncovered of police corruption I won’t go into it here for obvious reasons. But the minute my investigator started testifying to the evidence, the lead detective got on her phone and began to furiously text. I objected but the judge ignored it and just demanded the witness proceed.
Lo and behold the officer who was on his way to testify at the preliminary exam never showed up and stopped answering his phone. 2 days later cops are at my mom's house attempting to execute a warrant. So, at this point the word is the warrant actually exists, though no one knows what for. The vibe changes from trying to help me fight corruption to “what did you do?”
I racked my brain to figure out the last time I was in this small county— almost a decade ago. My office contacts a contract public defender whose house was raided, dog shot, tazed and arrested in retaliation for representing a man accused of murdering an officer. He’s going to represent me. His altercation with police happened in a neighboring small county and he inevitably won a large lawsuit against that county.
By 6pm, I’m still at the office. I’ve buried myself in the case this is all arising out of because now I know there’s something to be found. But also scared to drive and to be stopped alone, scared to be home so avoiding those realities as well. The attorney who was representing me finally calls my cell to tell me he talked to the magistrate and he has agreed to hold execution of the warrant until Thursday,... The days seemed to drag on as i inwardly raged.... People who should have condemned such a brazen misuse of resources and abuse of authority said nothing.
Finally my court date came, I walked in the magistrate court— for all who are unaware in this very small town the “court” is just a small room attached to the police station where they handle generally traffic matters and the biggest penalty is a drivers license suspension. People aren’t represented by defense counsel, there isn’t a court reporter recording what occurred or what is said, there is just the magistrate/judge (who is an ADA in another county) and local police. The police chief of that small town sits next to the magistrate acting as ADA, having to approve every reduction of fine given or anything else done. So by having the warrant issued in this small town they were able to bypass everyone and be completely in control of “justice”. My attorney looked at me and said “this is going to be a real shit show.”
So these are the facts— they stated the warrant required I be held without bond for a minimum of 14 days. When my attorney asked to see the warrant, they couldn’t find my file.
They sent the police secretary to go try to find said file while we waited. While we waited, the police chief told my attorney that he was going through old files and executing old warrants. My attorney asked, why now? Chief said, she’s just the first one I came across.
When they came back with the file, he opened it and first page across the entire page — it said NO CHARGE— BOLDED AND HIGHLIGHTED. My attorney pointed it out and the chief just said “ohhh, huh”. The magistrate said, “y’all can go”.
Attorney was unable to see the alleged warrant at this “court date” so we just took our win that I was walking out of there that day. So I left with a lot more unanswered questions than I came with, honestly. Tampering with evidence, hiding evidence, and manipulation of evidence for their purposes— is just the way it is with police.
But I fought for the “contents” of my file and this is what I found out— the warrant was a bench warrant allegedly issued in 2012 for failure to appear at a court date. I was never served or issued a summons with the court date that I allegedly failed to appear. The file itself says— no service. The court date was recorded as happening on a Sunday in 2012. Court dates do not occur on Sunday here. Most importantly, there was no underlying charge that would have given me a court date... at all.
How did I enter the system? I have been in a wreck and gotten a traffic ticket since 2012. An officer would have seen my outstanding bench warrant and arrested me... I was not. Nor was I ever told I had one. Bench warrants even from other counties are in a nationwide database, yet the ADAs could not find an active bench warrant for me. I also passed character and fitness for the bar, a notoriously grueling accounting of every ticket you’ve ever received.
Other interesting facts— the police chief going through executing old warrants has a manpower of 3-4 officers. They also do not have jurisdiction outside of their small county, as such they rely on larger forces to execute warrants. They forward them to larger agencies to have them executed. This would have been the one time they did not follow normal protocol.
There is no record of them ever forwarding this “warrant” to the larger agency in 2012 or thereafter for execution. Not discounting that they fought so hard for something to exist then willingly and without any fight acquiesced to it not existing once we saw the file. It’s clear they knew it didn’t exist all along which is why they wouldn’t give any information. The goal was just to have me in custody for as long as they could until things were figured out— to threaten me from further representing my client and continue on my quest to expose police corruption.
There are still so many questions about the alleged warrant and what lengths they went through exactly to try to get me in their custody but I had to put that aside and continue the fight for my client— which has been a hell of a fight. He was initially charged with obstruction of justice but the officer who thought of himself as a victim personally went to the ADAs office claiming it was attempted murder. The ADA told him it was not and he couldn’t charge the client with attempted murder. The cop became angry, went to the news, gave an interview subtly threatening the DA — you see, it’s an election year and blue lives have a lot of power if they say you are against them.
Despite the ADA on the case telling this cop it was not, the DA required the ADA to amend the charge to 2 counts of attempted first degree murder. This was almost a year ago. He is still incarcerated but has been convicted of nothing.
We were blocked from receiving any police conduct files despite what was done to me. They have refused to turn over what evidence I have been able to subpoena requiring me to file motions to have them held in contempt only to show up and turn over bits and pieces.
The ADA, the judge, and the police are aware they do not have enough to hold this boy or convict this boy of attempted murder x2 but continue to hold him so as not to upset the ego of a police officer. That is our justice system.
Police are aware that they can manipulate prosecutors and judges to do their bidding just by withholding their support. They know the system works to their advantage and they can do so with impunity. Their unions give them this enormous power. That’s all I can say.
But just know this is not an outlier— it is an epidemic. And it gets much worse. In all of this I was trying to navigate things I could not say, keep client confidentiality, but inform you all of the realities. I hope I did the story justice and provided you with some important context to the stories of people who have been wronged by our criminal justice system today.
The other story is a public Facebook post by a Hennepin County public defender named Mark Devaraj, who appears to be Indian-American (not American Indian). You may recall that Amy Klobuchar used to be Hennepin County prosecutor, and I think this would have been just before her time in that office:
One night about 25 years ago, I was smoking a cigarette outside my home. I was a young attorney at the Hennepin County Public Defender’s Office, my first real job in my chosen profession. As I was standing there I saw a marked police car slow down as they drove past me. The officers looked at me and I looked at them. At the end of the block they turned around and pulled up in front of me and two officers got out and approached me. They asked me where I lived and if I had any ID on me. I told them where I lived, but that I didn’t have my ID on me as I had just stepped out of the house for a smoke. They told me to put out my cigarette and put my hands on the roof of their car. I was stunned. They proceeded to frisk me and then locked me in the back of their squad car and drove to a more secluded spot about a block away.
I did not tell them what I did for a living, I did not talk back or refuse to comply with anything they asked. I did ask them why they were detaining me and they said that after the recent murder of a police officer at the Pizza Shack on Lake Street, they were frisking everyone they stopped. I asked them why they stopped me and they answered by asking me for my name and date of birth. The older officer who asked for my name and date of birth entered this information into a computer, presumably checking for warrants. He asked me to repeat the information a couple times and revealed that he had gotten the spelling wrong, claiming he was hard of hearing. The younger officer now recognized me from a new officer training for which I had been a volunteer a couple of years prior. Eventually, after over half an hour sitting in the back of their car, they realized what I already knew: I had no warrants and had done nothing wrong. They then spent several minutes trying to explain their behavior, making the same excuses for “officer safety” that I had already heard countless times in my career, even in those early days. They offered to shake my hand, I politely declined and told them I would like to go home. They finally let me out of the car and I walked home.
I was stunned by the whole surreal encounter. I went in the house and after my roommate asked me where I’d been for the last hour, I immediately sat down and typed out a two page account of everything that had happened in as much detail as possible.
The next day at work I reported the incident to my boss, who immediately called the chief of police and the media. He joked that he wished I hadn’t gotten into the car so willingly, because we could really raise some hell about this. He was a big blustery Irish guy. I wasn’t. Maybe a guy like him could do that. I knew instinctively what my black and brown clients knew. That’s why I got in the car and did not assert my rights. Of course, I also knew that I had done nothing wrong and kept thinking it would not escalate or continue more than a brief conversation outside my doorstep. I got that part wrong, like I said I was still pretty young then. I’m a lot older now.
There was a big article in the Star Tribune, with an interview and photo taken in my office. Complaints were filed. The chief of police said that his officers had no record of any such stop: no log entry and no report. After further inquiry, the officers admitted to the stop and were directed to write reports. After the article was published, one of the Sheriff’s deputies who provides courtroom security was looking at me funny one day. This was a guy I saw every week at work and had always been cordial, if not friendly, toward me. He was giving me a hard look, he had read the newspaper story and asked me what I was doing to get stopped. I laughed and said nothing at all, just like I said in the paper. He did not laugh and informed me that was not possible, cops don’t just stop people for no reason. I was stunned. A prosecutor who I knew and liked called me and vouched for the two cops as good guys and not racist at all. She also kept asking for more details about what I had been doing that could have attracted their attention. I couldn’t provide any more, because such details didn’t exist. She concluded the conversation by reiterating what good cops they were, she knew because she had worked with them. I was stunned at the conclusion of this conversation with someone I considered a “work friend,” who felt comfortable enough to reach out to me personally yet could not believe “her” officers had done anything wrong.
Eventually the officers wrote a report. Unlike my written account, theirs was created several days later and only at the direction of their chief, with the express purpose of justifying their conduct. Their report stated that they stopped me because I was prowling parked cars and that I repeatedly gave them a false name and date of birth, until they were finally able to find me in their computer. You see, it was my own fault that the detention had continued that long. I was not surprised to read the lies in the reports, because the report read just like all the reports I read on the job, that my clients insisted were inaccurate or untrue. I was, however, stunned to see my name slotted into these boilerplate and fictitious descriptions of suspicious behavior. The civilian review agency at the time assigned an investigator, an ex-cop, who called after reading the police report and asked me to repeat all the same information in my written statement that I had already provided. Afterward, he wanted to schedule additional in-person interrogations. I had already told them everything more than once and it was clear at this point that there was a high probability of not being believed, or nothing coming of it even if they did believe me. My boss had probably been right about the lack of physical injury. I never went in for any further interviews.
For years, a few people thought it was a funny story and prompted me to retell it in social settings. I was stunned that people thought it was a humorous and entertaining anecdote, but I always complied with the request. Eventually, people forgot about it and stopped asking. I was relieved. At the time, I was a young lawyer trying to establish my professional identity, hoping to be taken seriously. I didn’t want to be a punchline or a victim or worse, suspected by the people in the court system of being a crybaby or a liar or even a criminal myself. I didn’t want to be reminded that I was a person of color. I wanted to be a person. Most of the time I could pretend to live in a colorblind world. I wanted to go back to the relative comfort of that lie. I’m still a public defender today. I often have little consolation to offer my clients who claim the police lied about them. Some are stunned that I don’t argue the point and may actually believe them. Sometimes it feels like, deep down, part of them wants me to defend the police and provide a palatable race-neutral reason for what happened to them. They don’t like me confirming what they already knew to be true. I get no joy from it either.
This is how those cops treated public defenders (whether they knew they were attorneys or not at first, or after they knew they were attorneys). Lying and falsifying documents does not seem to be an impediment in these two examples.
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