|
The purpose of this post is to inform the public about the incompetence and blatant disregard for the law Plainwell Department of Public Safety, Plainwell, Michigan, its police officers, administrators and elected officials have employed in an effort to silence a good friend of mine who has challenged their honesty, integrity, ethics and practices.
My friend was considered a "suspect"
in a crime report that her ex-husband filed. He is a department head at
the City of Plainwell. Plainwell, in its efforts to protect one of its own, engaged in unethical and possibly illegal conduct to cover for Rick
Updike and his attorney, Plainwell's City Attorney, Bob Champion. Please respond to this posting if you have been a victim of Plainwell PD's use of harassment and intimidation to silence victims and critics. A group of six individuals who have been through similar experiences as my friend have joined together to bring Plainwell's issues to the attention of the Michigan Attorney General's Office, Criminal Division and the United States Department of Justice, Office of Special Investigations.
A Brief Lesson in Plainwell "Herstory."
1. Police
report contains egregious errors including the date and time of the incident.
2. Police
report contains gross inconsistencies including a Supplement, added the day Plainwell received UPDIKE'S ex-wife's
FOIA request, wherein UPDIKE claims he was at home. The original police report stated six (6) times UPDIKE was NOT AT HOME at the time of the alleged "incident."
3 The witness, DEHART, UPDIKE'S neighbor, when giving VARELY an initial physical description of the "suspect," described the City of Plainwell's personnel manager, who is in the photograph with UPIKE'S ex-wife. However, the HR manager's face was redacted (hidden) prior to DEHART seeing the photo (allegedly for the first time, yeah, right!) four days later at Plainwell Public Safety.
4. VARLEY used one picture, a photo provided to VARLEY by UPDIKE for witness
identification of a suspect using a photo display.
5. When UPDIKE'S ex-wife questioned
VARLEY as to why he did not follow protocol for witness identification of a
suspect (see below), VARLEY informed UPDIKE'S ex-wife that VARELY didn't have to do so as she was the
only suspect. HUH?????
6. Ironically, even tho' UPDIKE'S ex was at home in bed, and had never met DEHART, DEHART tells VARLEY he is 90% sure the photo is that of the "suspect." AN AMAZING FEAT, MR. DEHART, SINCE YOU NEVER MET HER.
7. Plainwell Police may be
interested in knowing that it IS against the law to violate a person's civil
rights.
A Presentation of
Photographs to a Victim or Witness of a Crime.
A photo lineup, also known
as a photo array and or photo display, is a procedure used by law enforcement personnel
to discover or confirm the identity of a criminal suspect. Generally a
police officer shows a set of photographs to a victim or witness and asks
whether he or she recognizes one of the persons in the photographs as the
perpetrator. A positive identification
of a suspect can be used to place the suspect under arrest, and the act of
identification may be used later as evidence in the
prosecution of the defendant.
The Supreme Court has ruled that photo
lineups should not be unduly suggestive
(Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98, 97 S. Ct. 2243, 53 L. Ed. 2d 140 [1977]). That is, a photo lineup should not be conducted in
such a way as to highlight the suspect and elicit an identification of the
suspect. If a photo lineup is unduly suggestive,
any affirmative identification of a suspect may be excluded from her or his
subsequent prosecution.
Gee, do you think it may have been "unduly suggestive" for VARLEY to use only one photo, that of the complainant's ex-wife; (i.e. the "only suspect,") a photo provided to VARLEY by UPDIKE, the complainant? Incompetence? Intentional disregard of the "suspect's" civil rights? A cover up???
AMEN!
|