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1. Court: Rights don't have to be read to prisoners

   By Jesse J. Holland Associated Press

   WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court said Tuesday investigators don't have to read Miranda rights to inmates during jailhouse interrogations about crimes unrelated to their current incarceration.

   The high court, on a 6-3 vote, overturned a federal appeals court decision throwing out prison inmate Randall Lee Fields' conviction, saying Fields was not in "custody" as defined by Miranda and therefore did not have to have his rights read to him.

   "Imprisonment alone is not enough to create a custodial situation within the meaning of Miranda," Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the court's majority opinion.

   Three justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor, dissented and said the court's decision would limit the rights of prisoners.

   "Today, for people already in prison, the court finds it adequate for the police to say: `You are free to terminate this interrogation and return to your cell,'" Ginsburg said in her dissent. "Such a statement is no substitute for one ensuring that an individual is aware of his rights."

   Miranda rights come from a 1966 decision that involved police questioning of Ernesto Miranda in a rape and kidnapping case in Phoenix. It required officers to tell suspects they have the right to remain silent and to have a lawyer represent them, even if they can't afford one.

   Previous court rulings have required Miranda warnings before police interrogations for people who are in custody, which is defined as when a reasonable person would think he cannot end the questioning and leave.

   Fields was serving a 45-day sentence in prison on disorderly conduct charges when a jail guard and sheriff's deputies from Lenawee County, Mich., removed him from his cell and took him to a conference room. The deputies, after telling him several times he was free to leave at any time, then questioned him for seven hours about allegations that he had sexually assaulted a minor. Fields eventually confessed and was charged and convicted of criminal sexual assault.

   Fields was then sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison but appealed the use of his confession, saying that he was never given his Miranda rights on the sexual assault charges.

   On appeal, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati threw out his confession and conviction, ruling that it is required that police read inmates their Miranda rights anytime they are isolated from the rest of the inmates in situations where they would be likely to incriminate themselves.

   The Supreme Court overturned that ruling.

   "Not all restraints on freedom of movement amount to custody for purposes of Miranda," Alito said.

   Questioning an inmate doesn't bring the "shock" of arrest that free people experience and the coercive pressure that follows, Alito said. There is also no hope for a quick release if the inmate talks to police, like there would be for a free person, and there is also no chance of a lighter sentence or any type of reprisal for not talking because the person is already in prison, Alito said.

   "Thus, service of a term of imprisonment, without more, is not enough to constitute Miranda custody," Alito said.

   The majority looked to the wrong question in making its decision, Ginsburg said.

   "I would ask, as Miranda puts it, whether Fields was subjected to `incommunicado interrogation ... in a police dominated atmosphere,' whether he was placed, against his will, in an inherently stressful situation, and whether his `freedom of action (was) curtailed in any significant way,'" Ginsburg said. "Those should be the key questions, and to each I would answer, `Yes.'"

   The case is Howes v. Fields, 10-680.

   Copyright 2012 Associated Press

   
   
2. More than 100 cases dropped after cop's firing

   By Matt Lakin News Sentinel

   KNOXVILLE — A hundred-plus drivers can tear up their court papers and walk away, courtesy of the ex-Tennessee Highway Patrol trooper fired for driving past a fiery wreck last year.

   Knox County prosecutors dropped charges Friday in all cases handled by Charles Van Morgan, a veteran trooper who routinely logged the most drunkendriving arrests in the Knoxville district for years.

   Morgan lost his job this month after THP internal investigators determined he drove by the Nov. 26 wreck that killed Gordon Kyle Anito on Andersonville Pike in North Knox County and didn't stop. The agency fired him for neglect of duty and conduct unbecoming a trooper.

   "Mr. Morgan's actions were so egregious as to completely destroy his credibility," Tammy Hicks, an assistant district attorney general, wrote in a motion. "As such, the district attorney general's office cannot continue with the prosecution of his cases."

   The cases dismissed Friday ranged from felonies to misdemeanors and amounted to 95 defendants, some facing more than half a dozen charges each. About half the defendants appeared to be first offenders, with others on their second and third DUI arrests.

   That number doesn't include minor traffic tickets. Prosecutors said they're still trying to sort through those and drop them one by one.

   That could take a while. Morgan's personnel file shows he averaged as many as 300 total arrests and citations per year. He made 117 DUI arrests alone in 2010 - more than any other trooper in the state.

   The defendants who won't come back to court include Justin Ryan Kinard, 37, of Decatur, Ga., who faced charges of an implied consent violation and vehicular assault on a child. Morgan arrested him May 21 after Kinard's Nissan Maxima ran off Interstate 75 North around 1:15 a.m., hit a tree head-on and flipped with his toddler daughter in the car.

   Kinard failed field sobriety tests and admitted to taking Xanax but refused to give a blood sample, Morgan wrote in an arrest warrant. Morgan forced him to give a blood sample anyway, as allowed by law in cases involving serious injury, but prosecutors can't use the test results now.

   Morgan had worked for the state Department of Safety for nine years when he clocked Anito driving nearly 80 mph in a 40 mph zone on Emory Road just before 3:30 a.m. The trooper turned on his lights and siren.

   Friends have said Anito had been drinking, although tests for drugs and alcohol aren't complete.

   Anito led the trooper on a chase onto Andersonville Pike. Video from Morgan's cruiser shows he passed Anito's 2005 Subaru Impreza moments after it crashed head-on into a tree and as smoke and the glow of a fire spilled from under the hood. The THP determined Morgan's car slowed to almost 20 mph as he passed but kept going. He didn't know then whether Anito was dead or whether anyone else was in the car.

   Morgan told dispatchers he'd lost the car and kept going for another half-mile, then sat parked for about five minutes until dispatchers broadcast a neighbor's report of hearing the wreck.

   Morgan drove back to a car engulfed in flames. He sprayed it clumsily with a fire extinguisher - "to make it look good," he later explained.

   Morgan says he saw the car but thought it was parked. He'll face no criminal charges, and the THP found no fault with the initial chase.

   Anito's family has filed a $10 million federal lawsuit in his death.

   Morgan remains on paid leave until Monday, when his firing becomes final. He appealed his firing, but Safety Commissioner Bill Gibbons turned the appeal down this week.

   Morgan has until next month to decide whether to fight the commissioner's decision. His lawyer has said he'll exhaust all appeals.

   Copyright 2012 News Sentinel

   
   
3. Video: Tense police station standoff caught on head camera

   By PoliceOne Staff

   BURNSVILLE, Minn. — An officer's head camera captured a tense standoff with a knife-wielding man at a police station.

   Officer Dave Luchsinger of the Burnsville Police Department was in the station when a man entered sporting a cut to the neck and carrying a knife. In the video - captured by Luchsinger's TASER AXON camera - the officer instructs the man to drop the weapon, and draws his firearm after the man refuses.

   At that point, the officer calls for backup, and his partner, Officer Brad Litke, responds - opening the door and incapacitating the man with a Taser strike.

   Both officers received Awards of Honor recently from the Dakota County Chiefs of Police Association for their handling of the situation, according to WCCO.

   “Sometimes we have to do some difficult and challenging things, so it’s good to be recognized for that,” said Officer Luchsinger.

   
   
4. SC mayor sneaks into town hall, pulls over trooper
   
   

   By Jeffrey Collins Associated Press NORWAY, S.C. — In the two decades since Jim Preacher arrived in rural Norway, he's been this tiny town's police chief, self-proclaimed constable and now the mayor. He's pulled over a state trooper who wrote him a speeding ticket, and sneaked into town hall before he was sworn in so he could change the locks and take over the town's checkbook.

   Preacher, 66, half-heartedly apologizes for bringing bad publicity to the town of only 337 people. But he also left no doubt he has big plans to try to save Norway, which hasn't written a budget in years, has lost so much revenue it had to disband its police department, and currently uses Preacher to read meters and run its water system.

   "Somebody has got to take accountability. I was elected, and that's what I am going to do," Preacher said at a recent Town Council meeting. "I may not do it gracefully like a ballerina. I might be more like an elephant in a china shop."

   Preacher has never steered clear of controversy. He's survived a couple of investigations by the State Law Enforcement Division. Back when he was a lieutenant with the Berkeley County Sheriff's Office, the South Carolina Supreme Court called his work in a murder investigation "reprehensible."

   Preacher, who was elected to a two-year term in November, refused to talk for this story, instead inviting a reporter to come to Norway's February Town Council meeting. People who offered to talk about Preacher and the town's problems after the meeting didn't answer phone calls or return messages.

   Preacher and the four-member Town Council have quite a task in front of them. Norway has lost 42 percent of its population in the past 40 years, and almost half of the residents who remain are over age 50.

   At the intersection with the blinking traffic light — the only signal in town — there is a shuttered bank on one corner, and a closed restaurant on another. The building that once housed the funeral home is for sale. Residents have to go seven miles up U.S. 321 to find a grocery store and 10 miles down the two-lane highway to find a fast food restaurant.

   But something about this town about 50 miles south of Columbia keeps Preacher there. He first arrived in 1990 to be police chief. He lives on the outskirts of town on land with a pond. Two huge German shepherds have the run of the yard, and Norway's old police car is parked out back.

   Preacher has always been closely involved with the town's business. He ran a water and sewer business earlier in his life, so along with his police job, he took over Norway's waterworks. That led to his lawsuit against the town for more than $30,000 he said he was owed for his work. It was filed not long after he was fired as police chief in 2007.

   Preacher was a familiar sight at Town Council meetings after that, stressing the same message of financial accountability he has carried into the beginning of his two-year term as mayor. He thinks the town needs more fiscal discipline and should aggressively pursue grants to stay alive.

   "There's no accountability for what we do," he said at a recent Town Council meeting. "We are just bleeding to death as far as finances go."

   It was that worry about finances that led Preacher to Town Hall on Jan. 1.

   Preacher couldn't wait until his formal swearing-in at the monthly council meeting, so he decided to change the locks and take over the bank account. The former mayor wanted Preacher arrested, but SLED determined there wasn't a break-in because the building was not secured.

   Less than three weeks later, a state trooper said he stopped Preacher because he was speeding just outside of town limits in Norway's old police car. On the trooper's video of the stop, Preacher can be heard saying he is the town's constable and was investigating a man with a gun at a convenience store. The trooper notes Norway disbanded its police department and issues the ticket for going 70 mph in a 55 mph zone anyway.

   But when the highway patrolman pulled away, Preacher flipped on his blue lights and pulled over the trooper, threatening to charge him with interfering with a police officer. The trooper called his supervisor, who is heard on the tape saying, "I know it's aggravating. I know exactly who you are dealing with."

   The supervisor then spoke to Preacher, who spent a minute dressing down the trooper before dropping the matter. But Preacher did get the last word.

   "Son, you've got a lot to learn," Preacher said before blasting his siren for three seconds. "You have a nice night."

   State agents said Preacher is no longer certified to be a state constable. Preacher first said that he is a town constable and that there is a difference. But after the outcry from people in the town, he agreed to stop doing police work. SLED is investigating the traffic stop.

   Town Council members were upset over the incident because it brought more bad publicity. In the past, a councilman accused the mayor of using a racial slur, and a police officer suspended and later fired for talking to the media about traffic ticket quotas.

   "It's not what you do, it is how you do it. I felt betrayed, disrespected as a council person. I'm sure I can speak for the entire council. This has got to stop, really," Councilman Michael Singleton said.

   Contention followed Preacher even before he showed up in Norway. In May 1990, he was a Berkeley County sheriff's lieutenant investigating a fatal shooting at a pawn shop. After two hours of questioning, Herman "Bud" Von Dohlen was still proclaiming his innocence. Then a second agent entered the room with a police sketch of Von Dohlen. The investigators tried to convince the suspect they had a witness who saw him at the shop. But the sketch was actually made by a police artist watching the questioning through a one-way window. The suspect was also shown some shell casings, and investigators lied and said that they were found at the scene, according to court documents.

   The South Carolina Supreme Court called the police tactics reprehensible, but upheld Von Dohlen's death sentence. A later appeal would be granted, and Von Dohlen is now serving life.

   Because Norway is such a small place, it causes interesting dynamics. Sitting directly to Preacher's left at the February Town Council meeting was Gregory Covington, who is suing Preacher for slander after Preacher said in a 2010 meeting that Covington filled his farm equipment with water from a city fire hydrant.

   At one point during the 90-minute meeting, Preacher asked former mayor Cindy Williams — whom he had defeated by five votes in November's nonpartisan election — for her help getting together the town files. Then he threatened to not allow her to speak again in the meeting and brought up her relationship with another man in town.

   "He's so power hungry," Williams said, after the council went behind closed doors. "He just wants to be a dictator."

   Copyright 2012 Associated Press

   
   
5. Video: Hourlong melee at Mall of America

   UPI

   BLOOMINGTON, Minn. — A fight at the food court led to "other altercations" that lasted more than an hour throughout Minnesota''s Mall of America, officials said.

   Mall spokesman Dan Jasper said in a news release the incident began at about 4:20 p.m. when "50 juveniles caused a large disturbance in the north food court."

   "Mall of America security and Bloomington (Minn.) police responded to the call," the release said. "Following that call, a few other altercations occurred throughout the mall. Mall of America security and Bloomington police have called in extra officers to ensure guest safety."

   The melee prompted some shoppers to duck into stores for safety, but some shops closed their inside doors during the disturbance the (Minneapolis) Star Tribune reported, citing police and witnesses.

   There had been reports the mall was locked down and that the fight involved weapons, but mall officials said those reports were not accurate, the newspaper said. There were no reports of injuries or arrests.

   Witnesses said after the fight at the food court, large numbers of young people coursed through the mall — some snatching property from shoppers and merchants.

   Hannah Betz, 16, of Maple Plain, Minn., told the newspaper the larger group broke up into small groups and scattered when police arrived.

   Copyright 2011 U.P.I.