True Crime & Justice

LAPD Corruption

David Koresh and the Branch Davidians

Attack at Waco The tragic assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. Why did the Justice Department believe David Koresh was a menace? When did agents from Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms decide to use deadly force? Answers to these questions by taking apart the federal authorities' case and examining the timing, techniques, and tactics that led to the gruesome outcome. Interviews with officials and survivors and extensive footage much of it previously unreleased highlight the dramatic account of the disaster.

Theodore Kaczynski The Unabomber - 1996

Suge Knight, gangster cops and police cover-up

Cops and Confessions Chicago -- Substituting interrogation for thorough investigation, police in Chicago and Cook County have repeatedly closed murder cases with dubious confessions that imprison the innocent while killers go free. A veteran detective obtained a confession from a man who, records show, was in jail when the murder occurred. The gateway to a false confession is, in many cases, an illegal arrest, taking a person into custody on little or no evidence and subjecting him to high-pressure interrogation. Officers ignore laws set up to guard kids putting pressure to confess on the most vulnerable suspects. Police have repeatedly flouted the law while interrogating juveniles, disregarding decades old safeguards and building murder cases that later fall apart. Chicago Tribune

A homeless schizophrenic remanded for trying to break into a former girlfriend's home, died after being beaten up in his cell by prison officers.

As disturbing as the Diallo case was, an equally serious example of police brutality in Louisville, Kentucky, received less publicity. Desmond Rudolph, 18, was confronted by 2 police officers, Chris Horn and Paul Kinkade, as he was reportedly stealing a vehicle. The officers fired 22 times. 10 bullets pierced Rudolph's body, with 6 shots exploding in his head. Several months later, a criminal investigation cleared the policemen.

Fatal mistake -- In a outrageous example of police incompetence, narcotics unit of the Lebanon Tennessee Police Department, officers Kyle Shedran, 25, and Greg Day, 24, burst into the wrong home during a drug raid and killed an innocent 64-year-old African-American man.

Carrie's relatives win $3.75M -- Convicted -- Citing the "shocking" conduct of the Blanchester police chief, a federal court jury ordered the Clinton County village to pay $3.75 million to relatives of Carrie Culberson, a Blanchester woman missing since 1996 and presumed dead. Jurors faulted Richard Payton, then chief of Blanchester police, for halting a search for Ms. Culberson in a junkyard pond, despite indications her body might be there. Mr. Payton also failed to secure the scene, allowing someone to remove Ms. Culberson's remains, the jurors concluded. Debbie Culberson Mr. Payton, who has pleaded no contest to dereliction-of-duty charges, retired and moved to Florida and could not be reached.

Susan Nelles, RN a nurse at Toronto's Sick Children's Hospital, was accused of murdering four babies in 1981. Although there was no evidence to justify the charges, the Ontario Crown Attorney's Office pressed ahead. The charges were dropped, but Nelles' reputation and family had been severely effected. She spent four years seeking vindication and sued the Crown Attorney's Office for "malicious prosecution." Her case eventually went to the Supreme Court of Canada, which ruled that, under the Charter of Rights, Canadians can sue when a prosecutor "acts in fraud of his duties."

Man Arrested And Handcuffed For Having Messy Yard -- A day after the US Supreme Court ruled that police do not need a warrant to handcuff and arrest people for minor infractions, police arrested and cuffed a man for refusing to sign a citation for a messy yard.

Internal Affairs -- The internal affairs departments of police forces nationwide are bastions of secrets and suspicion. Investigating allegations of impropriety and crime among their fellow officers, yet few honest officers would deny that they perform a vital service. They are the reminder that no one is above the law, even those sworn to uphold it. Their decisions can ruin careers and lives, or they can choose not to pursue officers suspected of misconduct. Meet Cynthia White, a Chicago policewoman who turned in 12 other officers, and Marvin Hirsch, who represented officer Mike Dowd, accused of drug dealing. Charles Campisi, Chief of Internal Affairs for the NYPD, traces some of the landmark corruption cases that have shaken the force. It is a remarkable examination of the problems facing police officers today.

LAbyrinth: A Detective Investigates the Murders of Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls, the Implication of Death Row Records' Suge Knight, and the Origins of the Los Angeles Police Scandal by Randall Sullivan -- Sullivan follows Russell Poole, a highly decorated LAPD detective in 1997 called to investigate a cop-on-cop shooting, and discovered the officer killed was tied to Marion "Suge" Knight's gangsta-rap label, Death Row Records. Poole would realize a growing cadre of officers were allied with Death Row but and the Bloods street gang. He began to uncovered evidence "gangsta cops" may be involved in the murders of Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur. Shrewd detective work pointed to crooked cops such as David Mack, who orchestrated the biggest bank heist in LA. Poole's investigation was stifled by a police chief wary of doing damage to a force sullied by the OJ trial, Rodney King beatings, and the Rampart corruption scandal -- which dozens of officers were implicated in a conspiracy of robbery, brutality, drug dealing, and false imprisonment.

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