Tag Archives: false arrest

Family on Roadtrip Meets Abusive Trooper (who should already have been fired)

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Bridgeport, West Virginia Trooper A.J. Trupo, who was caught on a secret audio recording two years ago verbally abusing a female businesswoman, has once again been recording abusing people. A family was on a roadtrip, visiting family in West Virginia for the Christmas vacation. As they drove through Shinnston, West Virginia, they stopped to get the kids food in the McDonald’s drive through.

As they pulled back onto the road to continue driving, the dad observed a car speeding towards them. He motioned for the car to slow down. It happened to be a West Virginia State Police cruiser. It didn’t have emergency lights activated, but rather was just speeding illegally. Apparently upset about being signaled about his speed, the trooper turned around and stopped the family.

This was the location of the encounter:

Here’s the police report (criminal complaint):

Here’s the dismissal order:

Here’s my first video on Trooper Trupo, from two year ago.

Here’s the media report on Trooper Trupo being disciplined for the prior incident.

Country Singer Writes Song About Arrest by Idiot Cop | Charges now Dropped

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This 18 year old country music singer from Montana was pulled over for speeding by a state trooper who is looking for reasons to accuse him of driving intoxicated. Even though he blew a 0.0 showing he had no alcohol in his system, and even though he did all the stupid human tricks he was asked to do, and even though he was 100% polite and cooperative with the officer, he was still wrongfully arrested and charged. A blood test taken after the arrest showed what any rational police officers should have known: that the kid was completely sober. Yet this happened to him. He wrote a song about it.

Jaden’s test results, both the official blood test and the urinalysis:

Jaden Decker’s YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@JadenDecker

Here’s the song Jaden wrote about the incident:

City Pays $250,000 for Abusing Elderly Man for Looking at a Police Car

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A 70 year old man in Ada County, Idaho was arrested by police officers at a police station, after he dared to look into a police cruiser window. The charges were later dismissed. He filed a lawsuit, which just settled for $250,000, along with mandatory additional training for sheriff’s deputies in that county.

Here’s Sherriff Matt Clifford’s troubling statement, as discussed in the video:

Earlier this week, we settled a lawsuit with Mr. Heikkola, stemming from an incident in January 2023. It wasn’t our best day. It is the expectation that Ada County deputies perform to the best of their abilities every day — while keeping people’s constitutional rights in the forefront of their minds, while also keeping our community safe.

For anyone to claim we are trampling on someone’s constitutional rights simply isn’t true.The reality is, we have hundreds of contacts every day with people of all different backgrounds, religions, ethnicities and socioeconomic standings. While the vast majority of those interactions go well, occasionally we fumble and miss the mark.

Part of the settlement was to include additional constitutional policing training; fortunately, we had already implemented this training prior to the settlement. We will now also include a scenario similar to Mr. Heikkola’s in our scenario-based training. We are one of few law enforcement agencies across the country with routine built-in training time. Every patrol deputy receives 9.5 training hours per month. These blocks of training include topics such as firearms training, scenario-based training, legal updates, EVOC, de-escalation techniques, arrest and control techniques, CPR and first aid, and more.

Part of our culture at the Ada County Sheriff’s Office is to always strive to be better – and learning from this incident will help us to do just that.

– Matt Clifford, Ada County Sheriff

Here’s the full lawsuit:

Heikkola-ComplaintDownload

Guy Posted About Local Cops on Facebook – They Arrest Him For it!

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Paul O’Brien, who lives in Grafton, West Virginia, observed a Taylor County Sheriff’s Deputy running a speed trap across the road from his residence. He posted on Facebook about it, joking that he WISHED he had an M-80 (firecracker) so that he could set it off and cause the deputy to have a heart attack. In the same post, he criticized the department for the deaths of three individuals over the years. Deputy Cody Mayle of the TCSD then paid Paul a visit at his home. He had no warrant, but rather just wanted to “talk.”

When Paul decided he didn’t want to talk with Deputy Mayle, Deputy Mayle suddenly grabbed him and arrested him. Paul spent two nights in jail. Around three months later, the frivolous charge of “obstruction” was dropped, since it was admittedly frivolous, according to the prosecutor. Paul submitted a complaint to the department, but heard nothing back.

This is Deputy Cody Mayle, who is seen on bodycam laughing as soon as Paul was thrown in the holding cell:

My last West Virginia based video coincidentally, was from Barbour County, which is only the next county over, and that deputy also has the same last name – Mayle. Here’s a link to that video. I’ll have more information soon about that situation…

This is the location of the incident:

Here’s the police report / charging document:

Here’s the dismissal order:

Cop KICKS Dog | Caught on DoorBell Video | Does your Family Pet have Rights?

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This footage was submitted from Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, showing the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office knocking on a man’s door and then kicking his tiny dog shortly afterwards, after the dog apparently attempted to urinate on the cop’s leg. The officers knocked on the man’s door while investigating him for allegedly causing damage to a police cruiser. Without obtaining a warrant first, the officers ended up arresting the man.

As I’ve explained numerous times, according to the 1980 Supreme Court opinion in Payton v. New York, in order to legally arrest someone in a home, rather than in a public place, absent consent or exigent circumstances, police officers must have a warrant. But what about kicking the homeowner’s dog? Or shooting the dog?

As an initial matter, it is well-settled that privately owned dogs are “effects” under the Fourth Amendment, and that the shooting and killing of such a dog constitutes a “seizure.” So it’s a different legal standard that standard police shooting cases. It’s an overall reasonableness standard, recognizing that police can shoot dogs where officer safety justifies the decision. 

The question is whether, at the time the officer shot the dog, he held a reasonable belief that the dog posed a threat to himself or others. If the facts are sufficient to show that such a belief was unreasonable, then the law is clearly established in most circuits that shooting a dog under those circumstances would constitute an unreasonable seizure of property under the Fourth Amendment. That’s not a great way of looking at the value of our dogs, but that’s the actual legal analysis.

Law Student ARRESTED | Then Quickly RELEASED!

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A New Mexico law student, who has already been featured in an Audit the Audit Youtube video for cops harassing him at the entrance to his dorm room, has now been arrested in another unrelated incident. However, once the supervisor showed up, the student was quickly released with an apology. They ended up arguing back and forth on Fourth Amendment law. Who was right?

Joel Martinez Youtube channel is here with the original raw footage of both incidents.

The Audit the Audit video I reference is here.

MAYOR: Our Officer Got the Law Wrong… Sorry!

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Video surfaced from Andalusia, Alabama, showing a police officer entering a woman’s home to arrest her, while her 18 year old son filmed the incident. The footage was subsequently released by the woman’s attorneys, who accused the officer of race-related retaliation. The footage then went viral, prompting the mayor of the town to make a public statement. He apologized, stating that the officer was disciplined for not knowing the law.

Subject to only two exceptions, police officers cannot enter your home and arrest you without a warrant. The exceptions are consent and exigent circumstances. But where an arrest is initiated outside the home, can the officer then follow the person inside the home to complete the arrest?

Media report here.

Full video of the mayor’s statement here.

Employee ARRESTED Over Missing Item Found 10 MINUTES Later!

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This is an interesting situation. A black employee of a firearms-related company, apparently run by military vets offering a number of different products, realized they were missing an AR-15 “lower,” which was supposed to have been mailed out by a particular employee. Rather than discuss the matter with the employee, they called the cops, who arrested the employee pretty much immediately, ultimately holding him for multiple hours. However, it seems that the missing lower was found only 10 minutes after this man was arrested. Oops… it was all a big mistake. But the employee was still fired and sent packing, with an apology from the cops.

Here’s the link to James’ GoFundMe.

Here’s James’ Instagram.

Doorbell Arrest Video | NO Warrant | COPS RESPOND on Youtube!

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Ring doorbell video surfaced showing the arrest of a man at his own front door, after he refused to provide identification to police officers in Clayton County, Georgia. The footage showed officers arresting the man without a warrant. After the footage went viral, the police department then made their own Youtube video responding to the footage, as well as the allegations. But the issue remains: can cops constitutionally arrest a homeowner at his own front door without a warrant?

The Fourth Amendment guarantees the “right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” The constitutional protection of people in their houses extends to the “curtilage” of the home, which is “the area ‘immediately surrounding and associated with the home.'” Collins v. Virginia, 138 S. Ct. 1663, 1670 (2018) (quoting Florida v. Jardines, 569 U.S. 1, 6 (2013)).

Subject to a few exceptions, the Fourth Amendment prohibits law enforcement from entering a home or its curtilage to conduct a search without a warrant. United States v. Walker, 799 F.3d 1361, 1363 (11th Cir. 2015). United States v. Stephen, No. 19-12172 (11th Cir. Aug 06, 2020)

The original video used by the “We The People” Youtube channel here.

“We The People’s” Youtube video here.

Clayton County PD’s Response video here.

Arrested For Knocking on Cop’s Window | OUTRAGEOUS Bodycam

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I literally received hundreds of requests for my take on this outrageous bodycam footage that was originally uploaded by Lackluster, showing a lady being arrested in Kentucky, after she attempted to criticize a police officer for his poor driving skills. Well, you were right that I would be interested in this incident. Here’s my take on it.

Here’s Lackluster’s original video. It’s fantastic, by the way.

Here’s the police report narrative:

Here are the relevant Kentucky statutes (I mistakenly used disorderly conduct in the first degree in the video, but the operative portions are identical):

Here’s her GoFundMe link.