UPDATE x2:
Jose Lambiet at GossipExtra.com has new information including the fact that three of the officers named in the lawsuit are Hialeah police officers. Lambiet also reports that after cops arrested Moulin and his older son, "they sent his 11-year-old on his way – alone, with no money, in a foreign city he’d never been and where he couldn’t make himself understood!"Read Lambiet's report by clicking here.
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UPDATE x1: Criminal defense attorney Michael Grieco - who is not involved in this case - has posted some additional info in the comments section below this post. He also adds this by email: "The State Attorney filed 4 felony charges including 2 counts of battery on a Leo and 1 count of attempt to deprive an officer of means protecting (weapon). He took PTI [pre-trial intervention] and case was dismissed after he finished the program."
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A French tourist who was arrested and charged with four felonies in 2008 by Hialeah and Miami Beach cops has filed a lawsuit "alleging false arrest, battery and civil rights violations."
From Courthouse News Service:
None of the detectives mentioned in the story show up in any recent news stories.Miami Beach police beat up two French tourists, a father and son, then threw the father in jail for six days, say the two men in court.
The tourists say the plainclothes officers never identified themselves as police until they had thoroughly beaten the bewildered Frenchmen.
Guy Sabine Moulin and his son Mayeul Moulin sued the cities of Miami Beach and Hialeah and four police officers, alleging false arrest, battery and civil rights violations.
"On or about August 8, 2008, plaintiff Guy Sabine Moulin and his two sons Mayeul Moulin (17) and Joris Moulin (13) were in the City of Miami, Florida on a family vacation when they went to Miami Beach for dinner at a restaurant on South Beach," according to the complaint.
"In the area of Collins Avenue and 12 Street on Miami Beach, Guy parked his rental car in an empty parking space and along with his two sons, exited the vehicle. As Guy attempted to insert money into the parking meter or machine he noticed that same was not working. So Guy and his two sons walked from the location of the parked his car to another meter where Guy obtained a parking ticket to place on the vehicle dashboard. At that point, Guy walked back to his car while Mayeul Moulin and Joris remained sitting on a bench next to Collins Avenue.
"During this time, detectives [Philippe] Archer, [Ricardo] Fernandez, [Elton] Dorsey, and [Gordon] Spitler were patrolling the South Beach area undercover and in plain clothes some distance away from where Mayeul and Joris were sitting when they claim that an unknown, unidentifiable passerby told then two or three males were acting suspicious and might be involved in drug-related activity.
"None of the detectives knew the individual who gave them this information nor does anyone recall this individual giving them this type of information before. Additionally, detectives were not dressed in a way in which a passerby from the street could just walk up and know that they were police detectives.
"None of the detectives observed the individual in question identify Mayuel and Joris as the individuals he claimed were acting suspiciously.
"Based on this scant information from an unknown passerby and without observing any suspicious behavior from Mayeul or Joris, defendants Archer, Fernandez, Dorsey and Spitler attacked and accosted Mayeul without identifying themselves as police officers and without any probable cause whatsoever that Mayeul had committed or was in the process of committing any crime whatsoever.
Read the complete story at Courthouse News by clicking here.
Detective Archer however, has been identified as one of the officers who took part in last year's deadly Memorial Day shooting of Raymond Herisse.
Archer, who has been a cop since 1995, also shows up on LinkedIn where he describes himself as Gang detective and someone who is "definitely into the Health and Wellness Industry."
"Work on South Beach (Miami Beach, Fl.) as a Gang Detective. Trust me when I tell you, it definitely gets crazy down here!!!," Archer boasts on his profile.
Courthouse News says "the Moulins are represented by Raul Lopez, of Miami Lakes."
police brutality miami beach
Yes, I am a criminal defense attorney, but I also represent (Beach) cops when certain situations arise. I have known Phil Archer from back when I was a Gangs prosecutor and he is a stand up guy. What the quoted article fails to mention is that the State Attorney formally charged the Plaintiff and he went through a pretrial diversion program in order to get his case dropped later. A program that would only be available to him if the cops generously approved it.
ReplyDeleteThe cops don't 'approve' PTI. It's offered to first time offenders who meet certain criteria. In felony cases the cops are often asked for their input by the State Attorney but the decision is up to the state, not the cops.
ReplyDeleteIn a case like this the cops might have 'generously' approved of the PTI so that they didn't have to be called in to trial to testify about what happened. They may have been anticipating a civil suit and they less they had to say about the incident the better it could be for them. If the facts about the battery came up during testimony, it could be used against them later.
This worked out pretty well for both the cops and Moulin. Moulin paid some money, did his 12 hrs of anger management classes (or something similar) and he could go on without criminal charges. The cops didn't have to worry about their testimony coming back to bite them.
Well nobody's cried racial profiling yet, but with those names I have to ask if the Moulins were African and/or Muslim Frenchmen.
ReplyDelete