By Jan Hefler
Philadelphia Inquirer
GLOUCESTER COUNTY, N.J. — Three years ago, a police video captured a loud scuffle in the backseat of a cruiser between a handcuffed motorist and two Deptford officers.
Now, the Gloucester County township is mired in bills for lawyers’ fees and settlements reached with police, who were cleared of wrongdoing, and the driver.
So far, the incident has cost Deptford and its insurer nearly $800,000, including $200,000 to the motorist, a South Philadelphia man who subsequently filed a civil lawsuit.
And it’s not over. The officers are pursuing a civil-rights lawsuit against the township in U.S. District Court in Camden.
The videotape, taken from a dashboard camera, showed a screaming and skinny man tussling with two hefty officers leaning into the backseat on Feb. 2, 2006. Joseph A. Rao, then 19, had been pulled over for running a stop sign, and was placed in the cruiser because he had become combative, the officers said on camera. Rao was heard begging the police to stop choking him.
Initially, Patrolmen John Gillespie and Timothy Parks were suspended from the force and charged with aggravated assault and official misconduct.
But in July 2007, a jury acquitted Gillespie of the charges after a frame-by-frame inspection of the video showed Rao taunting the officers and kicking at them before he was punched and pulled from the cruiser. The video also revealed that Gillespie had one hand on the roof of the car at the time Rao claimed he was being choked.
The defense argued that the Gloucester County Prosecutor’s Office had not enhanced the video before indicting the officers. Charges against Parks, who was awaiting trial, were dropped after Gillespie’s acquittal.
In December 2007, the township agreed to pay about $200,000 in combined back pay to Gillespie, 37, and Parks, 32, plus roughly $300,000 reimbursement for their lawyers’ fees. The two were reinstated; Gillespie is on disability.
Patrolman Brian Green, 42, who was charged with lying to investigators about what he saw at the police station, where prosecutors said the abuse continued, was also cleared. He, too, was reinstated and received about $100,000 in back pay.
Then in May, Deptford quietly agreed to a $200,000 out-of-court settlement with Rao, who had filed a lawsuit against the township and the police, claiming his civil rights had been violated by the officers.
The Gloucester, Cumberland and Salem County Joint Insurance Fund, which represents about 65 municipalities, paid most of the award. Deptford paid a $10,000 deductible and admitted no guilt, said Township Manager Denise Rose.
Mayor Paul Medany, who was named in Rao’s lawsuit, would not comment this week. Former Police Chief John Marolt, who is now retired, did not return messages left at his home. Police Chief Daniel Murphy, who was a captain at the time of the incident, is on vacation and did not return calls.
Rao, who claimed he was emotionally and physically harmed, also could not be reached for comment. After the incident, he was treated at a local hospital for cuts and bruises. His lawyer, Leonard Zack of New York City, would not comment this week, according to his paralegal.
Ron Helmer, a Haddon Heights lawyer who represented Gillespie at trial, was angry when in 2006, charges against Rao for resisting arrest were dropped in return for his testimony against the officer.
Now he’s livid that Rao -- who at the time of the incident was on probation for threatening police officers in Philadelphia -- has landed a settlement.
“I was shocked. I wouldn’t have given the guy anything,” Helmer said. “He’s a criminal who was on probation for terroristic threats against cops, and he kicks one officer in the groin and the other in the head, and then gets a box of money.”
Helmer contended during the trial that Rao had kicked Gillespie and Parks. Helmer also said that Rao had previously sued the Philadelphia police and gotten a $10,000 settlement for similar conduct.
“In the view of the claims adjustors and the various attorneys, it was prudent to settle the case,” said Rose, the township manager.
“You know, there was the videotape. And if the jury only saw that, the likelihood is they’d have sympathy for the plaintiff,” she said. “The burden of proof in civil litigation is much lower than in criminal litigation.”
Still working through the courts is a lawsuit that the three police officers filed against the township, the police department, and Gloucester County Capt. John Porter, an investigator with the Prosecutor’s Office. The suit alleges malicious prosecution.
Joining them in the lawsuit is John Leone, a fourth Deptford police officer, who claims he was intimidated by the police hierarchy after he agreed to testify on behalf of his colleagues. Leone said Marolt, Murphy, and John Weatherby, a lieutenant at the time, threatened his job, and warned that they would launch an internal affairs investigation against him.
Leone later went on disability due to emotional stress, he said at Gillespie’s trial.
None of the police officers returned calls seeking comment. Through a prosecutor’s spokesman, Porter said that it would not be appropriate to comment on pending litigation.
The lawsuit, filed by Moorestown attorney Bill Buckman, alleges that Gillespie, Parks, and Green were fraudulently indicted because the grand jury was not shown an enhanced videotape.
They “suffered a great deal,” Buckman said. They lost their income, went into debt, and hurt their credit ratings, he said.
Even the repayment of wages was a problem, Buckman said.
“This lump-sum payment placed plaintiffs in a higher tax bracket,” leading them to pay more in taxes than if they had drawn their regular salaries, according to the lawsuit, which seeks no specified damages.
Copyright 2009 Philadelphia Inquirer