The head of the Oakland Police Department's Internal Affairs Division almost nine years ago beat a drug suspect who later died, and then ordered subordinate officers to lie about it.
Capt. Edward I. Poulson of Danville, who heads Internal Affairs, was suspended with pay by the department Thursday.
Poulson, working with an undercover team in April 2000, kicked a drug suspect, breaking his ribs, the sources said. The suspect, Jerry Amaro, died about a month later of pneumonia caused by broken ribs and a collapsed lung, according to a coroner's report. Before Amaro died, he told several people about the incident.
Internal Affairs investigators at the time found that Poulson ordered subordinate officers to lie about his involvement, and those investigators called for his firing, according to the sources. Then-Chief Richard Word instead suspended Poulson for two weeks. No charges were brought in Amaro's death after a homicide investigation.
During that investigation, officers who arrested Amaro said they saw no use of force as he was captured, according to homicide case notes.
But during a subsequent Internal Affairs investigation, the same officers said Poulson ordered them to protect him, according to an officer familiar with their statements. Those statements led to administrative charges against Poulson and the two-week suspension.
Officers with knowledge of the matter said colleagues were angry that a member of the command staff who had been punished for interfering in an Internal Affairs investigation was later put in charge of Internal Affairs, and they alerted the FBI. Two senior members of the department said Thursday that Tucker had been advised last year not to put Poulson in charge of Internal Affairs because of the Amaro case.
The investigation of Poulson comes as the Internal Affairs Division remains under the oversight of U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson and a team of independent monitors under the Negotiated Settlement Agreement reached after the infamous Riders corruption case in 2001.
Fuck OPD,IAD,Howard Jordan,Mayor Quan(Recall her),Mayumi Taylor,Ofc Yoshi,Oakland FBI branch,The Riders and all biased,corrupt,inept officials.Civilian Police 2012
Pimpczar2011 3 weeks ago in playlist warshyt