Ironically were it not for Frances Robles writing
a Miami Herald article on March 26th 2012 an entire chain of events would not
have taken place.
It was that Robles article, and the outlining of the
Miami-Dade School Police Department’s report on a Trayvon Martin incident from
October 2011, that kicked off an internal investigation by M-DSPD Police Chief
Hurley against his own officers to find out who leaked the police report.
[Note: The Miami-Dade Public School System has its own
Police force, and Chief, who report to the School Board and Superintendent -
Not the Police Dept. The Police Chief is appointed by the School
Superintendent, in this example, Alberto Carvalho]
It was that M-DSPD internal affairs investigation which
revealed in October 2011 Trayvon Martin was searched by School Resource
Officer, Darryl Dunn. The search of Trayvon Martin’s backpack turned up at
least 12 pcs of ladies jewelry, and a man’s watch, in addition to a flat head
screwdriver described as “a burglary tool”.
When Trayvon was questioned about who owned the jewelry and
where it came from, he claimed he was just holding it for a “friend”. A
“friend” he would not name.
Later, after the police report was outlined in the Robles
article, and despite Trayvon being suspended for the second time in a new
school year, Martin family attorney, Benjamin Crump, said Trayvon’s dad, Tracy
Martin, and Trayvon’s mom, Sybrina Fulton, did not know anything about the
jewelry case.
It was only as a consequence of the M-DSPD internal affairs
investigation that “why” theymay not have known came to light.
On October 21st 2011 a burglary took place a few blocks from
Krop Senior High School where Trayvon Martin attended. The stolen property
outlined in the Miami-Dade Police Report (PD111021-422483) matches the
descriptive presented by SRO Dunn in his School Police report 2011-11477.
Trayvon Martin
However, there was ONE big issue. SRO Dunn never filed a
criminal report, nor opened a criminal investigation, surrounding the stolen
jewelry. Instead, and as a result of pressure from M-DSPD Chief Hurley to avoid
criminal reports for black male students, Dunn wrote up the jewelry as “found
items”, and transferred them, along with the burglary tool, to the Miami-Dade
Police property room where they sat on a shelf unassigned to anyone for
investigation.
A separate report of “criminal Mischief” (T-08809) was filed
for the additional issue of writing “WTF” on a school locker. [It was the
search for the marker used to write the graffiti that led to the backpack
search].
The school discipline, “suspension”, was attached to the
graffiti and not the stolen jewelry.
The connections between the Police Burglary report and the
School Report of “found items” were never made because the regular police
detective in charge of the Burglary case had no idea the School Police Dept.
had filed a “found items” report.
Two differing police departments, and the School Officer,
Dunn, intentionally took the criminal element out of the equation – instead
preferring “school discipline” and not “criminal adjudication”.
It was only when the M-DSPD Internal Affairs investigation
kicked in, and six officers gave sworn affidavits, the manipulative scheme to
improve criminal statistics within the School System were identified openly.
School Superintendent Alberto Carvalho gave his hire, Police
Chief Hurley, instructions to reduce the criminal behavior of young black
males. The chosen strategy between them, to insure optical success, was to stop
using the Criminal Justice System to punish black student behavior. Instead
they instructed the School Resource Officers to use school discipline in place
of criminal justice.
Former M-DSPD Police Chief Hurley with son and wife
Another approach was the use of The Baker Act, to quantify
behaviors under health HIPPA law secrecy by assigning the students with
psychological problems. This allowed them to again use school discipline and
work around criminal reports.
Without the reports, the statistics would improve
immensely; And improve they did.
The final approach, to insure no-one would find out about
the manipulation, was to change the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for
inter-agency information sharing.
This new SOP was outlined by a communications directive
in 2010 forbidding the sharing of Miami-Dade School Police reports to outside
agencies without redaction. Officers had to send any and all requests through
the public information officer.
Hence, the furor of Chief Hurley when the Robles article hit
the press and cited police reports – Hurley smelled a leaker and launched an
investigation.
Ultimately the internal affairs investigation initiated by
Hurley led to his own firing, because the officers questioned told the internal affairs investigators the truth of
what was going on and outed the scheme.
One of the examples of this in action was the jewelry
incident and Trayvon Martin – as accidentally outlined in the Herald report.
But the Herald never knew their reporting had launched an internal affairs
investigation which led to the collapse of the scheme.
Meanwhile the stolen jewelry from the burglary
(PD111021-422483) was sitting on a shelf in the Property Room listed as
(2011-11477 “found items) gathering dust.
Until we started digging, and the FOIA requests revealed not
only the scheme, but the fact a victim was never made whole
with the return of their items.
That is, until now.
Yesterday we contacted Detective Manresa, assigned to the
burglary case, of the Miami-Dade Police Department to notify him some of his
victims’ stolen items were actually in the Miami-Dade property room:
Subject: Attn: Detective Omar Manresa [RE:
PD111021-422483 Burglary at XXXX XX XXXXX]
Dear Detective Manresa,
Per phone conversation of 4/30/13 @ 10:20am regarding
burglary incident #PD111021-422483
During the course of research surrounding an internal
affairs M-DSPD investigation in March/April of 2012 it coincidentally came to
our attention that School Resource Officer Darryl Dunn (Dr. Krop Senior High
School) filled out a report of items from a student’s backpack without criminal
attachment.
The internal documentation used by SRO Dunn only listed
the contents of the backpack as “found items” and a burglary tool. He was
trying to avoid subjecting the student [Trayvon Martin] to a criminal
investigation, therefore no criminal report, nor investigation was initiated.
This action by SRO Dunn was taken at the direction and
request of former M-DSPD Police Chief Hurley who had advised his officers to
avoid writing criminal reports on student offenders; Apparently in an attempt
to artificially improve the recorded criminal student statistics.
The internal report #2011-11477 never attached the stolen
property to the student who was carrying it when searched. The property was
taken to the custody of Carmen Gonzalez, Property Specialist, where it was
held, and still should be located.
The details surrounding this event are outlined in the
following sworn affidavits completed by members of the Miami-Dade School Police
Department. (they are extensive)
As mentioned, if you contact the victim of Miami-Dade
burglary #PD111021-422483, and review with them the property confiscated by
M-DSPD SRO Dunn listed under #2011-11477, we believe you will be able to return
at least a portion of the stolen merchandise.
Perhaps some of the items returned may have sentimental,
as well as obvious financial, value.
Right is Right Even If Nobody Does it; and Wrong is
Wrong, even if Everybody Does it…
