Judge Combest: Former Riverside Police Officer Robert Forman is going to trial
The preliminary hearing for former Riverside Police Department Officer Robert Forman began this morning in front of Judge Ronald R. Combest in C3 which might be the former elementary school that's been converted into a court facility but that's just a suggestion that I received. The odd thing is that the use of the elementary school if that's where the mysterious C3 actually is located was supposed to be reserved for civil case hearings and trials and not those involving criminal cases. There was some concern that the renovated classrooms couldn't provide the same security for criminal proceedings as could be provided by a regular court facility.
The case minute record from Jan. 23 actually shows that Forman was ordered by the judge to report to the downtown courthouse in Riverside to Dept. 42 for his preliminary hearing on Jan. 29 but that hearing was vacated and Forman's hearing was moved to 11:20 at this dept. C3 without a minute trail.
There's actually no reference on the court's Web site to where exactly C3 is so it will just be called the shadow courtroom where a public servant who once was paid tax dollars gets to have his preliminary hearing. So if you're charged with sexually assaulting women, it doesn't hurt to be a police officer because most individuals would have had to sit in Dept. 42 for three hours and then drive or travel to the other venue And there's usually a minute trail of the decision of the presiding judge to send their case to another venue and the time that it was sent out. But there's no such order online in this case. In this case, that early morning appearance in Dept. 42 was vacated meaning that it never took place.
Further inquiry and it turned out that C3 actually is located at a structure in Corona but guess what, the Corona courthouse isn't included on the "Locations" page either. And what's also interesting in a different context is that Combest is a retired judge from Mendocino County. He's been working on and off in the courts in this county since at least 2007.
There's a lot of judges still working on and off in Riverside County. In fact, a lot of the judges that people thought had retired are actually working on handling cases in the overcrowded Superior Court system. A lot of the emphasis of using retired judges was to handle the backlog of civil cases but according to that list, quite a few of them are actually assigned to handle the criminal case backlog.
But there was still no minute trail leading from Dept. 42 in Riverside to C3 in Corona.
Here's the minute order from the preliminary hearing that took place in the "shadow" courtroom.
AT 1:30, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD:
PEOPLE'S WITNESS JULIAN HUTZLER, PREVIOUSLY SWORN, RESUMES THE WITNESS STAND.
LET THE RECORD REFLECT THAT THE WITNESS IDENTIFIES
THE DEFENDANT FROM THE WITNESS STAND.
AT 2:19, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD:
WITNESS SERGEANT JULIAN HUTZLER EXCUSED.
PEOPLE REST.
ORAL MOTION BY DEFENSE REGARDING REQUEST TO DISMISS LACK OF EVIDENCE IS CALLED FOR HEARING.
MOTION DENIED.
COURT FINDS SUFFICIENT CAUSE TO HOLD THE DEFENDANT TO ANSWER ON ALL CHARGES.
INFORMATION ARRAIGNMENT SET FOR 02/17/2009 AT 8:30 IN DEPARTMENT 42.
DEFENDANT ORDERED TO RETURN ON ANY AND ALL FUTURE HEARING DATES.
CURRENT BAIL BOND CONTINUED.
SAVE MINUTE ORDER TO CASE.
In normal words, this means that Forman will be moving ahead in his criminal case and will face a formal arraignment on the three felony charges including two counts of oral copulation under the color of authority and sexual battery. He'd already been fired from the police department.
In an aside, the minutes indicate that Hutzler is a sergeant. If that's true, that would make him the third Oceanside Police Department lateral to be promoted to that position this year following Dan Warren and Chad Milby, an impressive streak.
Numerous arrests by ICE at a day laborer site in Casa Blanca in Riverside have led to protest of that action including a possible demonstration at one of Riverside's police stations. Reports by individuals apparently said that several of those detained and arrested were beaten in the process and that local police officers participated in the arrests. A lot about this incident remains cloudy.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
Border Patrol spokesman Agent Richard Velez said he could not confirm the exact number of arrests but said it probably was not as many as 30.
Suzanne Foster, executive director of the day-laborer group, said members of her organization and the Los Angeles-based National Day Laborer Organizing Network witnessed and filmed the arrests, which occurred between 5 a.m. and 1 p.m.
"The Border Patrol is going out of its bounds," Foster said. "We don't think the Border Patrol should aggressively raid people walking down the street or riding their bikes and not committing any crimes."
She accused the Border Patrol of racial profiling, by stopping random Latinos on the street.
Velez defended the arrests and denied targeting any ethnic group.
"We have a mandate from Congress to enforce our immigration laws, and that's what we're doing," he said.
A demonstration of 30-35 people took place at Caesar Chavez Community Center in the Eastside of Riverside against the death of a young woman by the Riverside County Sheriff's Department near Lake Matthews.
Also in attendance was a representative from the U.S. Justice Department's Community Relations Division, James A. Williams III who covers the Western region. Dropping by was Sgt. Don Tauli who works in the East Neighborhood Policing Center (with Sgt. Val Graham switching to the North NPC) who advised marchers to be careful crossing the streets during their march to the Sheriff's Department's administrative headquarters downtown.
Even though the city council's trying to force Greyhound out of downtown Riverside, the RTA will be staying at its current location instead of moving to where it had been heading near the Metrolink station.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
City officials said they are committed to finding a new spot for Greyhound.
"We're not sure what impact that will have on the project," Rouzaud said. "We phoned city officials after we saw the article ... they have not returned any of our e-mails or phone calls."
The intermittent communication between bus and city officials was worrisome to transit board members.
"Frankly I am a little miffed they are not returning phone calls or e-mails," said bus agency board chairwoman Karen Spiegel.
Bus officials were aware the city was considering extending Greyhound's time on Fairmount, said Riverside councilman Mike Gardner, who brokered the extension.
"The executive director (of the bus agency) was sitting there when I said I had made the offer in a public meeting," Gardner said.
Rouzaud said after the meeting that Greyhound's six-month extension would not affect plans or construction of the bus system's new terminal, but prolonged delays in moving Greyhound could hurt the project.
Here are some poll questions including one about whether the city manager or city attorney in cities should be an elected position instead of an appointed one. An anonymous cyber bully with his hands down his pants (and the feminization of men's names reminds me of one visitor to my site with a penchant for paddling ) has already weighed in on the poll but there is still plenty of opportunities to weigh in.
Most cities appoint city attorneys including Riverside. Others like San Bernardino, Huntington Beach and Los Angeles elect them. Riverside's own, Gregory Priamos is in a position of being the "four vote" legal counsel meaning that he needs at least four votes on the city council to keep his job. Does that pose the risk that he and other appointed city attorneys will shape their interpretations of issues and laws to please their constituents which are the elected officials? Who directs them?
Of course, city attorneys who are elected risk being politicized in a different way, because they receive campaign donations from contributors while running for an elected seat? What would it say about a city attorney if he or she received huge donations from some of the same development firms which clog the campaign contribution disclosure lists of several elected officials currently serving on the dais in Riverside?
The same debate has come up in law enforcement as well in a country where cities tend to appoint chiefs and counties tend to elect sheriffs. Scandals have plagued the heads of different law enforcement agencies whether they've been chiefs or sheriffs. But the difference is that the sheriff is theoretically accountable to the voters as well as his employees while police chiefs are quite a few degrees removed from being accountable to their cities' residents. Chiefs are also more vulnerable to being ousted by their employees' labor unions through no confidence votes.
Some people on Hemet's city council want to reform the city including through the imposition of term limits and an independent review of the city's financial situation involving its public safety departments which have seen layoffs and other cuts.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
McBride said many of the issues raised are things he thinks need to be dealt with.
"I'm glad they're jumping on my bandwagon," McBride said.
In their letter, Franchville and Youssef, who ran as a slate in the elections last fall, said they "favor a much smaller and more efficient" local government.
They said they do not plan to take advantage of health benefits available to council members and will not accept city-issued credit cards.
The issues they raised include:
Proposing a local term-limit initiative to go before voters.
Hiring an independent party to conduct a fiscal analysis of the police and fire departments and review "options available to the city" in terms of public safety services.
Contracting out more services now provided by Hemet's Public Works Department.
Returning City Hall business hours to an eight-hour-a-day, five-day work week, instead of the current extended hours and every other Friday off.
McBride said he supports the idea of term limits but doesn't think this year is the right time to put a measure before voters.
He said he prefers drawing up a "strategic plan" for police and fire, outlining how the departments plan to deploy resources instead of hiring an auditor.
The battle over sealed search warrants in the case of San Bernardino County Assessor Bill Postmus begins in earnest by the Press Enterprise.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
The newspaper is challenging a Jan. 14 order by San Bernardino County Superior Court Judge Douglas Elwell sealing all search warrant documents leading to the Jan. 15 raids of 10 locations in San Bernardino and Orange counties.
"The assessor is under investigation for public corruption," the document says. "It is difficult to imagine a circumstance in which maintaining public trust in the integrity of the judicial process is more crucial."
A hearing is scheduled for this morning.
Postmus was arrested on suspicion of two drug offenses when investigators raided his Rancho Cucamonga apartment in search of information relating to his political activities.
Elwell's order, obtained by The Press-Enterprise, says only that he determined that "good cause" had been shown to justify the sealing.
The newspaper argues that Elwell's order goes against California law, which requires that court records be sealed only "in the rarest of circumstances."
The mayor of Norco gave a state of the city address. She said that times were tough but that her city had a bright economic future.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
Federal prosecutors dropped corruption charges against the wife and mistress of former Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona.
After Carona was acquitted of most of his charges, a judge ordered that the charges for both women be dropped.
Oakland's police chief has resigned but here's one major reason why. Amid a series of controversial incidents involving the police, it turns out that the department's internal affairs division was in tatters and that its supervisor was under investigation for an onduty murder and a cover up.
(excerpt, San Jose Mercury News)
Someone criticized me once for being too harsh on Oakland Police Department which is under a consent decree of sorts but not by the federal or state law enforcement agencies. Its decree came about through lawsuits filed by its city residents. Not to mention that a White officer racially profiled a Black officer in the same department and shot and killed him. Not to mention that the department had organized gangs within the department. Is anyone shocked that the supervisor of the division which is supposed to try to keep all this behavior in check might be facing serious criminal charges himself?
They shouldn't be. Any police department who is in this situation deserves a consent decree.
Citizen complaints against the New York City Police Department are getting a closer look.
The case minute record from Jan. 23 actually shows that Forman was ordered by the judge to report to the downtown courthouse in Riverside to Dept. 42 for his preliminary hearing on Jan. 29 but that hearing was vacated and Forman's hearing was moved to 11:20 at this dept. C3 without a minute trail.
There's actually no reference on the court's Web site to where exactly C3 is so it will just be called the shadow courtroom where a public servant who once was paid tax dollars gets to have his preliminary hearing. So if you're charged with sexually assaulting women, it doesn't hurt to be a police officer because most individuals would have had to sit in Dept. 42 for three hours and then drive or travel to the other venue And there's usually a minute trail of the decision of the presiding judge to send their case to another venue and the time that it was sent out. But there's no such order online in this case. In this case, that early morning appearance in Dept. 42 was vacated meaning that it never took place.
Further inquiry and it turned out that C3 actually is located at a structure in Corona but guess what, the Corona courthouse isn't included on the "Locations" page either. And what's also interesting in a different context is that Combest is a retired judge from Mendocino County. He's been working on and off in the courts in this county since at least 2007.
There's a lot of judges still working on and off in Riverside County. In fact, a lot of the judges that people thought had retired are actually working on handling cases in the overcrowded Superior Court system. A lot of the emphasis of using retired judges was to handle the backlog of civil cases but according to that list, quite a few of them are actually assigned to handle the criminal case backlog.
But there was still no minute trail leading from Dept. 42 in Riverside to C3 in Corona.
Here's the minute order from the preliminary hearing that took place in the "shadow" courtroom.
| AT 11:15, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD: |
| HONORABLE RONALD R. COMBEST PRESIDING. |
| COURTROOM ASSISTANT: LAK-L. KING |
| COURT REPORTER: JEB-JANE E. BRUGGER |
| PEOPLE REPRESENTED BY DEPUTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY ELAN ZEKSTER. |
| DEFENDANT REPRESENTED BY PVT-MARK JOHNSON. |
| DEFENDANT PRESENT. |
| ORAL MOTION BY PEOPLE REGARDING DESIGNATE INVESTIGATING OFFICER IS CALLED FOR HEARING. |
| MOTION GRANTED |
| SERGEANT JULIAN HUTZLER DESIGNATED AS INVESTIGATING OFFICER. |
| AT 11:16, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD: |
| PEOPLE'S WITNESS, DETECTIVE LINDA BYERLY IS SWORN AND TESTIFIES. |
| LET THE RECORD REFLECT THAT THE WITNESS IDENTIFIES |
| THE DEFENDANT FROM THE WITNESS STAND. |
| AT 11:44, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD: |
| WITNESS DETECTIVE LINDA BYERLY EXCUSED. |
| AT 11:45, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD: |
| PEOPLE'S WITNESS, SERGEANT JULIAN HUTZLER IS SWORN AND TESTIFIES. |
| AT 12:00, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD: |
| COURT IS IN RECESS. |
| SAVE MINUTE ORDER TO CASE. |
AT 1:30, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD:
PEOPLE'S WITNESS JULIAN HUTZLER, PREVIOUSLY SWORN, RESUMES THE WITNESS STAND.
LET THE RECORD REFLECT THAT THE WITNESS IDENTIFIES
THE DEFENDANT FROM THE WITNESS STAND.
AT 2:19, THE FOLLOWING PROCEEDINGS WERE HELD:
WITNESS SERGEANT JULIAN HUTZLER EXCUSED.
PEOPLE REST.
ORAL MOTION BY DEFENSE REGARDING REQUEST TO DISMISS LACK OF EVIDENCE IS CALLED FOR HEARING.
MOTION DENIED.
COURT FINDS SUFFICIENT CAUSE TO HOLD THE DEFENDANT TO ANSWER ON ALL CHARGES.
INFORMATION ARRAIGNMENT SET FOR 02/17/2009 AT 8:30 IN DEPARTMENT 42.
DEFENDANT ORDERED TO RETURN ON ANY AND ALL FUTURE HEARING DATES.
CURRENT BAIL BOND CONTINUED.
SAVE MINUTE ORDER TO CASE.
In normal words, this means that Forman will be moving ahead in his criminal case and will face a formal arraignment on the three felony charges including two counts of oral copulation under the color of authority and sexual battery. He'd already been fired from the police department.
In an aside, the minutes indicate that Hutzler is a sergeant. If that's true, that would make him the third Oceanside Police Department lateral to be promoted to that position this year following Dan Warren and Chad Milby, an impressive streak.
Numerous arrests by ICE at a day laborer site in Casa Blanca in Riverside have led to protest of that action including a possible demonstration at one of Riverside's police stations. Reports by individuals apparently said that several of those detained and arrested were beaten in the process and that local police officers participated in the arrests. A lot about this incident remains cloudy.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
Border Patrol spokesman Agent Richard Velez said he could not confirm the exact number of arrests but said it probably was not as many as 30.
Suzanne Foster, executive director of the day-laborer group, said members of her organization and the Los Angeles-based National Day Laborer Organizing Network witnessed and filmed the arrests, which occurred between 5 a.m. and 1 p.m.
"The Border Patrol is going out of its bounds," Foster said. "We don't think the Border Patrol should aggressively raid people walking down the street or riding their bikes and not committing any crimes."
She accused the Border Patrol of racial profiling, by stopping random Latinos on the street.
Velez defended the arrests and denied targeting any ethnic group.
"We have a mandate from Congress to enforce our immigration laws, and that's what we're doing," he said.
A demonstration of 30-35 people took place at Caesar Chavez Community Center in the Eastside of Riverside against the death of a young woman by the Riverside County Sheriff's Department near Lake Matthews.
Also in attendance was a representative from the U.S. Justice Department's Community Relations Division, James A. Williams III who covers the Western region. Dropping by was Sgt. Don Tauli who works in the East Neighborhood Policing Center (with Sgt. Val Graham switching to the North NPC) who advised marchers to be careful crossing the streets during their march to the Sheriff's Department's administrative headquarters downtown.
Even though the city council's trying to force Greyhound out of downtown Riverside, the RTA will be staying at its current location instead of moving to where it had been heading near the Metrolink station.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
City officials said they are committed to finding a new spot for Greyhound.
"We're not sure what impact that will have on the project," Rouzaud said. "We phoned city officials after we saw the article ... they have not returned any of our e-mails or phone calls."
The intermittent communication between bus and city officials was worrisome to transit board members.
"Frankly I am a little miffed they are not returning phone calls or e-mails," said bus agency board chairwoman Karen Spiegel.
Bus officials were aware the city was considering extending Greyhound's time on Fairmount, said Riverside councilman Mike Gardner, who brokered the extension.
"The executive director (of the bus agency) was sitting there when I said I had made the offer in a public meeting," Gardner said.
Rouzaud said after the meeting that Greyhound's six-month extension would not affect plans or construction of the bus system's new terminal, but prolonged delays in moving Greyhound could hurt the project.
Here are some poll questions including one about whether the city manager or city attorney in cities should be an elected position instead of an appointed one. An anonymous cyber bully with his hands down his pants (and the feminization of men's names reminds me of one visitor to my site with a penchant for paddling ) has already weighed in on the poll but there is still plenty of opportunities to weigh in.
Most cities appoint city attorneys including Riverside. Others like San Bernardino, Huntington Beach and Los Angeles elect them. Riverside's own, Gregory Priamos is in a position of being the "four vote" legal counsel meaning that he needs at least four votes on the city council to keep his job. Does that pose the risk that he and other appointed city attorneys will shape their interpretations of issues and laws to please their constituents which are the elected officials? Who directs them?
Of course, city attorneys who are elected risk being politicized in a different way, because they receive campaign donations from contributors while running for an elected seat? What would it say about a city attorney if he or she received huge donations from some of the same development firms which clog the campaign contribution disclosure lists of several elected officials currently serving on the dais in Riverside?
The same debate has come up in law enforcement as well in a country where cities tend to appoint chiefs and counties tend to elect sheriffs. Scandals have plagued the heads of different law enforcement agencies whether they've been chiefs or sheriffs. But the difference is that the sheriff is theoretically accountable to the voters as well as his employees while police chiefs are quite a few degrees removed from being accountable to their cities' residents. Chiefs are also more vulnerable to being ousted by their employees' labor unions through no confidence votes.
Some people on Hemet's city council want to reform the city including through the imposition of term limits and an independent review of the city's financial situation involving its public safety departments which have seen layoffs and other cuts.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
McBride said many of the issues raised are things he thinks need to be dealt with.
"I'm glad they're jumping on my bandwagon," McBride said.
In their letter, Franchville and Youssef, who ran as a slate in the elections last fall, said they "favor a much smaller and more efficient" local government.
They said they do not plan to take advantage of health benefits available to council members and will not accept city-issued credit cards.
The issues they raised include:
Proposing a local term-limit initiative to go before voters.
Hiring an independent party to conduct a fiscal analysis of the police and fire departments and review "options available to the city" in terms of public safety services.
Contracting out more services now provided by Hemet's Public Works Department.
Returning City Hall business hours to an eight-hour-a-day, five-day work week, instead of the current extended hours and every other Friday off.
McBride said he supports the idea of term limits but doesn't think this year is the right time to put a measure before voters.
He said he prefers drawing up a "strategic plan" for police and fire, outlining how the departments plan to deploy resources instead of hiring an auditor.
The battle over sealed search warrants in the case of San Bernardino County Assessor Bill Postmus begins in earnest by the Press Enterprise.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
The newspaper is challenging a Jan. 14 order by San Bernardino County Superior Court Judge Douglas Elwell sealing all search warrant documents leading to the Jan. 15 raids of 10 locations in San Bernardino and Orange counties.
"The assessor is under investigation for public corruption," the document says. "It is difficult to imagine a circumstance in which maintaining public trust in the integrity of the judicial process is more crucial."
A hearing is scheduled for this morning.
Postmus was arrested on suspicion of two drug offenses when investigators raided his Rancho Cucamonga apartment in search of information relating to his political activities.
Elwell's order, obtained by The Press-Enterprise, says only that he determined that "good cause" had been shown to justify the sealing.
The newspaper argues that Elwell's order goes against California law, which requires that court records be sealed only "in the rarest of circumstances."
The mayor of Norco gave a state of the city address. She said that times were tough but that her city had a bright economic future.
(excerpt, Press Enterprise)
Azevedo told the audience that the city has worked to keep expenditures under control by not replacing employees who have left.
In 2008, 10 positions were eliminated after the employees left, and two were eliminated this year, she said.
At the same time, the city has increased its reserve funds, with the reserve projected to be about $6.2 million at the end of this fiscal year, Azevedo said.
"We must continue to be fiscally prudent as reserves can be exhausted quickly," Azevedo said.
Federal prosecutors dropped corruption charges against the wife and mistress of former Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona.
After Carona was acquitted of most of his charges, a judge ordered that the charges for both women be dropped.
Oakland's police chief has resigned but here's one major reason why. Amid a series of controversial incidents involving the police, it turns out that the department's internal affairs division was in tatters and that its supervisor was under investigation for an onduty murder and a cover up.
(excerpt, San Jose Mercury News)
The beating allegations are just one aspect of a wide-ranging FBI probe covering many of the department's recent high-profile problems, including the handling of the 2007 slaying of journalist Chauncey Bailey, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of workplace reprisals.
Capt. Edward I. Poulson, who heads Internal Affairs, was suspended with pay by the department Thursday.
Poulson, of Danville, did not return messages. Police Chief Wayne Tucker refused requests for an interview. In a written statement released Thursday night, Tucker said the department was cooperating with the FBI.
The FBI is investigating allegations that 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, according to police reports.
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, the sources said.
Someone criticized me once for being too harsh on Oakland Police Department which is under a consent decree of sorts but not by the federal or state law enforcement agencies. Its decree came about through lawsuits filed by its city residents. Not to mention that a White officer racially profiled a Black officer in the same department and shot and killed him. Not to mention that the department had organized gangs within the department. Is anyone shocked that the supervisor of the division which is supposed to try to keep all this behavior in check might be facing serious criminal charges himself?
They shouldn't be. Any police department who is in this situation deserves a consent decree.
Citizen complaints against the New York City Police Department are getting a closer look.
Labels: Greyhound watch, judicial watch, Making the grade, public forums in all places, recession blues
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