In 2010, Abigail Ayers filed a civil lawsuit (PDF) against the officers and agencies allegedly responsible for her husband's death. The lawsuit exposed a number of shocking details, such as the fact that Agent Harrison had not even completed the series of firearms-training classes required by the department in his 40 days since being hired, and had no police training on the use of deadly force as a police officer. Agent Harrison might have escaped criminal charges, but he did not escape the verdict in the civil case against him. In early 2014, over five years after the pastor's killing, U.S. District Judge Richard Story declared that Agent Billy Shane Harrison would not receive civil immunity for the shooting, and a jury determined that he was financially liable for Ayers' fatality. (See ibid: http://www.policestateusa.com/2014/jonathan-ayers/)
Judge Story found it unreasonable for Harrison to think "that Ayers posed an imminent threat of serious harm or that deadly force was necessary to prevent his escape." Harrison owes nearly $711,000 in attorneys' fees, and more than $121,000 in expenses, plus a judgment of $1.64 million, for a total of nearly $2.47 million, Courthouse News Service reported.
_____
A reporter smoking a cigarette outside the offices of the Rocket Courier photographed Laceyville Borough Police Officer Matt Chamberlain, on duty at the time of this alleged gun sale, who grabbed a machine gun from the back of his cruiser, handed it to a man, closed the trunk, then walked away from his police car. Chamberlain was immediately suspended for allegedly selling this lethal monster in this bizarre 'trunk sale' in the parking lot of a convenient store, Dandy Mart, across the street from the Rocket Courier offices (See: http://wnep.com/2014/06/19/police-cop-caught-selling-ak-47-on-the-job/)
"I was shocked, I was shocked! Especially when there's a (semi-automatic) weapon involved and the public was exposed. It's one isolated incident, but you have to deal with it. You can't let this slide," said Phillip Brewer, the mayor of Laceyville. The mayor suspended Chamberlain without pay, according to news from WNEP-16. "For him to do something so foolish, it just boggled my mind," said Jean Reinhart, the mayor of Wyalusing. Reinhart also said that it was foolish and crazy for Chamberlain to walk away from his patrol car, and especially from the weapon that was then being held by this unknown stranger. (See ibid: http://wnep.com/2014/06/19/police-cop-caught-selling-ak-47-on-the-job/.)
Area residents were stunned and upset by this gun sale. Ashley Fiori from Forksville said, "They know the law, ya know? They're supposed to be protecting us!" Meantime, Shawn Burns from nearby Lawton, said, "It's pretty scary knowing that someone in law enforcement could be out selling guns to people," (See ibid: http://wnep.com/2014/06/19/police-cop-caught-selling-ak-47-on-the-job/.)
The Laceyville Borough Council met a
few days after this incident, on June 22, to discuss Chamberlain's fate. "We
did not make any decision on what kind of action we're going to take,"
Mayor Brewer is quoted as saying in a June 23 interview with The Daily Review, a major print
source of this area (with offices in Towanda, Sayre and Troy, Pa.). (Click here.)
"There are other areas (related
to the case) that we have to get solved before we do any type of disciplinary
action," Brewer is quoted as saying to The
Daily Review. Chamberlain remains suspended without pay, Brewer told The Daily Review on
June 23. Brewer had previously said that Chamberlain could lose his job over
the incident. The gun does not belong to the Laceyville Police Department, but
is Chamberlain's private weapon, the mayor explained. As to whether Officer Chamberlain violated any gun laws, Brewer replied: "As far as the federal gun law, I don't think he did." (See ibid: click here.)
Writer's note: No reports could be found online about who
the buyer is or what he intends to use the AK-47 for, or if the man who purchased the AK-47 still has
possession of this military-style weapon.
-----
To editorialize a wee bit, Detective Lyga's Vlad-the-Impaler lecturing method is way off the chain, considering the source. If Lyga's not interested in his own future employ with the LAPD, he should at least be sensitive to the precarious position he's put the force in after a violent road-rage incident that resulted in another man's killing.
Back to the facts; here's a little background: Lyga, who is white, shot and killed 31-year-old, off-duty, black LAPD policeman Kevin Gaines on March 18, 1997. Gaines, who had ties with the Blood's street gang and who Wikipedia says was privy to death-row records, did not have a squeaky-clean reputation, but his special assignment duties probably created this stigma. A seven-year veteran of the force, Gaines took part in the notorious LAPD Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums unit that was later implicated in the Rampart Scandal (see: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rampart_scandal). An investigation spurred by Gaines' shooting and even his behavior provided an impetus to discovery of widespread corruption throughout the LAPD at the time. (See:
Lyga,
eventually exonerated by the department for killing Gaines, cost the City of Los Angeles
some bucks, however, after the Gaines family hired celebrity attorney Johnnie
Cochran to file a $25 million wrongful-death civil suit against the city.
Gaines' family settled for $250,000, according to Kevin Gaines' Wikipedia page, but the shooting
stoked racial tensions that lingered for years, the online free encyclopedia
also says. (See ibid: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Gaines_(police_officer).)
According to a Los Angeles Times commentary , during this clip Detective Lyga talks about Gaines' execution with seeming levity and jocularity: "I could have killed a whole truckload of them" with no regret, he squawked to the his class of newbie cops, reminiscing about telling the lawyer for the dead man's family the same thing.
In a commentary, Los Angeles Times writer Sandy Banks asserts: The training spiel caught on tape also included vulgar remarks about a "cute little Hispanic" sergeant, and used "male black" and "female black" so gratuitously, listening made me cringe. His tirade ought to make Lyga as much of an embarrassment to the LAPD as Donald Sterling was to the NBA. (See: click here.)
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
