In Nashville, Tennessee two young police officers wrongly shot and killed a 61-year old man in his home, thinking he was involved in a drug-related incident.

John Adams, was shot three times by officers Kyle Shedran (25) and Greg Day (24) after he reportedly shot at them with a sawed-off shotgun. The man’s widow, Loraine, says that she thought it was a home invasion when the officers burst into their house. In the panic that ensued, Loraine shouted to her husband to get his gun, which he did.

The officers handcuffed Mrs. Adams and locked her in another room before the shooting began. Mr. Adams was shot three times and died later at the Vanderbilt Medical Centre in Nashville.

Lebanon Police Chief Billy Weeks admitted that the police had gotten the wrong information from a drug informant and had made a mistake when breaking into the house. He said “It’s a very severe mistake, a costly mistake. It makes us look at our own policies and procedures to make sure this never happens again!”

Weeks insists that the two young officers were not at fault, although the widow of the deceased thinks otherwise. Loraine Adams was quoted as saying “They need to get rid of those men, boys with toys!”

The case is now being handled by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation as well as the NAACP (The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) who feel that race may have played a part in the officers’ hasty actions, considering that the two young officers were white and John Adams was black.

Police Chief Weeks and the family members of the deceased do not seem to think race played a part, but one thing is for certain, the incident will strain relations between the police and the black members of the community.

Weeks has handed over all of the evidence to the Investigation Bureau and the District Attorney General, Tommy Thompson for further investigation. A simple but effective step has already been made and that is to have every warrant carefully reviewed by a command officer beforehand.

Two police officers in Marion County were arrested and charged with “Misconduct in Office and Assault and Battery 1st Degree” after they used excessive force on a woman they were arresting.

The two officers, Corporal Eric Walters and Sergeant Frankie Brown were attempting to arrest an unknown female perpetrator and resolved to using excessive force and shocked her numerous times with a shock gun. While it is not known whether the woman was being aggressive or violent, the claims that the officers used excessive force have not been taken lightly.

The State Law Enforcement division in Oregon is investigating the case and the two officers have already been fired from the Marion County police department and could face up to ten years in prison if found guilty. Both Walters and Brown were given a $10.000 personal recognisance bond by the Marion County Magistrate.

The case is now awaiting trial and 4th Circuit Assistant Solicitor, Shipp Daniel has been asked to prosecute the case. Shipp has stated that he cannot comment on the case itself while it’s still pending.

In Los Angeles, two deputy officers have filed a lawsuit against…members of the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department, citing “retaliation, malicious prosecution, constitutional violations and conspiracy and harassment.”

The two deputies, James Sexton and Michael Rathbun, filed the lawsuit against Sheriff Leroy Baca, Undersheriff Paul Tanaka, Lt. Greg Thompson and Detective Perkins, stating that “an inappropriate relationship exists between certain LASD personnel and various inmate jail gangs, especially white supremacists.” The deputies believe that some of the members of the LASD are members of a white supremacy gang and revealed numerous allegations against them including hiding an inmate from the FBI and covering up an incident involving a skinhead deputy.

The first allegation was for an incident that occurred in 2011 where members of the LASD intentionally hid an inmate from the FBI (who was apparently an FBI informant) and had more than a dozen deputies watching his every move. In February of 2012, the two deputies were part of an intelligence unit called Operation Safe Jail, where they found out that one of their fellow deputies was closely associated with a powerful and dangerous white supremacy gang member.

The lawsuit also alleges that Undersheriff Tanaka encouraged police gangs and that they should “operate outside of the confines of the law”. Sexton and Rathbun also claimed that corrupt officers encouraged white supremacy inmates to verbally abuse them, calling them “race traitors” and “snitches”.

The lawsuit and its allegations eventually led to the firing of Deputy Rathbun, although officials claim Rathbun was fired for being caught drunk driving.

Rathbun claims that other officers had also on occasion been caught drinking and driving but were never fired and claims that his charge was upgraded from a minor misdemeanour to a felony.

Furthermore, the LASD released the video of Rathbun’s DUI incident to the public to, as Rathbun claims, “discredit…and ruin [my] life!” Both Sexton and Rathbun have requested a jury trial and compensation for lost wages and benefits.

When 18 year old, Ryan Mash pulled up to the drive-through at a McDonald’s in DeKalb Country, Georgia, he did not expect to have a gun aimed at him by a police officer!

Sergeant Scott Biumi, a 20-year veteran of the Dekalb County police force, allegedly got out of his vehicle, approached Mash’s vehicle, aimed a gun at him and accused Mash of “holding up the line”! The teenager also said that Biumu had uttered the words “You don’t know who you’re messing with” to him while holding a gun to his neck!

Video surveillance cameras caught the incident at the drive-through, where a man wearing a business suit, got out of an unmarked car, walked over to Mash and pointed a gun at him. A witness at the scene, Drake Thomson told a reporter for CBS that he saw a badge when the man pulled out his gun.

The surveillance footage of the car’s number plates at the McDonald’s helped Forsyth County police officers track down the vehicle back to the Dekalb County police department and subsequently led them to Biumi. The suspect was identified by witnesses and was arrested. The Forsyth police Sheriff, Duane K. Piper was “shocked” and said the incident led to a “severe break in judgement”, considering that it was a police officer who acted so violently and unpredictably.

After Biumi’s arrest, the DeKalb County police chief, Cedric Aleksander, told CBS news that Scott Biumi was placed on “administrative leave with pay” for the duration of the investigation. Biumi was released from prison, however, on a $22,000 bond, but is still awaiting trial, which has reportedly been scheduled for May 23rd.

A woman was literally squashed to death by a Japanese police officer who sat on her.

Police officers in Saka City, Osaka, Japan got a call at 7am from a family that was complaining of an middle-aged woman being disorderly in their neighborhood.

A group of officers, among them a heavy-set officer, arrived on the scene to find the accused, a woman in her 40′s, being disorderly and causing a stir outside of her home by throwing items and possessions around. Not being able to calm the woman down, the officers managed to finally subdue her after 20 minutes. They brought her to the ground and held her by her arms and legs. The heavy-set officer assisted his colleagues by sitting on top of the woman.

The accused officer apparently weighed over 100kg and it is presumed that when he sat on the woman, she suffered a case of hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy (or HIE), which in essence is the result of oxygen flow being cut off from the brain. The woman eventually passed out and was taken to a local hospital where she unfortunately passed away five days later.

Following the incident, Japanese prosecutors filed charges of “professional negligence resulting in death of a suspect” against the officer accused of killing the woman. An investigation is currently underway to determine whether the officers were using excessive force during the apprehension of the disorderly woman. Officials have also yet to determine whether the woman had any prior medical conditions and/or was taking any narcotics which could result in, or at least speed up the process of HIE.

In addition, there were no reports available regarding the officer’s height or body fat percentage which would indicate that he had indeed been too large to sit on the woman in question and subsequently cause her death.

The police commissioner of the Philadelphia police department, Charles Ramsey announced at a press conference that one of the department’s M16 rifles had gone missing from the storage locker at the Philadelphia Police Training Academy.

Ramsey stated that the discovery was made during a regular audit of the locker and its weapons. He also mentioned that only a small, select few, number of officers had access to the locker, thus assuring the public that the weapon was not stolen by anyone outside of the police department.

According to nbcphiladelphia.com, Ramsey insisted that he had never heard of such a thing having occurred in the department before. He also made it clear that they had the rifle’s serial number on record, that all personel with access to the locker would be thoroughly investigated and that the culprit would receive time in the federal penitentiary, adding that it is a “federal crime” to posses this type of weapon.

As a further precautionary measure, commissioner Ramsey has announced that a full audit will be held to make sure all of the department’s weapons are accounted for.

Whether the M16 rifle was misplaced or an officer forgot to return it is the question on everyone’s mind and an answer is needed before the firearm falls into the wrong hands.

A year ago, on April 12th in Brooklyn, 27 year old Tamon Robinson was killed by NYPD officers after they chased him from Bayview Houses, Canarsie for allegedly stealing paving stones.

According to witnesses the police chased Robinson in their police cruisers and eventually ran him over with one of the vehicles. DNAinfo claims that witnesses saw officers pull Robinson from under the car, yelling “Wake up, wake up” at the young man before throwing him onto the hood of the car.

The twist in this whole tragedy is that the NYPD now claim that Robinson actually ran into a stationary police cruiser, causing him to fall back and fatally hit his head on the pavement. To make matters even worse, the NYPD sent Robinson’s family a bill for damages caused to the cruiser in the incident (which was quickly withdrawn after the media picked up on it)!

District Attorney Charles Hynes is considering whether to bring the case forward to the grand jury. The Daily News reports that Hynes will bring in an “independent expert” to reconstruct the crash, before he can make any further decisions on the matter.

In a similar incident in August of last year, officers rammed a fleeing dirt bike with their police cruiser in the Bronx, killing the rider and injuring a passenger. The Daily News reports that the NYPD’s “Patrol Guide” states that the use of police cruisers to ram and stop fleeing vehicles is strictly prohibited! This then begs the question “Are police cruisers allowed to be used to ram and stop fleeing citizens?”

Vancouver police department is investigating the story behind a video of one of their officers hitting a man in the face during the arrest.

Andishae Akhavan was riding his bicycle without a helmet through downtown Yaletown when he got stopped by two plainclothes police officers. One of the bystanders started filming the arrest as the cops were trying to handcuff Akhavan. He asked “What is this for?” but didn’t get an answer, not knowing why he was getting arrested. As Akhavan moved his hand in a non threatening way without raising his voice or resisting, he got punched in the face. An officer with a British accent told him that he was punched for resisting arrest.

Vancouver’s police union president Tom Stamatakis stated that Akhavan drove his bike in a way that “put a lot of people in some risk, whether it’s accident or injury” and “allegedly confrontational with police”. Further investigation is to show whether the use of force was necessary.

After tweeting an anti-police picture depicting a police spokesperson being shot in the head, artist Jennifer Pawluck (20) was detained and brought into questioning in Montreal.

Even though she wasn’t aware of the implications that the sharing of the picture would bring, Pawluck told the Huffington Post Quebec that many of her friends dislike the police, and that the only reason she shared it was because she thought it was funny. “I don’t even know who Ian Lafrenière is”.

Pawluck took the photo in the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve neighbourhood of Montreal, and it depicts the named police official getting shot in the head with his name and the imprint ACAB next to it.

A day after uploading the pic to instagram, she was detained and held for 4 hours, where she told that she didn’t mean to harass Lafrenière and make him fear for his safety. Her trial has been set for April 17th, and until then she’s been given a restraining order, one kilometer from the location of Lafrenière.

In another case of a trigger-happy police officer an innocent 16-year-old black teen got shot in the face after being mistaken for a robber.

Oakland police received a call about an armed robbery on 10th and Clay Street around 9.50 p.m. The suspects were described as three black men in their twenties, armed with knives and riding bicycles. When the police arrived, one of the witnesses told them the suspects were about to commit another robbery down the block and directed them towards a group of teenagers hanging out in the street.

Even though none of the teens had a bike and they didn’t match the age description, the cops detained them as suspects.

A couple of minutes later, a cop pulled out his gun and shot one of the teenagers in the face. The bullet scraped the 16-year-old’s jaw and cheek, but luckily didn’t cause any serious injuries. It turned out later that the boy and his friends didn’t have any involvement in the robbery.

Oakland police has admitted their mistake but further action against the cop responsible for the shooting is still unknown.