Charges Against Officers in Video ‘Sting’ Dismissed

Criminal charges against two former Long Beach police officers secretly videotaped in a violent confrontation with black activist Don Jackson were dismissed Monday after jurors split 11-1 for acquittal.

Municipal Court Judge James Wright’s decision to dismiss the assault charges brought to an end a case that focused national attention on the issue of police brutality against blacks, only to be overtaken by interest in the Rodney G. King beating.

The case against Mark Dickey and Mark Ramsey--the longest misdemeanor trial in Long Beach history--will not be retried, according to prosecutor Herb Lapin.

Dickey was charged with assault after an NBC-TV camera crew secretly videotaped him Jan. 14, 1989, as he appeared to push Jackson through a plate-glass window after a routine traffic stop. Both men were also charged with falsifying their police report on the incident.

Jackson, a former Hawthorne police sergeant, had set out with the TV crew to conduct a “sting” against the Long Beach Police Department to support his allegation of widespread police misconduct against blacks. While being filmed, the officers arrested him for investigation of resisting arrest, but no charges were filed.

The only black on the jury, Charles Woolery, sided with Jackson but said that “color had nothing at all to do” with his position, adding that he believed Dickey and Ramsey to be guilty.

After the judge’s announcement, Dickey and Ramsey smiled broadly, hugged family members and spent at least an hour thanking jurors. They then joined their attorneys and most of the jurors, including the three alternates, in a three-hour lunch at a waterfront restaurant.

“It’s finally over,” said Ramsey, 28. “Now, everybody knows what happened out there.”

Dickey, 30, thanked the city’s police officers, including those who stopped by during the 10-week trial to shake hands and give their support.

“The Long Beach Police Department has taken a lot of undue criticism,” Dickey said.

The Jackson case rocked the Police Department two years ago, prompting the police chief to crack down on his officers with additional discipline, supervision and stings of his own.

Jackson, in a phone interview Monday, said the city’s Police Department needed shaking up. Jackson said he came to Long Beach “to educate the public.” But he said the 11-1 jury split in favor of the former officers means he will probably come back to conduct more stings.

“The public has not gotten the message,” Jackson said. He called the mistrial “an endorsement for police abuse, for racism.”

“This is part of a tradition. Who am I to deserve justice? People have been lynched and murdered in this country. This is what it means to be black in America,” said Jackson, now a criminology student at Pennsylvania State University.

Leaders from the local branch of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People, who closely monitored the trial, were also upset.

“I was just thinking, if Los Angeles wants to move the Rodney King police brutality case to Long Beach, they can do it and they would declare that nothing happened,” said Ernest McBride, a longtime NAACP member.

Some jurors said they had believed the officers guilty when they first saw the videotapes.

“The first time I saw them, it really honestly looked like (Dickey) did it,” said juror Teresa Hernandez, 32, of Compton.

But after seeing slow-motion versions of the tapes, most jurors concluded that the officer did not purposely push Jackson into the window and that Jackson broke the glass with his elbows, not his head, as he claimed. Jurors even experimented in the jury room, taking turns pushing each other, said Hernandez, a telephone company supervisor.

“Even before they got stopped, there were red flags,” said juror Marie Sterbenz of Torrance.

Several jurors said that the enhanced tapes showed Jackson acting suspiciously. He appeared, for example, to be ducking his head down inside the car. The officers testified that they wondered if his behavior meant Jackson was hiding a weapon.

Some jurors appeared less certain about defense arguments about the charge of falsifying a police report.

One psychologist, a former Long Beach police officer, attributed inaccuracies in the police report, such as claims that Jackson used profanity, to “post-traumatic stress syndrome.” The officers were under stress and likely to misperceive what happened, psychologist Robin Klein testified. What they wrote in their report--even if inaccurate--was how they remembered it, he said. When Jackson repeatedly questioned Dickey’s command, for example, Dickey perceived it as Jackson talking back to him using four-letter words, he said. The tapes show that it was Dickey, and not Jackson, who used obscenities.

“Frankly, I have a real problem with people who use stress as an excuse. However, I believe that stress occurs,” said juror Vince Kmett, 42, a manager for a steamship company.

The prosecutor called the post-traumatic stress syndrome defense “ludicrous.”

“It’s a simple case of two officers who falsified a police report,” Lapin had told jurors.

Most jurors disagreed and several called the Jackson sting “a show.”

“It was a show. It was a show that got out of hand,” said juror Heather Wilson, 22, of Long Beach.

“All of the evidence proved that they were innocent. One of the jurors just didn’t want to look at the evidence,” Wilson said.

Woolery said that being the dissenting vote placed him in an uncomfortable position, which he compared to “spending time in an alligator pit.”

“They didn’t see it like I saw it. I saw excessive force. I saw excessive force more than one time,” Woolery said.

But other jurors said that Woolery had made up his mind early on.

“We spent most of the time arguing with him. He wouldn’t deliberate with us,” said James Schramm, 34, a forklift driver from Lakewood.

“We have 12 people on this jury,” Schramm said. “Since day one, 11 of us have hung out together. One person refused to join us. He was always invited to come. He never did.” Woolery was often seen sitting alone during breaks while other jurors milled about together, having coffee or going to lunch.

Dickey and Ramsey said they are eager to move on to new jobs. Both said they are considering returning to school. The former officers retired last year on stress-related disabilities related to the Jackson case and will be paid 50% of their salaries for life.