The Houston Chronicle tonight shared a bit of what happened and the conditions on October 29 in the fatal wreck that killed both John M. O’Quinn and his assistant Johnny Lee Cutliff.
In part the police said that the black box of O’Quinn’s Suburban has given them more information of what happened right before the wreck, in the few sections of the black box information; that O’Quinn left the road airborne at 79 MPH, never applied his breaks and was going 76 MPH when he impaled the Suburban on a large tree; with the added condition of rain slick streets.
Police also released the toxicology report saying that neither John O’Quinn nor Johnny Lee Cutliff had been drinking nor did either man have any illicit drugs in their system.
I continued to be shocked in the realization that no matter how rich you are, no matter how powerful you are, you can still die in a instant like O’Quinn and Cutliff.
I am sure the police will release additional records after looking at the black box in greater detail. The street O’Quinn was traveling during Houston Texas morning rush hour traffic had a speed limit of 40 MPH.
Remember as the holidays come closer to please drive safe; watch the road condition and even the other cars around you. Any of us could be gone just as fast as O’Quinn and Cutliff. Whether you loved or hated John O’Quinn the man bigger than life will be missed for a very long time by those close to him and those who worked with him. It still feels surreal doesn’t it?
LATEST FILINGS IN HARRIS COUNTY TEXAS
November 24, 2009 Virgie Arthur’s Designation of two expert witnesses with the Resume of the newest one added.
The expressions in this blog article are based on the opinions of Rose Turner or our featured authors, please remember we are not lawyers and those opinions expressed here are each of our individual opinions and should not be taken as legal advice and/or legal opinions. The comments following this blog article are the opinions and sole property of the blog site members and do not necessarily reflect those of the site owners.
In a saga that appears to be getting stranger by the day, the Houston Police Department disciplined both officers involved in the fatal shooting of Roland Carnaby for not following policy.
Could the sweeping elections including ousting the current District Attorney for Harris County where Houston Texas is located, warrant a look again at the Roland Carnaby shooting? Are there new questions in the suit brought by Carnaby’s widow Susan Carnaby against the city and the police department in the Southern District Federal Court in Houston for violating her husband’s civil rights in the fatal shooting?
Last summer a grand jury failed to indict either officer, although the autopsy report clearly labels the death as a homicide. However, this week the Houston Police Department found both officers involved in the suit had failed to follow policy in the high-speed chase and shooting and issued letters to the officers dated Nov. 5, the day following the election. It was the department’s internal affairs division, which found that Sgt. Andrew J. Washington and Officer Cecil A.T. Foster did not use sound judgment and did not follow department policy in the incident.
Disciplinary records filed with the Civil Service Commission state that Washington and Foster did not follow department policy when they left their positions of cover and approached Carnaby’s vehicle without trying to talk with him first. The records also state that Washington did not properly supervise Foster.
Per the Houston Chronicle article, Chief Harold Hurtt suspended Washington for one day and gave Foster a written reprimand. Washington has appealed his suspension while Foster has filed a grievance.
Per KHOU of Houston, “In a statement released Tuesday afternoon, HPD said it issued three disciplinary actions to the officer who fired the shots and two to his supervisor following an internal affairs investigation.”
“We feel that the judgment calls they made, were the correct calls. We certainly intend on appealing the discipline,” said Gary Blankenship, HPOU to KHOU in a statement.
In accounts picked up first by the Houston Chronicle, this newest development quickly covered the national and international news setting off a new round of questions. “The Houston police officers involved in the shooting death of a man who claimed to have ties to federal law enforcement were disciplined for not trying to talk to the man before they approached his car after a high-speed chase earlier this year, according to the department’s investigation of the case.”
According to the reports, an officer pounded with a nightstick on the passenger side door. Then, as Carnaby started to get out of the driver side, another officer ran around to the front of the SUV with his gun drawn.
According to former HPD officer Tommy Nixon, in an interview with KHOU, after watching the video of what happened with Carnaby, Nixon agreed that there were violations of conduct and behavior, as well as police procedure.
Nixon also said that he had met Carnaby years earlier in a group of former intelligence officers. Nixon said that he believes Carnaby was a CIA operative, which may be why he fled.
Per TXCM.com, the investigation was launched after the death of Roland Carnaby, a 52-year-old Houston man with no prior criminal record who led police on a high-speed chase and claimed to be with the CIA.
In a sworn deposition, that officer blamed the City of Houston for poor training in high-risk vehicle approaches.
The on-scene supervisor also criticized HPD’s training process.
The disciplined supervisor has had previous actions taken against him by the department, including a suspension from duty for the violent striking of a prisoner, failure to abide by laws, insubordination and speeding.
The conspiracy site of Opednews.com has added even a stranger twist to this story by reporting, “That according to Wayne Madsen, he has been told to cease and desist reporting on the case of the shooting death of Roland Carnaby…”
Rose Speaks.com has talked to a long time friend of Roland Carnaby who asks to remain anonymous but which Susan Carnaby’s lawyer, Randy Kallinen, has verified the friendship and the source as reliable. This person describes the shooting as an “assignation” not a police shooting, and predicts the public is going to be surprised as to how deep Roland Carnaby’s connection to federal agencies including the CIA will be as the civil rights violations trial begins to unravel this mystery.
Rose Speaks.com did report that Carnaby’s laptop computer was quickly moved to the Houston Police Departments forensic department for extensive testing and that department just happens to be in the same building as the CIA’s forensic department. In Court papers filed June 7, 2008, it was shown that the Secret Service had taken possession of the laptop.
All of the newest developments unfolded after the Court Order the Houston Police Department to make available the dashboard camera views of police cars to Ms. Carnaby’s lawyer, Randy Kallinen, who then released them to the media.
Stay tuned to Rose Speaks.com as we have promised to cover all of these developments and the trial of Mrs. Carnaby against the city of Houston and the Houston Police Department.
You can pick up all of the papers in this case in our download section, opened to All not just members of Rose Speaks.com.
This article is the sole property of Rose Speaks unless otherwise stated. This article as with other articles is based on the opinion of Rose Turner, or our guest authors if so indicated. Please remember we are not lawyers and those opinions expressed here are each of our individual opinions and should not be taken as legal advice and/or legal opinions. The comments following this article are the opinions and sole property of the site members and do not necessarily reflect those of the site owners.
The main stream media has now picked up the video of Roland Carnaby being shot to death by the Houston Police Department, [HPD], and the coroner ruled it homicide but was it murder? Why did the HPD and the City of Houston fight so hard to keep this video and the others out of the public domain?
If you look at Susan Carnaby’s list of witnesses, she has an expert by the name of Roger A. Clark, from California, that is listed as a court certified expert in jail and police procedures in Federal and State Courts. The HPD however does not list anyone that is not connected to the HPD. Which leads to the question of why no FBI or ex-FBI? The other question is since the computer in Roland Carnaby’s SUV ended up in the same building as the CIA, why are there no CIA or ex-CIA are listed on the HPD witness list? Why did Don Clark allegedly lie about knowing Roland Carnaby, to have it however later be shown Clark not only knew him, Carnaby had introduced Don Clark at a speech he gave only the year before.
Why was there no aid rendered to Carnaby after he was shot in the back? Some reports right after the shooting said that no police personnel had “rubber gloves that would have allowed them to render aid”. However, they did handcuff Carnaby so they were not afraid to touch a man that lay bleeding to death in front of them.
The video is graphic and caution should be used viewing it. However as I watched it, I noticed a couple of things, I could see both of Carnaby’s hands as he got out of the SUV, that an officer slammed the SUV door on Carnaby as he was exiting the SUV, thus Carnaby had both hands out and viewable as he began to fall to the ground. Carnaby was shot in the back, and yet there were officers that could clearly see Carnaby from a front view and could see that both hands were out of the SUV. Why did an officer slammed the SUV driver door on Carnaby? Accounts say that as Carnaby was exiting the SUV, that an officer on the passenger side of the SUV was using a baton to smash the side window, thus another question of why?
Per the records and witness list of the HPD, Carnaby made multiple calls to the FBI and the Internal Affairs of the HPD, could they and did they assess Carnaby’s fear level, and if he was agitated and angry enough to be of danger to any officer in pursuit? Why did so many police vehicles including a HPD sniper join the pursuit?
I have more questions then answers, but why was there not an outside agency called to come in and investigate the shooting in a total objective view of all of the video, statements of officers, and decide if it was justifiable homicide or murder?
Roland Carnaby was “afraid” to be arrested and had never been arrested before, so why was the officer that pulled him over for speeding was told to “find something to arrest Carnaby on”? The fact that Carnaby like thousands of others in the state of Texas had passed the rigorous requirements to possess a concealed weapon is listed as one of the reasons officers felt threatened and shot Carnaby, so if any citizen of Texas with a conceal weapon permit is pulled over, should they fear being shot? Why was there no weapons located in the car at the scene of the shooting, but they were later found after the SUV had been impounded? Who had Roland Carnaby’s computer and will we ever know what was on it? Does an outside agency need to investigate how the HPD handles these situations as Susan Carnaby is asking that the HPD began to handle these situations in the future differently?
You see I have more questions then answers in this, but it does appear this is a trial in the federal court in Texas that many will be following, long after the 30 second clip of the shooting is no longer being shown by the main stream media. Which brings the final question, why is the mainstream media not covering who is Roland Carnaby?
Read the reports filed by the Houston Fire Department EMT, the autopsy report that Rose Speaks.com has obtained and watch the video. Then tell us what you think. Was this a “righteous shooting”, or was it murder?
The documents on the Roland Carnaby case is in our download section open to ALL, not just members of Rose Speaks.com.
This article is the sole property of Rose Speaks unless otherwise stated. This article as with other articles is based on the opinion of Rose Turner, or our guest authors if so indicated. Please remember we are not lawyers and those opinions expressed here are each of our individual opinions and should not be taken as legal advice and/or legal opinions. The comments following this article are the opinions and sole property of the site members and do not necessarily reflect those of the site owners.
In a brief article picked by the Houston Chronicle reporter, Brian Rogers stating in part, “HPD Sgt. A. Washington and Officer C. Foster were no-billed today, said Donna Hawkins, a spokeswoman for the Harris County District Attorney’s Office.
Roland Carnaby was fatally wounded on April 29… Carnaby, 52, of Pearland was stopped for speeding… He showed the officer an identification card that he claimed came from the Central Intelligence Agency, but fled after police learned he had a license to carry a concealed weapon.
The CIA maintains that Carnaby was not involved with the agency.”
When we contacted Susan Carnaby’s attorney, Randall L. Kallinen, for a comment, he said he was not surprise at this.
We also briefly touched on the subject that slowly Mrs. Carnaby is making progress in federal Court with the latest Order that the Estate was entitled to an imaged copy of the complete hard drive of the laptop computer that Roland Carnaby had with him at the time of his death. Likewise, Mrs. Susan Carnaby was entitled to any Blackberry PDA’s, any cell phones to have the data retrieved the data, and to have any print out of any data previously printed out by any agency in possession of those items.
The City of Houston and Mrs. Carnaby has also agreed to, submitted and the Court has signed into Order the joint agreed schedule with the jury trial now scheduled for August 3, 2009.
When ask if Mr. Kallinen felt he was beginning to make progress in the case and chip away at the objections raised in filings by the City, he did feel like slowly the truth would continue to come out.
You can download the documents from this case in our download section open to ALL, not just members of Rose Speaks.com.
This article is the sole property of Rose Speaks unless otherwise stated. This article as with other articles is based on the opinion of Rose Turner, or our guest authors if so indicated. Please remember we are not lawyers and those opinions expressed here are each of our individual opinions and should not be taken as legal advice and/or legal opinions. The comments following this article are the opinions and sole property of the site members and do not necessarily reflect those of the site owners.
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