Tuesday, June 27, 2017

Bogus statements from Missouri deputies suggest Carol broke her own arm by flailing about in back seat of patrol car after being arrested and handcuffed


Officer Debi Wade
Missouri deputies, in written statements about our unlawful eviction, suggest my wife, Carol, broke her own arm by flailing about in the back seat of a patrol car after she had been arrested and placed in handcuffs.

We're not making this up. Is there any chance this actually happened? No, and we will provide proof that it didn't happen. But first, let's examine officer statements from the Criminal Investigations Case Report we received from discovery requests in the pending criminal case ("assault on a law enforcement officer") against Carol.

Let's begin with the narrative from Officer Debi Wade, which begins on page 2 of the report. That's the same Debi Wade who prepared the Probable Cause (PC) Statement against Carol. (Note: The Criminal Investigations Report and PC Statement can be viewed by clicking at the links above, and both documents are embedded at the end of this post.)

Officer Wade's written statements are revelatory on a number of levels, but here is the main one: Her PC Statement, dated 9/22/15 (13 days after our eviction) makes no mention of Carol's broken arm. In other words, the document upon which Carol's arrest is based gives no indication she was injured. Wade's Incident Report, dated 9/10/15 (one day after our eviction) states clearly that Carol's arm was broken. Why the discrepancy? That is one of dozens of questions raised by the officers' accounts.

Here is Officer Wade's account of Carol's trip to a patrol car and what supposedly happened once Carol was inside:

As soon as Lt. [Christian] Conrad returned with the car, he and Deputy [Scott] Harrison helped [Carol] up from the ground, and Deputy Harrison walked her to the back seat of the patrol car. Carol continued jerking her arms in an attempt to get her hands out of the handcuffs again. We explained to her that if she would relax and quit fighting the cuffs, that they wouldn't hurt her wrists.

Once she was detained in the back of the car, Deputy Harrison retrieved her [Missouri] ID from her purse, and then gave the purse to Mr. Shuler. Mr. Shuler was asked to leave the scene so that the movers could get to work. He sat in his car across the street, refusing to leave the area while we allowed the movers in the house and turned the keys over to them. When I walked past the patrol car a couple of minutes later, Carol was screaming and jerking her body all over the back seat and cage of the car very violently.

Deputy Harrison went over to check on her. He asked her if she was alright. She complained again that her wrists hurt, so he double checked the handcuffs again for comfort. The handcuffs still had enough room that he could put a finger between her wrist and the inner edge of the cuff. Carol, only then mentioned that her arm hurt, but she was not exhibiting signs of pain, aside from that one calm verbal [cue]. We talked with Deputy Harrison briefly about alerting the jail that she would need a psych evaluation upon arrival at the jail, due to her very erratic and violent behavior.

Now, we come to information that Officer Wade left out of the Probable Cause Statement used to justify Carol's arrest:

After Deputy Harrison checked out at the jail with Carol, he called to advise me that she had requested that medical staff look at her left arm. He said that she couldn't see anything wrong, but he photographed it, since she was complaining that it hurt. He said that after jail medical staff looked at her arm, they insisted that she needed to get medical clearance from the ER before they would admit her into the jail. Deputy Harrison took pictures of her arm again at the hospital, as it started to show signs of swelling and bruising just above her left elbow. The initial thought was that she may have dislocated it (her elbow) when she was thrashing about in the back seat of the patrol car. Since we had seen her throw her body against the back of the seat and cage violently on scene just prior to transport, and there was no complaint about her arm until after that, it was the only thing that made sense to us.

Once the X-ray came back, Deputy Harrison called again to advise that her arm was broken and was going to require surgery. He further stated that she would have to be transported by ambulance to Cox South for the surgery. He said that Carol had remained calm throughout the trip to the jail and hospital, never acting aggressively in the least. After notifying my chain of command of the status change, it was decided to release the P.C. charges on her and let the hospital know that she was being left on her own recognizance and was free to go when they were done with her. Deputy Harrison told Carol that the 3rd degree assault case would be submitted to the prosecutor's officer for her assault on a law enforcement officer.

There is so much false rubbish in there that I'm still trying to digest it all. This seems clear: Once Officer Debi Wade starts lying, she can't stop herself.

Carol Tovich Shuler
Here are three key takeaways from Wade's report:

(1) She essentially tries to blame Carol's broken arm on Carol, from flailing (while handcuffed) in the back seat of a patrol car;

(2) Wade knew that Carol was seriously injured when she wrote her Probable Cause Statement, but she said nothing about that in the document that was used to justify Carol's arrest.

(3) Wade admits that charges against Carol had been "released" due to a "status change." In plain language, that appears to mean, "We'd better drop these charges because we broke this woman's f-----g arm." Wade gives no indication why charges later were reinstated once they already had been dropped.

We have evidence that will prove Debi Wade is lying -- and that she should be referred for criminal prosecution. We will address her lies in upcoming posts. But first, let's look at statements from other officers on the scene.


(To be continued)









39 comments:

Anonymous said...

if only you had paid your rent.

legalschnauzer said...

@8:44 --

If only you could read above a second-grade level.

Anonymous said...

The cops can't come up with a better lie than this? She broke her own arm? (Face Palm)

Anonymous said...

It's funny how many people break their own arms, break their own legs, give themselves concussions, shoot themselves full of holes, punch themselves into submission -- all after the cops arrive.

Anonymous said...

@8:44 --

Knuckle dragger.

Anonymous said...

I figured the cops would lie their asses off on this, but claiming Carol broke her own arm? I never in a million years thought they would be dumb enough to come up with that.

Anonymous said...

Hey, 8:44 --

When were Mr. and Mrs. Schnauzer ever 30 days late with their rent, which is the time frame required to start eviction proceedings under Missouri law? Why don't you cough up some evidence that shows they ever were 30 days late on rent? We'll be waiting.

Anonymous said...

Yep, people break their own arms so badly that they require trauma surgery. Happens all the time.

Anonymous said...

Bad cops must be among the stupidest people in the world. I know there are good ones, but this is almost worthy of being on the Jimmy Fallon Show.

Anonymous said...

Some coppers need to lose their jobs over this garbage.

Anonymous said...

They've never heard of seat belts in Missouri?

legalschnauzer said...

@11:08 --

You touched on a key issues here. Carol did not flail about in the back seat, buts she couldn't have if she had wanted to. Will be dealing with this issue in upcoming post. Goes to amazing cop stupidity and dishonesty.

Anonymous said...

How could you flail around in backseat enough to hurt yourself, with your hands handcuffed behind you? Seems to me all you could do is roll around a little, and that's assuming the cops were too stupid to put a seat belt on you.

Anonymous said...

Somebody in the Sheriff's department has been watching too much "Fairytale Theatre" or the land of make believe from "Mr. Rogers." Good Lord!!!

Anonymous said...

The cops might be too stupid to realize this, but a medical expert -- probably a radiologist -- will be able to look at the X-rays and determine if Carol's injuries happened the way the cops claim they did. Carol's surgeon might be able to make the same determination. If the cops are lying, they will be found out.

Anonymous said...

Even if you believe the cops' stories -- and I don't -- they are admitting negligence when they failed to secure Carol with a seat belt.

Anonymous said...

Carol looks like a softy in her photo, but you must have married the toughest woman alive, Schnauzer. My God, she "gets physical" with one officer, "barrels headfirst" into another, then breaks her own arm -- and she probably didn't need to keep a towel clenched between her teeth! She's like Col. Flagg, the CIA guy from M*A*S*H, who could inflict all sorts of harm on himself and never flinch.

legalschnauzer said...

@3:13 --

Hah, you are right. To hear cops tell it, Jim Croce must have had Carol in mind when he wrote "Roller Derby Queen."

legalschnauzer said...

From "Roller Derby Queen," by Jim Croce


She's five foot six and two fifteen
A bleached-blonde mama with a streak of mean
She knew how to knuckle
And she knew how to scuffle and fight

And the roller derby program said
That she was built like a 'fridgerator with a head
The fans called her "Tuffy"
But all her buddies called her "Spike"

(Chorus)
You know that I fell in love with a Roller Derby Queen
(Round 'n' round, oh round 'n' round)
The meanest hunk o' woman
That anybody ever seen
Down in the arena, uh huh

Round 'n round, oh round 'n round . . . round 'n round, oh round 'n round . . .

Anonymous said...

This is my favorite part of the cop's statement:

"The initial thought was that she may have dislocated it (her elbow) when she was thrashing about in the back seat of the patrol car. Since we had seen her throw her body against the back of the seat and cage violently on scene just prior to transport, and there was no complaint about her arm until after that, it was the only thing that made sense to us."


Gee, the fact we brutalized the shit out of this woman couldn't have had anything to do with her broken arm! Had to be something else!

Anonymous said...

A question for 8:44 . . .

I assume you realize this post is about cops lying about breaking a woman's arm. It doesn't say a word about rent, one way or another.

Are you suggesting it's OK for cops to break a tenant's arm -- and lie about it -- if said tenant is late with the rent? Is that the law in your strange little corner of the world?

legalschnauzer said...

@3:49 --

That truly is priceless. Thanks for spotlighting it.

legalschnauzer said...

Memo to @4:21 --

If most of your comments are deleted in the moderation queue, I doubt you are capable of composing a "thoughtful answer." All thoughtful, semi-sensible comments easily make it through the moderation queue. Even ignorant comments make it if the commenter IDs himself, which I gather you are too cowardly to do.

You are welcome to give it a shot. But if you are 8:44 and choose not to try, I doubt the world will be missing anything.

legalschnauzer said...

Memo to 4:45 --

If you want to know the answer, contact me directly via email or phone. Would be glad to discuss.

Anonymous said...

Funny how you never label as cowards any of the anonymous "favorable to you" commenters. In fact you are the coward when it comes to any comments critical of you.

legalschnauzer said...

@6:41 --

You have the mindset of a third grader, like this is a popularity contest, who has the most marbles or the most baseball cards. In fact, these are serious issues of fact and law, which often are grounded in our country's constitution.

If I've done the legwork to write a post on something here, you can rest assured I didn't take that task lightly. It doesn't mean I'm perfect, that I can't get something wrong. But it does mean I've put in the effort to try to get it right, and within the parameters of the relevant law, I usually am right.

If anyone wants to criticize my work, that's fine, but they need to realize the bar is high. I've put in the work, and I expect the critic to do the same. If the critic wants serious consideration of his view, he needs to do what I've done -- put his real name behind his work. But bomb throwers, who want to attack my work and leave a false impression about the issues at hand, without doing the hard work required . . . I have no respect for them. And they are not going to get a freebie here.

Those who are "favorable" to me, show that they have read the post and are intelligent enough to reach the right conclusion, under the facts and the law. There is no reason to label them cowards because they aren't. But the bomb thrower is both lazy and a coward.

Critics can earn their place by doing their homework. But you should be aware that I've done my homework, and while I can be wrong -- and I'm fine with somebody who shows I'm wrong -- that's not likely to happen by throwing about mindless barbs. If you think you can raise your game to the necessary level, try writing a "thoughtful response" to @3:52. In this instance, I will run it, whether you give your name or show you know what you're talking about. But if it's not up to snuff, I will rip it to shreds and show readers the truth.

Challenging me here can be done, but it's not for the faint-hearted. You'd better have an A game, and you had better bring it.

Anonymous said...

I've read the statements a couple of times and I didn't see anywhere that they said her injuries were caused by Carol thrashing in the back seat. It did say that they initially thought it was her fault, but it doesn't contain a final conclusion. So she technically didn't lie, she stated their opinion at the time.

legalschnauzer said...

@8:58 --

A few points:

(1) The post says the cop's statement "suggests" Carol broke her arm, and that's true.

(2) The post says we will provide evidence in upcoming posts that shows the cop is lying, and that's true.

(3) We will show in upcoming post that Carol states she did not flail about in the back seat of the patrol car, and that is true.

(4) Where the cop is lying, for now, is about the "flailing" issue. We will show the cop also is lying (or intentionally misleading, if you prefer) about how Carol's arm was broken.

Anonymous said...

I haven't posted in a long time since you requested I not, I hope you will not take this post is harassement since the main point of it is just to affirm the idea that Carol acquired a comminuted elbow fracture by banging around in the car is abolutely ludicrous.

I'm glad to see the benefits of competent counsel have been of real advantage so far, and that the trespass charge was disposed of appropriately.

Some medical testimony might or might not be useful in criminal court but it could inform strategy I suppose for your lawyer to be certain the her injuries were not from flailing in a car (and if Carol was distraught or disoriented, this is easily attributed to severe trauma to her arm)

What I said before I still think is most likely cause of such a fracture - it was the result of a fall - in this case Carol being roughly brought to ground - with reflexive bracing. (THIS DOES NOT MEAN ANYONE IS OFF THE HOOK FOR CAUSING HER INJURY) This type of fracture is not caused by flailing around against a squad car cage or back seat. Rough handcuffing would have exacerbated the injury but not caused it.

I think it's clear that the deputies are medically ignorant and didn't really understand the significance of things they saw correctly. It might be a good idea to catalogue her treating physicians now and perhaps for your lawyer to have a conversation about the cause of this kind of fracture with an expert, if it is relevant to her strategy for getting the remaining charge dropped.

legalschnauzer said...

@1:36 --

Quite a bit of what you say here makes sense, but I'm not sure why you can't comprehend that Carol did not "fall." As I've stated umpteen times, a cop grabbed her by the shoulders/upper body and slammed her viciously, butt first, to the ground. She landed directly on her butt, not on her arm. Her arm was broken when the same cop, while Carol was seated, yanked on both arms in an upward and backward motion. Her arm was broken before she ever was placed in the patrol car.

BTW, I believe the body slam might have caused a concussion, which likely made Carol feel disoriented and out of sorts. But she did not flail about or scream or curse or any of that. Medical records show she was treated twice with oxygen, which usually is a sign that the patient is at risk of going into shock.

In fact, the medical records show that Carol's overall health, even her life, were at risk from this extremely serious injury. To put it mildly, I resent the hell out of cops who make up stories about what happened, and others who try to explain away the actions of pure thugs, who damned near could have killed my wife -- when they had zero grounds to even be on our property.

Your own words -- "Carol being roughly brought to ground" -- do not point to a fall. If someone brings you roughly to ground, that's not a fall. That's being brutalized, which is what this was.

legalschnauzer said...

@1:36 --

Just curious. How do you know that Carol suffered a comminuted fracture? I don't believe I've published that information, so I'm not sure how you would know that.

Anonymous said...

You showed the x-rays.

Anonymous said...

I know you are hung up on the word "fall" - but I don't have the same connotation of Carol tripping by accident that you seem to ascribe to it. Falling can be caused by force, and that force includes being knocked down, backwards, to the side, whatever. The point is when then brought her down, it was fast and uncontrolled movement to the ground. It is the most common cause of the injury you've shown and described.

Anonymous said...

The point of my posting is that thrashing on the seat of a squad car is not going to cause that injury, it is nearly impossible, even if she was thrashing, which I wouldn't be surprised, because that is a painful injury and she was in a shocking situation.

If they grossly exaggerated her actions, or refused to properly attribute them to pain, I think that matters. False in one, false in all is the saying and that goes triple for police officers. People generally give officers credit for truthfulness, more than the average citizen. The flip side is when they are caught telling even a minor lie, the effect destroys their credibility more.

legalschnauzer said...

@4:28 --

Yes, I showed the X-rays. What's your point?

legalschnauzer said...

@4:32 --

I'm not hung up on the word "fall." I happen to know the meaning of the word, and you are misusing it. If someone tackles me, I didn't "fall"; I was thrown or tackled to the ground. Carol was body slammed, butt first, to the ground. Her rear-end took the force, not her arm. Her arm was broken when an officer, we call him "Mr. Blue Shirt" because that's what he was wearing, yanked on both arms in an upward and backward direction -- grabbing and wrenching on each arm, just above the elbow. It's a miracle her right arm wasn't broken, too.

Two things we are going to get straight:

(1) Carol's injury had nothing to do with a fall.

(2) A fall is NOT the most common cause of this injury. Trauma, as in a car wreck, is the No. 1 cause -- and this type of injury occurs in only 2 percent of adult fractures. It's rare, thank God.

(3) The force applied to Carol's arm was equivalent to what you might find in a car wreck. Imagine that, if you can. We're talking vicious treatment by cops, who had no lawful grounds to be on the property.

BTW, you haven't revealed how you came to use the term comminuted, when I have not used it in my reporting. Do you have unauthorized access to Carol's medical records? If so, you are treading on thin ice.

legalschnauzer said...

@4:38 --

You seem to be saying these cops are lying fools. You will get no argument from me on that.

Anonymous said...

I believe the point about you showing x-rays is that is how he knew it was a comminuted fracture. Just looking at the x-ray you can tell it is a comminuted fracture or a break or splinter of the bone into more than two fragments.

legalschnauzer said...

@5:32 --

You might be right. The commenter must be a doctor, nurse, lawyer, etc. to know the X-ray shows a comminuted fracture. That's not a term most people know. It's odd that I've run that X-ray and others multiple times and never had anyone say, "Hey, that's a comminuted fracture." In fact, I've had a number of commenters try to downplay the seriousness of Carol's injury. Odd that they now recognize it as a severe injury, even knowing the name for it. I wasn't aware that we had so many amateur radiologists out there.