LAW AND DISORDER: PROBE CASTS DARK CLOUD OVER CITY

For nine months last year, Ron Mills was locked in the Camden County
Jail.

For nine months he held firm to his story that the drugs he was
charged with possessing didn't exist.

Last month Mills' story was validated when a former Camden police
officer admitted in federal court that for more than two years he and
four other officers arrested suspects with planted drugs, carried out
illegal searches and wrote false arrest reports.

Mills' story, which was detailed by former Patrolman Kevin Parry in
court, is now being laid out in one of a growing number of lawsuits
planned against the city.

As of Friday, lawsuits, or notice of future lawsuits, have been filed
against the city in 10 cases, according to city attorney Howard McCoach.

"We're gong to be looking at each of these and determining how to
proceed," he said.

McCoach said city officials are discussing the pending lawsuits with
Camden's insurance providers. The city is responsible for all payouts
up to $300,000 -- anything above that is covered by Meadowbrook
Insurance Group.

While opinions differ on the extent of the liability Camden faces in
the still unfolding police scandal, most agree it's unlikely the city
will escape without settlements in some of the cases.

And local attorneys say they expect the number of lawsuits filed will
increase as more of the 182 people look for vindication after 185 drug
charges were recently dismissed in light of an FBI probe into the five
Camden officers.

In announcing the case dismissals for the first time last month,
Camden County Prosecutor Warren Faulk described their extent as
"unprecedented in the state of New Jersey."

Cherry Hill attorney Michael Pinsky said in his 46 years as an
attorney he has "never seen mass dismissals like this."

But the corruption in Camden isn't completely unique, as rogue
officers from Philadelphia to Los Angeles have caused thousands of
cases to be dismissed.

In the mid-1990s, a police scandal in Philadelphia's 39th District led
to at least eight officers pleading guilty to corruption charges.
Hundreds of criminal cases were thrown out by judges and lawsuits
against the city tallied at least $4 million in settlements, according
to media reports.

Around 2000, a similar scandal was exposed within a gang unit at the
Los Angeles Police Department. About 100 cases were overturned as part
of that investigation and the city was forced to pay tens of millions
to victims, according to media reports.

"I would be hard pressed to figure out a way they are going to dodge
that bullet," said Robert White, one attorney who is planning to sue
the city on behalf of his now-cleared client. "The city is not going
to be getting away from this scot-free."

Guilty plea

On March 19, former Camden Patrolman Kevin Parry detailed in U.S.
District Court in Camden that between May 2007 and October 2009 he and
the four former city officers arrested suspects with planted drugs and
threatened others with arrest if they didn't give over
information.

In other instances, Parry said he and the other officers, who weren't
named in court, conducted illegal searches, stole drugs and money
during searches and arrests, paid prostitutes for information with
drugs, prepared false police reports and lied in court to hide their
crimes.

Three of the other officers, who an attorney for the Camden police
union has identified as Jason Stetser, Antonio Figueroa and Robert
Bayard, were suspended along with Parry in November but have not been
charged. Authorities have not released the name of a fifth officer
apart from the investigation, but Camden Police Chief Scott Thomson
has confirmed all of the officers involved are not currently on the
force.

For some area attorneys, Parry's plea, which detailed a half-dozen
specific incidents where he and some of the other officers framed
suspects and carried out illegal arrests, is validation their clients
were wronged.

"Once you have a conviction for corruption it certainly helps to
establish the basis of the claim," said David Rudovsky, a law
professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

While Rudovsky said Parry's plea lends more credibility to any lawsuit
that is filed, he said the cases that were specifically named in court
appear to be the most foolproof.

One of those cases is that of Antwyan Rolax, a Camden man arrested
Dec. 27, 2009, in his home by Parry and another officer. Rolax was
charged with drug possession and spent 10 months in the Camden County
Jail before being sentenced to prison.

However, according to court records, Parry didn't have a warrant to
search Rolax's home. Now, Rolax's attorney Len Baker is drafting a
lawsuit.

"There is some substantial civil liability on the part of the city,"
Baker said. "Antwyan spent 20 months in prison for a crime he didn't
commit."

In January 2009 when Parry and three of the other officers searched
the Camden home Mills was in, the officers said Mills threw away drugs
as he ran from the home. However, in court last month, Parry
acknowledged neither the discarding of drugs nor the flight actually
occurred. Aside from that, the officers didn't have a warrant to
search the home.

Mills' attorney Ken Aita said the admission gives the lawsuit he is
drafting a "ton of credit."

And Aita believes the lack of credibility Parry now has lends strength
to suits he is planning to file on behalf of two other clients as well.

"I think that the city is going to have some major issues here," Aita
said of the pending litigation. "They are really going to have to do
something for damage control."

Aita said he suspects the city will try to argue the blame rests on
the officers themselves and can't be leveled up the chain of command
or at the department as a whole.

But Aita said he doesn't think the tactic will be successful.

"You are looking at clear liability on the side of the city," he
said.

While noting the city's liability will ultimately be decided by the
court, Thomson, the city's police chief, said the officers in question
"operated on their own accord in direct violation of not only criminal
law, but in diametric opposition to departmental procedures."

"Once we suspected their afoul activity, we aggressively took the
issue head-on," Thomson said.

Attorney White said he believes Parry's plea gives all future suits a
more credible basis.

"It cracks the whole thing open," said White, who is filing a lawsuit
on behalf of Paul Gibson.

White said Gibson was in the "wrong place at the wrong time" in April
2007 when Stetser arrested him for cocaine possession. The 73 baggies
of cocaine Gibson spent seven months in jail for possessing before
being sentenced to five years probation were planted, White said.

Since Parry has already admitted the officers planted drugs on up to
50 people, attorney Linda Campbell said there is no reason to believe
the facts are any different in the case of her client Frank Shaw.

Shaw was arrested by Stetser and Parry in the pre-dawn hours on March
27, 2008, according to a lawsuit Campbell filed in federal court last
month against the officers and the city.

According to the lawsuit, Stetser and Parry claim to have seen Shaw
involved in a hand-to-hand drug transaction. However, Campbell alleges
in the lawsuit that the drugs were planted and the search the pair did
on Shaw's Thurman Street home was illegal.

"I don't know how you could say in my case (the officers) were telling
the truth but not in any other," she said.

Not all a "slam dunk'

While there is the potential for litigation in each of the 185 cases
that have been dropped, experts say a payout in each instance would be
unlikely and not guaranteed.

In dismissing the cases, Faulk said his office dismissed all cases
"closely associated" with at least one of the five officers. Faulk
said the dismissals do not imply evidence was fabricated in all of the
cases or that none of the defendants might have in fact been guilty.

Rudovsky said this places burden on the attorneys to make allegations
their clients were in fact innocent.

"Each individual would have to prove (their arrest) was illegal in
their case and that it caused them harm," Rudovsky said.

"It's not a slam dunk that they could all sue," echoed Moorestown
attorney William Buckman.

Buckman said guilty pleas entered by some of the defendants could be
another obstacle to overcome in filing a civil suit.

However, Campbell said she doesn't see the fact that her client, Shaw,
pleaded guilty to a reduced number of drug possession charges as a
problem.

Campbell said defendants often accept plea agreements because they
feel there is no way to prove their innocence and they know if they go
to trial they are likely to get a stiffer sentence.

"People take pleas because they know the jury is probably not going to
believe them," she said. "No one is going to believe that officers
would deliberately lie."

Another factor that could come into play if the cases go to a trial is
the defendants' criminal histories, Pinsky said.

Jurors may be unwilling to hand out large settlements to a person who
has already been convicted of other crimes before, he said.

"The question is what would a jury give a person who has a bad
criminal record," asked Pinsky. "It's not like you have your next door
neighbor up there who was in the Rotary Club."

Price tag

When it comes to putting a price on the corruption, attorneys here say
they aren't exactly sure what to expect.

Attorneys also haven't disclosed exactly what they are seeking in
damages.

Baker said if he were in the shoes of his client, who was jailed for
20 months after his illegal arrest, that even $5,000 for each day he
was in prison -- roughly $3 million -- wouldn't be enough to make up
for the injustice.

Deborah Jacobs, executive director of the American Civil Liberties
Union of New Jersey, said it is hard to put a price tag on the cost of
placing an innocent person in jail.

"It's a tragedy," Jacobs said. "It has got so, so many negatives. One
is the time you actually lost. Another is the emotional impact and
suffering for the way that time was spent. It's not like (the
defendants) were on a desert island -- (they were) in prison."

McCoach, the city's attorney, declined to comment on whether the city
would try to broker a settlement outside of court. If the payouts are
expected to be above $350,000, McCoach said the city's insurance
provider, which pays for settlements above that amount, will have a
large say in how the matter is handled.

Aita said the city could face increased costs if they allow the
lawsuits to slowly wind their way through the court system as attorney
fees for the complainant are typically included in a judgment.

Aita and others said they also expect the number of lawsuits filed
against the city to continue to grow.

The state's Public Defender's Office is still working to notify some
of the people that their cases have been dismissed.

Yvonne Smith Segars, the state's head public defender, said her office
represented a majority of the defendants and is now tasked with
tracking down the transient population.

The American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey is also reaching out
into Camden. The civil rights advocacy group is holding a seminar on
civil rights at 6 p.m. Thursday at Mount Calvary Missionary Baptist
Church on Penn Street.

Jacobs said the group would like to talk with people affected by the
police scandal to see if they can be of assistance.

While there is a state statute for wrongful imprisonment that sets a
payout cap of $20,000 for each year of imprisonment or twice the
salary of the claimant, Buckman said few attorneys file lawsuits under
the statute because of its limitations.

Lawsuits filed under other statutes in state and federal court aren't
limited by the same cap and are difficult to predict, Buckman said.

"The recoveries have been various," he said of similar suits. "It's
not as if there has been one set standard."

Jacobs said it will be hard for any settlement to truly give justice
to an innocent person who was arrested and imprisoned.

"I don't think you can underestimate the damage done to somebody by
false imprisonment," she said.

"It's terrible. Outside of bodily harm, it's one of the worst things
that could ever happen to you."