ABC News Videos
Demonstrators in Cleveland Arrested After Michael Brelo Verdict

By Aaron Josefczyk and Kim Palmer

CLEVELAND (Reuters) - A Cleveland police officer was found not guilty on Saturday in the shooting deaths of an unarmed black man and a woman after a high-speed car chase in 2012, one in a series of cases that have raised questions over police conduct and race relations in the United States.

Judge John O'Donnell said Officer Michael Brelo, 31, acted reasonably in shooting the two suspects while standing on the hood of their surrounded car and firing multiple rounds through the windshield. Brelo, who was among a group of officers who fired on the car, was found not guilty of voluntary manslaughter and aggravated assault.

Protesters took to Cleveland streets on Saturday night as police patrolled in riot gear. Cleveland police spokeswoman Jennifer Ciaccia said that more than 20 people had been arrested.

Brelo's trial, which began on April 6, took place at a time when U.S. law enforcement is under scrutiny for the use of lethal force against minority groups. It followed a series of high-profile deaths of unarmed black men in confrontations with police, which have prompted sometimes violent demonstrations.

The two people who were killed, Malissa Williams and Timothy Russell, were black and Brelo, a former Marine, is white.

View gallery

A protestor lies on the ground on a downtown intersection as Cleveland police officers block them fr …

"Brelo was acting in conditions difficult for even experienced officers to imagine," O'Donnell said during the roughly hour-long reading of the verdict.

"He was in a strange place at night surrounded by gunfire, sirens and flashing bulbs. Brelo did not fire too quickly or at a person who was clearly unarmed or unable to run him over," he added.

Soon after the verdict, a small crowd of demonstrators took to the streets chanting "No justice, no peace," with protests becoming larger and more unruly. Police said on Twitter there was an incident with a large crowd with people spraying others with pepper spray.

Police arrested at least three people at a restaurant after someone threw an object through a window and injured a customer.

Reaction to the verdict was swift on social media, with many saying they were bewildered.

View gallery

Protestors gather in a downtown intersection as a Cleveland Police officers block them from an RTA b …

U.S. Representative Marcia Fudge, a Democrat from Ohio, called the decision a "stunning setback on the road to justice."

"The verdict is another chilling reminder of a broken relationship between the Cleveland Police Department and the community it serves," she said in a statement.

"Today we have been told – yet again – our lives have no value," added Fudge, who is African-American.

The U.S. Justice Department said its civil rights division, the U.S. attorney's office and the FBI were reviewing testimony and evidence from the state trial and would determine if federal action would be taken.

"While the law and the court ... found him not guilty, we feel that he was culpable and he was far from innocent, as was the city of Cleveland in their role in this situation," Paul Cristallo, an attorney for Russell's family, told a news conference.

View gallery

Protesters walk outside the Justice Center following the not guilty verdict for Cleveland police off …

Brelo's attorney, Patrick D'Angelo, described prosecutors as "ruthless" for pursuing the charges against his client. "It was classically a case of David vs Goliath," he said.

The trial came months after the Justice Department found the Cleveland Police Department systematically engages in excessive use of force against civilians. It launched the investigation after a series of incidents, including the Brelo case.

The department, in a December report, found that supervisors tolerated and in some cases, endorsed use of unnecessary or unreasonable force.

Just days before the report was released, a Cleveland police officer shot and killed Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy who was carrying what turned out to be a replica gun that typically fires plastic pellets. The shooting is under investigation.

CAR CHASE

View gallery

Renee Robinson (R) and Alfredo Williams, cousins of Malissa Williams, stand outside the Justice Cent …

Ahead of Saturday's verdict, Cleveland officials braced for demonstrations, concerned about flashes of violence that erupted in Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri, after fatal shootings of unarmed black men.

Six officers involved in the Baltimore incident in April have been indicted, while a Missouri grand jury decided against bringing charges against the officer who fatally shot Michael Brown in Ferguson last August.

Mayor Frank Jackson said he hoped Cleveland would stay peaceful. "Actions that cross the line, either by police officers or citizens, can not and will not be tolerated," he said.

Five other police supervisors were indicted on misdemeanor dereliction of duty charges in the deaths of Williams and Russell and are scheduled to go on trial in July. Dozens of officers have been disciplined and Cleveland paid the families of Williams and Russell $1.5 million each to settle a wrongful death lawsuit.

Brelo, who waived his right to a jury trial, will remain on unpaid suspension until a police review is completed, Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams said.

The chase, which started in downtown Cleveland after reports of gunfire coming from the car, went through multiple cities at speeds topping 90 mph (145 kph) and ended with 13 Cleveland police officers firing 137 rounds.

Russell was struck 24 times and Malissa Williams 23 times. No weapon was found in the car or along the route. A forensic mechanic testified that the car was prone to backfiring.

The judge found Brelo, who climbed on the car's hood once it had been cornered by patrol cars, had acted reasonably in the belief that the suspects were shooting at him and other officers.

(Additional reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles, Writing by Paul Thomasch; Editing by Robin Pomeroy, Janet Lawrence and Frances Kerry)

A tank of the Iraqi army is seen on the outskirts of the city of Falluja, Iraq May 19, 2015. REUTERS/Stringer

BAGHDAD/BEIRUT (Reuters) - Iraqi forces recaptured territory from advancing Islamic State militants near the recently-fallen city of Ramadi on Sunday, while in Syria the government said the Islamists had killed hundreds of people since capturing the town of Palmyra.

The fall of Ramadi and Palmyra, on opposite ends of the vast territory controlled by Islamic State fighters, were the militant group's biggest successes since a U.S.-led coalition launched an air war to stop them last year.

The near simultaneous victories against the Iraqi and Syrian armies have forced Washington to examine its strategy, which involves bombing from the air but leaving fighting on the ground to local forces in both countries.

In a sharp criticism of Washington's ally, U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter accused Iraq's army of abandoning Ramadi, a provincial capital west of Baghdad, to a much smaller enemy force.

"The Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight," he told CNN's State of the Union program. "They vastly outnumbered the opposing force, and yet they withdrew from the site."

Iraq's government, along with Iran-backed Shi'ite militiamen and locally-recruited Sunni tribal fighters, launched a counter-offensive on Saturday, a week after losing Ramadi. A police major and a pro-government Sunni tribal fighter in the area said they had retaken the town of Husaiba al-Sharqiya, about 10 km (6 miles) east of Ramadi.

"Today we regained control over Husaiba and are laying plans to make more advances to push back Daesh fighters further,” said local tribal leader Amir al-Fahdawi, using an Arabic acronym for Islamic State, also known in English as ISIS or ISIL.

“The morale of the (pro-government) fighters is high after the arrival of reinforcements and loads of ammunition," Fahdawi said. "Today's advance will speed up the clock for a major advance to regain control of Ramadi."

Planes were bombing Islamic State positions on the opposite bank of the Euphrates river, where the militants were launching mortars and sniper fire to prevent the pro-government forces advancing, Fahdawi and the police major said.

MASS EXECUTIONS

Days after taking Ramadi, Islamic State also defeated forces of the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad to capture Palmyra, home to 50,000 people and site of some of the world's most extensive and best-preserved Roman ruins.

The fighters have killed at least 400 people, including women and children in Palmyra since capturing the ancient Syrian city four days ago, Syrian state media said on Sunday.

It was not immediately possible to verify that account, but it was consistent with reports by activists that the Islamist fighters had carried out executions, leaving hundreds of bodies in the streets.

The Sunni Muslim militants have proclaimed a caliphate to rule over all Muslims from territory they hold in both Syria and Iraq. They have a history of carrying out mass killings in towns and cities they capture, and of dynamiting and bulldozing ancient monuments, which they consider evidence of paganism.

"The terrorists have killed more than 400 people ... and mutilated their bodies, under the pretext that they cooperated with the government and did not follow orders," Syria's state news agency said, citing residents inside the city.

Many of those killed were state employees, including the head of the nursing department at the hospital and all her family members, it said.

Islamic State supporters have posted videos on the Internet they say show fighters going room to room in Palmyra's government buildings, searching for hiding troops and pulling down pictures of Assad and his father.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors violence in the country with a network of sources on the ground, says beheadings have taken place in the town since it fell but has not given an estimate for the toll among civilians.

It says at least 300 soldiers were killed in the days of fighting before the city was captured.

"A bigger number of troops have disappeared and it is not clear where they are," Rami Abdulrahman from the Observatory told Reuters.

SETBACKS

Washington supports the government of Iraq but is opposed to Assad's government in Syria, making it more difficult to build a unified coalition against Islamic State, the most powerful force among Sunni Arabs in multi-sided civil wars in both countries.

In Iraq, government forces and Iran-backed Shi'ite militia advanced against the Sunni militants north of Baghdad in the Tigris river valley earlier this year, recapturing former dictator Saddam Hussein's home city of Tikrit.

But the insurgents responded by going on the offensive west of Baghdad in the valley of Iraq's other great river, the Euphrates, among the most hotly fought areas during the 2003-2011 U.S. occupation.

Washington worries that Baghdad's response of sending Shi'ite militia into the area for a counter-offensive could increase sectarian anger and play into Islamic State's claim to defend Sunnis from a Shi'ite dominated government in Baghdad.

In Syria, where a four-year civil war has killed 250,000 people and made 8 million homeless, Assad's government has been losing territory in recent months, both to Islamic State and to other Sunni groups, some of which are supported by the West.

(Reporting by Baghdad Bureau, Mariam Karouny in Beirut, Isabel Coles in Erbil and Andrea Shalal in Washington; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Andrew Heavens)

Associated Press Videos
Ohio Patrolman Acquitted in 137-Shot Case

CLEVELAND (AP) — The streets returned to calm Sunday after police arrested dozens of demonstrators overnight when protests grew increasingly aggressive in the wake of a patrolman's acquittal in the deaths of two unarmed black suspects.

In total, 71 people were arrested, including several who turned their anger toward bystanders in downtown Cleveland, Police Chief Calvin Williams said. Someone picked up a restaurant sign and hit a patron in the head, and other protesters used pepper spray on passers-by and restaurant patrons sitting at outdoor cafes.

But Mayor Frank Jackson thanked the vast majority of protesters who remained peaceful and respectful as they voiced their frustration with Saturday's verdict.

Officer Michael Brelo, 31, faces administrative charges while remaining suspended without pay after he was found not guilty on two counts of voluntary manslaughter, but he no longer faces the prospect of prison. The anxious city now awaits a decision on criminal charges against a white officer in the fatal shooting of a black 12-year-old boy with a pellet gun.

Brelo and 12 other officers fired 137 shots at a car with Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams inside it on Nov. 29, 2012. The shooting occurred at the end of a 22-mile chase involving more than 100 Cleveland police officers and 60 cruisers after Russell's Chevy Malibu backfired while speeding past police headquarters. During the chase, an officer reported that he thought he'd seen Williams with a gun. At the end, police mistook police gunfire for shots from Russell's car.

Brelo fired 49 of those shots that night, but it was the final 15 fired into the windshield while he stood on the hood of Russell's car that led to his indictment and a four-week trial. He faced up to 22 years in prison if convicted on both counts.

Victim's Sister: God Will Judge Acquitted CopPlay video

The shooting helped prompt an investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice that concluded Cleveland police had engaged in a pattern and practice of excessive use of force and violations of people's civil rights.

Jackson said protesters were encouraged to continue expressing their opinions as long as they stayed peaceful. Williams said police only moved in Saturday when things got violent and people refused to disperse.

"We want to make sure that people understand we're going to help you in this process but if things turn violent, as we stated in the beginning, we will take action to preserve safety in the city," Williams said.

The protests erupted as authorities work to complete an investigation into the Tamir Rice shooting, the findings of which will be given to the prosecutor's office to decide whether to pursue criminal charges.

Alicia Kirkman, 47, of Cleveland, said she joined the march in honor of her son, killed in a police shooting eight years ago.

Prosecutor: 'Case Will Prevent Future Deaths&# …Play video

"I'm just so mad we never get justice from any of the police killings," said Kirkman, who said she settled with the city after her son's death but no charges were filed.

The judge said in his ruling that he wouldn't "sacrifice" Brelo to the wave of anti-police sentiment that has swept across the nation in the wake of other police in-custody deaths. While protests in cities like Baltimore, New York City and Ferguson, Missouri, have erupted into violence, the demonstrations in Cleveland didn't escalate.

The judge's decision to acquit Brelo focused on which shots killed Russell, 43, and Williams, 30, two homeless drug addicts with a long history of mental illness. Four of the 23 gunshot wounds to Russell and seven of Williams' 24 wounds were believed to have been fatal. Judge John P. O'Donnell said in his 35-page verdict that while testimony showed Brelo fired some of the fatal shots, other officers fired kill shots as well.

A grand jury charged five police supervisors with misdemeanor dereliction of duty for failing to control the chase. All five have pleaded not guilty and no trial date has been set.

Prosecutors had argued that when Brelo stood on the hood of the Malibu that he meant to kill Russell and Williams instead of containing a threat to his and other officers' lives. O'Donnell ruled that even the last 15 shots were justified based on Brelo's belief that someone inside the car had fired at police at the beginning, middle and end of the chase.

Raw: Protests Erupt After Officer AcquittalPlay video

"Officer Brelo risked his life on that night," Brelo's lead attorney, Patrick D'Angelo, said after the verdict.

Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Tim McGinty said he respected O'Donnell's decision, and added that the case would prevent police violence.

In addition to the Tamir Rice case, the county prosecutor's office is looking into the death of a black woman who died in police custody while lying face first on the ground in handcuffs. The family of Tanisha Anderson, 37, has sued the city of Cleveland and the two police officers who subdued her. They say she panicked Nov. 12 when officers put her in the back of a patrol car after they'd responded to a call about Anderson having a mental health crisis.

Russell's sister, Michelle, said Brelo would ultimately face justice, despite the judge's decision. The city of Cleveland has paid the families of Russell and Williams a total of $3 million to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit.

"He's not going to dodge this just because he was acquitted," Michelle Russell said. "God will have the final say."

___

Associated Press writers Andrew Welsh-Huggins, John Seewer in Toledo and John Coyne contributed to this report.



Cleveland streets now calm after night's protests

Officers dressed in riot gear made multiple arrests during overnight confrontations with demonstrators.
Angry but mostly orderly

Athens (AFP) - Greece warned Sunday it has no money to repay the International Monetary Fund on time in June unless a deal is reached with its creditors, in a stark warning that the country could be just days away from defaulting.

Athens already had a close shave in May, when it was only able to scrape together the 750 million euros ($845 million) due to the IMF then by raiding its emergency reserves.

With the clock ticking down to four more debt instalments from June 5, Interior Minister Nikos Voutsis told Mega TV that the country has nothing left for the IMF in its coffers.

"The instalments for the IMF in June are 1.6 billion euros ($1.8 billion). This money will not be given. There isn't any to be given. This is a known fact," Voutsis said.

Nevertheless, the minister believes that negotiations between Athens and its creditors were taking place "on the basis of cautious optimism that there will be a strong agreement".

Greece's radical-left government has been locked in negotiations with its creditors -- the IMF, the European Union and the European Central Bank -- for the past four months in a bid to unlock some 7.2 billion euros in bailout cash.

View gallery

Nikos Voutsis (right) speaks with Greek Finance Minister Yanis on March 18, 2015 in parliament in At …

The Syriza government, which was elected in January on its anti-austerity promises, has so far refused to agree to key economic reforms that the creditors want in exchange for the rescue funds.

But with a punishing debt repayment schedule in the next three months, the country now desperately needs the rescue funds.

In addition, the government has running costs to meet, including salaries to civil servants and pensions.

Last week, the parliamentary spokesman for Syriza said that the government would be unable to honour a repayment to the IMF on June 5 as its priority is to pay salaries, pensions and running costs.

"No country can repay its debts with only the money from its budget," Nikos Filis told Ant1 television.

View gallery

"We have done what we ought to do, now it's Europe's turn to do so," PM Alexis Tsi …

- 'Europe's turn to act' -

While ramping up its warnings of a looming default, Greece's government has also refused to budge on its anti-austerity promises.

"We have done what we ought to do, now it's Europe's turn to do so," Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said in a speech to his radical-left Syriza party's central committee on Saturday, where he claimed the country is "in the homestretch of a painful and difficult period".

According to Mega TV, Tsipras had asked US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew to help persuade the IMF to agree to delaying all four June repayment installments to the end of the month.

In an interview with the BBC on Sunday, Greece's Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis also warned: "We have done remarkably well for an economy that doesn't have access to the money markets to meet our obligations. At some point, we will not be able to do it."

For some in Syriza, it was perhaps time to think about simply leaving the eurozone.

"Who says that if we exit the eurozone and we return to the national currency this will be a disaster?", asked Energy Minister, Panagiotis Lafazanis during the Syriza's Central Commission session on Sunday.

His group within Syriza, the Left Platform, circulated a letter on Sunday urging the government not to meet the IMF payments if the creditors insist on their "blackmailing attitude".

Others in the ruling party are less radical, including MEP Dimitris Papadimoulis who called on Syriza to accept "difficult compromises" in order to reach an agreement and avoid a "disastrous" breakdown in the talks.

Local media have reported that the creditors are seeking a further 5 billion euro reduction in the government's budget through measures including more pension cuts and lay-offs.

Blast in downtown Damascus kills Syria general: monitor

Beirut (AFP) - A Syrian brigadier-general was killed in a blast that targeted his car in downtown Damascus on Sunday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said.

The Britain-based group said "a brigadier general and approximately six people with him were killed in an explosion in the Adawi neighbourhood in the centre of the capital."

The powerful Ahrar al-Sham rebel group posted a video online claiming to show the attack on Brigadier-General Bassem Ali Muhanna's car with an improvised explosive device, in the early hours of Sunday.

A security source said Muhanna was a member of the Republican Guards, an elite unit of the army.

Elsewhere, jihadists shot down a government helicopter in northern Syria's Aleppo province, according to both the Observatory and supporters of the Islamic State group.

But state media said the helicopter had suffered technical problems.

View gallery

Image grab taken from propaganda video uploaded on September 7, 2013 by Syria's Islamist Ahrar a …

The Observatory, which relies on a network of sources on the ground, said IS had brought down the helicopter after midnight near the Kweyris air base in the east of Aleppo province.

Its director, Rami Abdel Rahman, said at least one crew member had been killed but "the fate of the rest is unknown".

Jihadist accounts on Twitter said IS had downed the helicopter using anti-aircraft missiles.

They posted the names of three crew members they said had been killed and pictures of a helicopter in flames.

State television said, however, that "a helicopter crashed after takeoff from Kweyris airport in Aleppo province because of technical faults and the crew were killed".

View gallery

Fighters from the Al-Nusra Front, Al-Qaeda's Syria branch, hold a position as they fight against …

IS fighters have surrounded the air base since March 2014 and have fought fierce clashes with its garrison.

- Palmyra 'massacre' unconfirmed -

The government has used helicopters to drop so-called barrel bombs on rebel-held areas of Aleppo province.

The crude weapons -- made from oil drums, gas cylinders or water tanks, packed with explosives and scrap metal -- have killed hundreds of civilians, drawing condemnation from human rights groups.

President Bashar al-Assad has denied they are being used.

View gallery

An abandoned outpost, belonging to Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate Al-Nusra Front, is seen on the Le …

Elsewhere, the Observatory said the toll in regime air raids on Saturday in the eastern city of Deir Ezzor rose to 16, including six children from one family.

IS jihadists control most of Deir Ezzor province, including more than half of the provincial capital, which sits strategically on several key highways.

The Observatory also gave new details about the battle for a building in Jisr al-Shughur where regime forces were besieged by rebels until Friday.

The siege began when the town fell to rebels including Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front on April 25, but a group of regime forces got stuck inside the building.

Dozens of those trapped were able to flee on Friday as the opposition forces finally stormed the building.

But the Observatory said at least 75 regime forces were killed in the fight for the building and the subsequent evacuation.

It said another 73 soldiers had been taken hostage and 91 regime forces and their families had escaped and reached government lines.

Syrian media said government air strikes which provided the cover for the escape had killed 300 Al-Nusra fighters.

Also Sunday, state television reported what it called a "massacre" in the city of Palmyra, which was captured by IS on Thursday.

State media said 400 people had been killed, "mostly women, children and elderly people."

But the Observatory said there was no evidence of such mass killings.

"Several dozen people accused of ties to the regime have been executed, but the number does not exceed 35 since the town was captured," Abdel Rahman said.

One woman and two children were among those killed but the rest were men, added the Observatory director.