Federal prosecutors seek to bar police uniforms, badges at trial
Normally, it’s the defense in a criminal case that cringes at a courtroom full of uniforms.
In a case in which the defendant is a former police sergeant, though, the prosecution is calling for a ban on badges.
Federal prosecutors in a civil rights case against fired Pittsburgh sergeant Stephen Matakovich filed a pretrial motion Thursday, warning that “the presence of identifiable officers could unduly influence or intimidate the jury” and asking the judge to “establish a courtroom rule that courtroom spectators should not invoke the color of their office by wearing a uniform, badge” or similar indicia.
That provoked vigorous responses late Friday from Mr. Matakovich’s defense attorney, and from a police union official.
“It is a sign of the times that support for police officers at the
highest levels of government service is substantially waning,” wrote Pittsburgh Officer Robert Swartzwelder, president of Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 1, in a widely circulated email.
Tina O. Miller, a former federal prosecutor now defending Mr. Matakovich, called the prosecution motion a “richly ironic” attempt “to hijack the defendant’s constitutional right to a fair trial.”
Mr. Matakovich faces criminal charges of deprivation of civil rights and falsification of a document, stemming from a 2015 incident outside Heinz Field, in which he was caught on video surveillance striking and shoving Gabriel Despres, of South Park.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen S. Gilson wrote in his motion that “police officers may be interested in the case, either because they know the defendant or because they are interested in the subject matter itself, and therefore, may wish to attend the trial.”
He wrote that “uniformed courtroom spectators may lend an air of credibility to the defendant, via association. Uniformed courtroom spectators could also send the jury a message that a finding of guilt is ‘anti-police,’ injecting considerations which are not evidence-based and wholly inappropriate.” That could “unduly influence the verdict,” he wrote.
Ms. Miller countered that it is “disingenuous for the government to suggest that exclusion of uniformed spectators is appropriate here, merely because it may lose the advantage of having uniformed officers on its side, as it generally does in nearly every other criminal trial. Accordingly, it is worth noting that the government sees no problem with fighting to have its own witnesses at trial testify in police, fire and military uniforms over a defendant’s objection.”
Mr. Gilson wrote that in federal court in Pittsburgh, officers usually testify in plainclothes. Ms. Miller held out the possibility that the government could “stipulate that none of its witnesses will wear a uniform or any other item suggesting that they are law enforcement personnel while in court or on the witness stand.”
A spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney’s office indicated that she did not expect that the office would have further comment.
U.S. District Judge Cathy Bissoon can rule on the motion. She has set a pretrial conference in the case for Monday, with jury selection to begin May 15 and trial set for May 22.