Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Day One: Officers Nash and Poccia found the body

Patrolman Jeremy Nash has taken the stand. He says he has worked with UPD for 3 1/2 years.

He says he was working the 4 p.m. - Midnight shift that night in April, assigned to Car 59, which is a City Wide car, much like Rizanovic's. He describes it as a car that can be dispatched anywhere in the city, unlike a Zone car, which has a particular area to patrol.

He says he was with Officer Poccia that night, when he heard a radio transmission from Officer Lindsey, who he had known for 2 1/2 years at that point. He says that Lindsey had called in the traffic stop, and then Nash completed the sector check in Proctor Park and proceeded to Lindsey's location to offer backup.

Nash says that there is often a sense of more urgency in backup response for traffic stops in "high risk" areas, such as Zone 57.

He says that while in route, he heard the "shots fired" call in the same area Officer Lindsey was in, thus speeding up his response to the scene.

Nash is then shown the aerial map of the 1100 block of Nielson Street. The prosecution then points out Eagle Street and Mortimer Street.

When arriving at the scene, he saw Lindsey's emergency lights on the vehicle, but no car in front of the police vehicle. Upon approaching the vehicle, Nash says that he looked to his left and saw a body laying on the ground.

"At first sight, no...as i got up next to the body, i could tell it was Officer Lindsey," Nash said.

Nash then told Officer Poccia who it was and they radioed that an officer was down, and ran to the body, which he says was on its back, with his arms at the side, his head facing northeast.

Nash said he called out to Officer Lindsey, heard a slight gurgle, saw the officer's eyes move, and that was it. He said he yelled to people out on a porch if they had seen anything, to which they said no.

He then stayed with Officer Lindsey and noticed trauma to the right side of the head, which he says appeared to be a gunshot wound and brain matter.

Nash says he then started a canvassing of the area and suggesting checking out the computer in Lindsey's patrol vehicle for any names recently ran through that might help the investigation.

Nash describes Lindsey as someone who followed procedure meticulously. Prosecution now shows Nash some photographs of the interiort of Lindsey's vehicle from various angles. Nash says that when he went to check the computer screen in Lindsey's vechile, that the screen was illuminated, with information on the screen.

Prosecution then tried to show a picture of the information that was on that screen that night. Though the photograph was fuzzy, it showed a check on a warrant for Ishmael Rivera for an open container.

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