ANTIOCH — As soon as once more, federal prosecutors have dropped a felony conviction involving an Antioch police officer, as a number of throughout the division proceed to be investigated for medication and different crimes, court docket data present.
Antioch resident Richard Jobe, 37, pleaded responsible to possessing two weapons, in Antioch and Pinole, inside a three-month interval. Final December, a federal decide sentenced him to seven years in jail. However now the U.S. Division of Justice has dropped the Antioch gun conviction and is renegotiating a plea take care of Jobe’s attorneys.
Jobe will seemingly plead responsible to the Pinole gun cost later this 12 months and be re-sentenced to a lesser jail time period, in accordance with court docket data. His subsequent court docket date has been set for July.
Jobe’s case is the most recent in a sequence of greater than a dozen dismissals in federal court docket by the U.S. Lawyer’s workplace since late March, when authorities introduced they had been probing potential “crimes of ethical turpitude” dedicated by an unspecified variety of Antioch and Pittsburg officers. A number of legislation enforcement sources have stated the fees pertain to alleged involvement with cocaine and steroids, however that federal authorities are additionally reviewing deadly use-of-force incidents involving a number of the officers.
The Contra Costa District Lawyer’s Workplace is conducting its personal evaluation of ongoing instances and convictions because of the investigation, a spokesman for the workplace instructed the Bay Space Information Group.
In Jobe’s case, he was arrested in December 2020 for allegedly possessing a pistol. An Antioch police canine bit Jobe throughout a bodily altercation with the officer, in accordance with the criticism.
Court docket data don’t establish the officer, however they do establish the canine because the K9 Purcy. The Antioch police division’s web site says Purcy was assigned to Ofc. Morteza Amiri. The positioning additionally says that K9 canines are assigned to their companions for years and stay with the officers at their houses throughout off-duty hours.
Amiri was concerned in at the least one different dismissal. In that case, he claimed to have seen Antioch resident Kardell Smith throw a gun via a window. Prosecutors charged Smith with being a felon in possession of a firearm, however like Jobe, they dismissed the case after Smith pleaded responsible. Prosecutors wrote in a court docket doc that “the federal government has uncovered proof that undermines its confidence within the conviction,” the identical language utilized in Jobe’s dismissal.
Antioch police haven't named any of the officers who've been positioned on depart or are being investigated by the FBI.
Jobe has been in jail since February 26, 2021, data present.