Officer charged in death of teen

LITTLE ROCK — Correction: Bobby Joe Moore III is the name of the 15-year-old who was fatally shot in August 2012 by then-Little Rock Police Department Officer Joshua Hastings. An incorrect suffix was used in the teen’s name in this story.

Little Rock police arrested one of their own Friday on a charge of manslaughter in an Aug. 12 shooting that left a 15-year-old dead behind the wheel of a car.

Patrol officer Josh Hastings, who has been suspended six times in his five years with the department, was arrested at 2 p.m. He was booked into the Pulaski County jail at 2:38 p.m. on a Class C felony that can lead to as many as 10 years in prison if he is convicted.

Hastings, 26, bonded out of jail on a $15,000 bond and, according to department officials, remained on paid administrative leave. He was placed on leave, as is the usual policy, after the shooting.

He reportedly told investigators last month that he shot at a car driven by Bobby Moore Jr. out of “fear for his life” as he was investigating a report of automobile break-ins outside a west Little Rock apartment complex.

In a Friday statement to the media, Little Rock Chief of Police Stuart Thomas said Hastings’ account of the shooting “did not occur in the manner represented by the officer and that the use of deadly force did not conform to Departmental Orders.”

In initial reports, Hastings described a car speeding at him, which prompted him to shoot in self-defense. Departmental policy allows officers to fire into a car only if their lives or the lives of others are in immediate danger.

Affidavits submitted at the time of Hastings’ arrest Friday said Moore was hit by several gunshots — once in the head — after the teen had stopped the car and was trying to back away from the officer.

Moore’s is the fourth fatal officer-involved shooting this year and prompted a criminal investigation by homicide detectives and an internal investigation by internal affairs detectives, both of which continue.

Beyond Friday’s statement, department officials, including Thomas and spokesman Sgt. Cassandra Davis, declined to comment on the circumstances or the institutional significance of Hastings’ arrest.

But deputy prosecutor John Johnson said there is no precedent for his arrest, adding that the 6th Judicial District has never prosecuted an officer for an officer-involved shooting.

“Obviously, there have been officers charged with crimes a number of times,” Johnson said, “but to my knowledge, we’ve never had an officer charged in a shooting. ... It’s not something you would forget.”

EARLY CONTRADICTIONS

Shortly after 5:15 a.m. on Aug. 12, Hastings scanned the parking lots of the Shadow Lake Apartments, 13111 W. Markham St., not long after he answered a radio call about a “suspicious person,” according to police reports.

Hastings told detectives after the shooting that he heard “glass breaking” and “vehicles getting broken into” inside the complex from his position on the northeast edge of the apartment grounds, police reports said.

Hastings made his way into the complex and hid behind a Dumpster while waiting for other officers to surround the area, according to arrest affidavits.

While behind the Dumpster he saw two suspects get into a Honda Civic parked several hundred feet away from him, he told detectives shortly after the shooting.

Moore, who was out on bond after his arrest for a June 24 carjacking, was the driver of the car.

Hastings told investigators that the car was moving along the short, narrow driveway at 25-30 mph.

He stepped out from behind the Dumpster, holding a flashlight and his gun, and yelled “Little Rock Police. Stop the car, stop the car,” he told investigators.

But the car kept moving toward him and, at only 5 feet away, Hastings said he saw the driver’s hands locked at a “ten and two position” on the steering wheel and “coming directly at him.”

Fearing for his life, he said he fired two rounds and stepped out of the way of the approaching car. The car continued past him, he told investigators, went over a curb and crashed into some rocks “about arm’s reach” from him.

The car then started to roll backward down the sloped drive, Hastings said. He tried to stop it, but it continued downhill in reverse before crashing into a light pole and another car, Hastings told investigators last month.

Two other teens jumped out of the car and ran away. They were later arrested and charged with breaking or entering.

Moore stayed behind the wheel and, according to Hastings’ account, “appeared to be deceased” from a gunshot wound.

But Moore’s passengers, as well as physical evidence at the scene contradict key elements of Hastings’ story, according to homicide investigators.

Keontay Walker, 16, was with Moore that night, along with 14-year-old Jeremiah Johnson.

The three went to the apartments to break into some cars after a night spent “looking for parties,” according to arrest affidavits.

After the trio broke into a car near a Dumpster, Walker said a series of text messages from his mother prompted the group to leave.

As Walker sat shotgun and Moore drove the car toward the Dumpster, Walker said he saw Hastings’ flashlight and told Moore to stop the car because it was the police.

Moore stopped the car about 5 feet short of Hastings, Walker told investigators, and put the vehicle into reverse. When the vehicle started going back down the sloping drive, Walker said, he heard three shots.

“‘Pow, pow, pow,’ and the officer yelled ‘Stop, stop or we’ll fire,’” the arrest affidavit states. “[Walker] said he heard Bobby moan and realized he had been shot.”

Johnson gave a similar account, stating that “they were not going fast because they did not know the police were there until the officer stepped in front of the car.”

Johnson “did not believe” Moore was trying to run over Hastings, according to the arrest affidavit.

Detectives at the scene noted that there was no sign that Moore’s car went over the curb into a rocky section, nor was there damage beneath the car from such an impact.

An autopsy showed that bullets hit Moore in the left middle finger, right shoulder and the left side of his head, which killed him instantly, the affidavit said.

The head shot came in at a downward sloping angle from left to right, which detectives said is consistent with the other teens’ statements that Moore was backing the car away from Hastings.

“While it appears that the vehicle was driving toward Hastings at some point ... all of the physical evidence ... statements ... [indicate] that the car was stopped, or in reverse at the time Hastings fired,” the affidavit said.

DISCIPLINARY HISTORY

Thomas’ statement Friday said Hastings violated departmental orders, but no one with the agency would specify which sections of the policies known as general orders were violated.

The use of deadly force, which is covered by General Order 303, is “an act of last resort” for law enforcement and is sanctioned only when an officer or another individual faces serious injury or death.

The policy states that an officer’s interest in criminal apprehension or property protection are “secondary” to the “protection of life.”

Policy also prohibits Little Rock officers from firing into vehicles unless the officer’s life or another’s is at stake.

Officers “will not place themselves in front of an oncoming vehicle,” according to police policy.

“When confronted by an oncoming vehicle, [the officer] will move out of its path, if possible, rather than fire into the vehicle,” the policy states.

While police haven’t commented on which rules Hastings is accused of violating in Moore’s slaying, they have said the officer has a history of policy infractions.

In a department of roughly 500 officers, where 124 complaints were made against officers in 2011 and 123 in 2010, Hastings has been named in at least 18 complaints since 2008.

At least six of those complaints were found to be true by command staff members and resulted in 34 days of missed work for the officer.

In an interview two weeks ago, Thomas said Hastings — whose father is a captain in the city’s southwest division and until July had been the spokesman of the department for 18 years — was “on the higher end” of the discipline spectrum in comparison with other officers.

An Arkansas Democrat-Gazette review of Hastings’ disciplinary record showed that the officer was insubordinate, lied to other officers, missed court dates, showed a “reckless” disregard for public safety by excessive speeding, damaged city property, used profanity and didn’t follow other department standards and policies.

Hastings’ most recent disciplinary action occurred earlier this year when he was given a 15-day suspension for falling asleep in his patrol car while in the middle of a shift.

A supervisor wrote in an assessment that Hastings, who in addition to numerous suspensions, had been ordered five times to get counseling and received two oral reprimands and six written reprimands.

The supervisor also questioned Hastings’ ability to be an police officer.

“It is in my opinion based on the severity of the current allegations and the complaint history of Officer Hastings: he has continuously shown poor decision making and unprofessionalism [as an officer],” the supervisor wrote. “I have great concern for his mental stability and decision-making as a [officer].”

Hastings’ frequent policy violations qualified him for the department’s Early Intervention System, a program designed to identify problem employees and find ways to redress any flaws in their job performance. Department policy states that an officer should enter the program if he receives two or more substantiated complaints in a year, which Hastings did two years in a row.

But Hastings was not enrolled in the system, a fact Thomas said last month was because of changes in policies and software. Even though an officer isn’t enrolled in the Early Intervention System, Thomas said, command staff members are fully aware of which officers are problematic and take corrective action where they deem necessary.

Hastings’ actions even before he was an officer raised eyebrows within and outside the department.

At a public meeting in January 2011, fellow officers accused Hastings of having attended a Ku Klux Klan rally while he was a junior in high school.

Hastings told the Democrat-Gazette that he was fourwheeling with a friend near Crossett when the friend suggested that they stop to see his grandfather.

They walked into a KKK meeting. Hastings told the newspaper that he was only there for a few moments and didn’t know what was going on until later.

But the incident became a source of strained race relations inside the Police Department.

LAW ENFORCEMENT FUTURE

State law forbids law-breaking by law enforcement officers, according to Brian Marshall, the deputy director of the Office of Law Enforcement Standards.

Marshall, whose organization is responsible for setting the minimum standards for law enforcement officers in Arkansas, said that an officer can’t be certified by the state if he has a felony conviction.

If someone is convicted of misdemeanor domestic battery, that person is prohibited by law from carrying a weapon and thus cannot be a certified law enforcement officer.

Marshall noted that being accused or charged with a felony isn’t cause to revoke an officer’s ability to police.

At that point, it’s up to the individual law enforcement agency.

Hastings isn’t the first Little Rock officer to be charged with a felony.

On Jan. 4 of 2011, officer Jason Gilbert was one of several area officers indicted by the U.S. attorney’s office of the Eastern District of Arkansas for involvement in the planning of a North Little Rock bank heist in 2007.

Gilbert had been on paid administrative leave for several state crimes, including felony theft by receiving and drug possession charges, before his indictment.

He was fired on Jan. 28, 2011. He was found guilty in federal court in March this year and sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison.

Also this year, Little Rock officer Mark Jones and his half brother Randall Robinson were arrested after a two-year-long FBI sting for accepting up to $14,000 to escort drug traffickers.

Their May 24 arrest was followed by Robinson’s resignation on May 30 and Jones’ firing on June 1, more than a week before they were formally indicted by a federal grand jury on drug and weapon crimes.

Last December, officer John Bracey was arrested and charged with aggravated assault after a disturbance at his home with his wife.

That charge was reduced to a misdemeanor count of domestic battery in Little Rock District Court in March and was ultimately dropped by prosecutors in late June.

Beford the charges were dropped, Bracey was fired by Thomas on May 11. Bracey is appealing his firing.

Hastings is to make his initial court appearance in Little Rock District Court on Monday.