Part III--To Protect and Serve: The siege on 12th street | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: This article originally appeared in the Beaufort Observer. They are doing a masterful job in exposing the other side of this story.

Sheriff's SWAT team may have arrested the wrong man

    This is the third part of our series on To protect and serve: The siege on 12th street."

    On June 15, 2011 a massive police response was sent to the home of Gary Gautier who had called the Washington Police Department seeking help in getting into rehab for what he characterized as a drinking problem. The evidence is that Gautier had been out of work for several weeks due to an accident which broke his leg. He had been put on pain pills by a doctor, a fact he advised the WPD of in his calls to them. Apparently when he concluded that he was not going to get the help he was seeking he began to make threats against the police. Several police units responded from several different law enforcement agencies. Eventually Mr. Gautier was talked into surrendering himself to be taken to the hospital.

    You can read the other articles in this series by clicking here: Part I and Part II

    In the meantime, Gary Gautier's uncle, Carter Leary, was arrested by the Beaufort County Sheriff's SWAT team before Gautier gave himself up. Leary had been negotiating with Gautier for a good portion of the siege, but the Sheriff's Office (SO) apparently did not know that at the time they arrested Leary and hauled him to the magistrate's office. (See Q&A #1).

    Leary lives two doors down the street from Gautier. He talked to him several times that day on the phone and is reported to have made contact with Gautier to facilitate police talking directly with Gautier. Leary was concerned that Gautier was armed and although he says he never worried that Gautier would harm anyone, he was afraid the guns would provoke a catastrophic response from the police. Gautier however, was apparently very afraid that if he gave himself up that he would be killed or hurt by the police. He refused to give up his weapons, apparently for that reason, according to his father, Robert Gautier. Leary and other family members were attempting to get Gautier to give up his weapons. Eventually Gautier agreed to allow Leary to remove them from his house and take them to Leary's house, which Leary did as members of the WPD watched, knowing what Leary was doing. The SO SWAT however did not know. (See Q&A #1).

    Here's Mr. Leary's story: After Leary had removed several long-guns and a handgun from Gautier's house he secured them inside his house. He returned outside his house to be sure the handgun was unloaded he says. The power had been turned off to the block at that time and he could not see much inside his house. At this point he says a SWAT officer ordered him to give them the guns he had placed inside his house. He refused to do so unless they obtained a warrant. He returned inside to leave the handgun and then, according to him, went back outside to go back to Gautier's house to be sure all the weapons had been removed and to try to get Gautier to give himself up. As he exited his house the second time he was jumped by the SO SWAT team. Leary was unarmed at that point. But in the process of placing him under arrest his tooth was knocked out, he suffered several lacerations and bruises and his foot was injured; all of which our reporter observed two days later.

    A witness told the Observer that she thought "they were going to kill the man." She told us that several officers jumped him from behind and pushed him to the ground while one pointed a "machine gun" at his head. "I've never seen anybody treated that roughly in real life," the witness told us.

    The eye witness account must be taken with a grain of salt however. She refuses to identify herself either to us or to the authorities. She has called us using a "blocked number" and refuses to meet with us or even tell us how we can contact her. She says she fears for her life. She is very afraid of the Sheriff's Office, having said that is her reason for anonymity. It may also be germane in assessing her account to know that she says she has cellphone video of the arrest but does not know how to download it to a computer to send it to us. But she will not give us access to the phone. She fears that if her identity is known that "somebody" will try to get the video. We are hoping she will cooperate with us or the authorities to document her account and to allow the video to be viewed. We have assured her that we will protect her identity as a legitimate news source of a matter of importance to the public (the conduct of police officers) and will work with her to protect her. But what she has told us was enough for us to question some of the details in the SO's account of the incident.

    As you will read in Chief Meredith's account of the incident, the SO did not know Leary was negotiating with Gautier and that he was seeking to remove the weapons from Gautier's house although Washington Police Department officials not only knew what Leary was doing, they too were observing him at the same time the SO SWAT team moved in to arrest him. Chief Mick Reed, who was the on-site incident commander, told us he did not know the SWAT team was going to intercept Leary until after they had already done so and WPD officers across the street notified him of the SWAT team's actions. The radio traffic on the regular frequencies tends to support that conclusion.

    A source within the WPD who refused to be identified told us that WPD officers did not perceive Leary as presenting any threat to anyone when the SWAT team moved in. We were told that when Leary exited Gautier's house with the weapons that he held them by the muzzles and yelled to the officers watching that he was taking them back to his house to unload and secure them. No WPD officer apparently saw any need to intervene. But the SO SWAT team did. You can read Chief Meredith's account of that in his responses. Again, here is the link to that document.

    Thus, only the SO team saw an "imminent threat" from Mr. Leary.

    There is also some question about whether SO SWAT team identified the wrong man. A source on the scene told us: "The only reason I can see for the SWAT team moving in on Leary was that they thought he was the suspect." That would make sense if you assume that Leary did not possess the weapons when he was wrestled to the ground. Leary contends that he was surprised by the SWAT team and that he was jumped from behind. He indicated that he put up no resistance. In fact, his physical condition would tend to support this. He had recently had gall bladder surgery and on the day we first interviewed him was hardly able to get up and down from his chair. The lady who said she saw it all told us that he appeared to be trying to protect himself from "three or four of those men who jumped on him and pushed him to the ground. One put his knee on his head when he was on the ground defenseless."

    Indications are that the SWAT team entered Leary's house and removed some, but not all of the weapons, without a search warrant even after Leary demanded they not enter his house without a warrant. For some unaccounted for reason they did not remove all of the weapons Leary had obtained from Gautier's house. Some were sitting in plain sight but the SWAT team did not seize them. Other weapons were in Leary's gun cabinet, which was unlocked at the time, but they did not seize them. Thus, it is not clear how they determined which weapons to seize and which to leave.

    It should also be noted that the WPD had procured the assistance of the SBI bomb squad, having been told that explosives might be present. Chief Meredith indicates his SWAT team knew this and may have believed Leary had possession of the explosives. But they did not wait for the SBI team to enter the house as the WPD later did at Gautier's house. (See radio traffic in Part II).

    Chief Meredith indicates in his responses that the SO SWAT team did not know at the time that Leary was not the suspect but rather the negotiator. What he does acknowledge was that Leary was not armed when he was actually arrested. Given that Leary was obviously not armed, was not fleeing from the scene and the fact that no WPD officer saw enough of a threat to act, it would appear reasonable to conclude that the SO SWAT team either misidentified Leary or used un-necessary force to arrest him and apparently without probable cause that he had committed any crime. What is not in doubt is that the SO SWAT team's actions put an end to Leary's negotiations.

    Leary was taken to the magistrate's office but released. The SWAT team did not return to the scene even though Gautier had still not given himself up. It also remains unclear why the entire SWAT team left the scene before Gautier gave himself up.

    We have been told that if indeed the WPD knew that Leary was attempting to remove the weapons from Gautier's control that he was not committing a crime in doing so. We have been told that unless he exhibited evidence of an intent to use the weapons that he was well within his rights to secure the weapons in his house after having advised the WPD officers observing his actions that is what he was doing and none of them told him otherwise to do something different.

    Leary tells us that the SO SWAT team, after handcuffing him, demanded that he produce the weapons. Leary refused unless and until the SWAT team secured a search warrant. They did not secure a search warrant but entered his house and seized some (but not all) of the weapons inside his house. The reader may need to know here that this is the second time such an entry and seizure without a search warrant has taken place with Mr. Leary. We will have more details on that earlier incident later in this series, but suffice it to say here that from that incident Mr. Leary said he learned to never give permission for a search without a warrant.

    Chief Meredith makes a point of emphasizing that he believes Chief Reed should not have "used" Leary to disarm Gautier. Indications are that WPD did not ask Leary to do anything, but that Leary was acting on his own. Leary confirms this. He tells us his intent and purpose was to get the guns away from Gautier so the police on the scene would not feel threatened by the weapons and thus harm Gautier. Leary told us that he observed what appeared to be police snipers across the street. The radio traffic (see Part II of the series) tends to support that the officers were preparing to fire on Gautier if he made a threatening move, or what was perceived to be a threatening move, with the weapons. Leary says he was afraid Gautier would be shot if he came out with the weapons whether he was trying to get shot or would be shot while he thought he was giving up the weapons.

    A significant discrepancy between the information given us by Mr. Leary, the witness and the WPD officer who spoke to us and the statement by Chief Meredith is that only Chief Meredith says that the SWAT team gave Leary any "commands" before jumping on him. Three witnesses say the SWAT team ran from the bushes beside the house and never stopped before they pushed Leary to the ground. But regardless of whether they issued any commands, what does seem beyond doubt is that Leary was not presenting any imminent threat at the time he was thrown to the ground and handcuffed. Even Chief Meredith's statement does not contend that.

    We'll pick up with Question #4 in the next installment in this series.

    Here are the links to the earlier stories in this series: Part I, Part II.