OAKLAND — A jury has convicted ex-Antioch police officer Morteza Amiri of depriving one person of civil rights and falsifying reports, but acquitted him of the remaining charges, including conspiring with other cops to commit violence.
The jury’s verdict on Friday capped a trial that saw Amiri’s own colleagues – including a former close friend who had already pleaded guilty to many of the same charges – testify against him, describing in searing detail one of the largest policing scandals to hit the Bay Area in decades.
The rollercoaster of a trial reached its end in the most tumultuous way. The court clerk read aloud a guilty verdict for count one, instantly changing the mood of the court. But just as quickly, the jury foreman spoke up, announcing that this was a mistake and they had not convicted Amiri of conspiracy.
Jurors returned to their deliberations room as Amiri let out a small smile, adding even more drama and suspense to the moment. They returned with a corrected verdict form a few minutes later. The judge then polled the jury after the verdict’s reading, just to make sure.
With each not guilty verdict, Amiri’s supporters let out sighs of relief. He shook his head at the jury after learning that he wouldn’t come away from the trial unscathed.
Amiri was found not guilty of conspiracy and two charges of depriving the rights of a person, but was found guilty of illegally siccing his dog on a man while taking his roommate — a former Antioch and Pittsburg policeman who testified against Amiri — on a ride along. He faces up to 10 years in prison for deprivation of rights and 20 years for falsifying records, but sentencing guidelines will probably recommend his actual prison term be far lower.
The civil rights deprivation charge was backed up by testimony of Amiri’s ex-roommate, Timothy Manly-Williams, whose Amiri’s attorney ironically referred to as the “dumbest witness” in the whole trial. Manly-Williams, who has pleaded guilty to unrelated felony charges, testified that Amiri said he wanted to “get into something” that night, then seemed to start a confrontation with a man on a bicycle for no reason, before calling on Manly-Williams to open the police vehicle door and release his dog, Purcy, whom Amiri occasionally referred to as his “fur missile.”
The jury reached its verdict on its third day of deliberations, the bulk of which was one on Thursday — National K9 Veterans Day.
The trial could be good news for Amiri’s remaining co-defendant, Devon Wenger, who is also charged with conspiracy. But unlike Amiri — who set records at the Antioch Police Department with his dozens of K9 bites — Wenger faces only one additional charge, related to using a less-lethal launcher on one person.
The jury’s decision ends a nearly two-week trial centered on dueling narratives: Was Amiri a racist cop who used his police dog to hunt down residents for sport, or was he merely the victim of lying witnesses and “cherrypicked” text messages meant to paint him in a bad light?
To settle that matter, jurors watched as a parade of current and former police officers – including Amiri’s own former colleagues in Antioch – testified about the dozens of times that Amiri sicced his dog, Purcy, on people, many of them Black.
From the first time he called Purcy into action, Amiri appeared to relish the violence and gore of it all, prosecutors claimed. In texts read before the jury, Amiri offered a filet mignon steak to anyone who could help get him get that first “bite.” And when he finally sicced the German shepherd on someone, the dog initially appeared reluctant to bite the man – leading Amiri to repeatedly force the dog onto the suspect until its jaws clamped down on him, according to court testimony.
“He was anxious to deploy his dog that hadn’t gotten a bite yet,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Cheng. “He wanted that bite badly.”
Three of the charges alleged that Amiri – at times flanked by Purcy – deprived the rights of residents while working as a police officer.
In one instance, Amiri allegedly joked about having a “weak ass” reason for using his dog on a man in July 2019, texting someone later that he skewed his report on the incident “so I don’t go to court for the bite,” according to testimony shown at trial.
That incident led federal prosecutors to file another felony charge – this time, alleging he falsified records – after prosecutors said Amiri made no mention of another officer being at the scene in his initial written report.
The following year, in August 2020, federal prosecutors say Amiri released his dog on a man who appeared to be sleeping in a homeless encampment tent. Afterward, Amiri texted another officer that “I walked out of the tent and game-planned how to f*** him up. Went back and did justice,” according to court testimony.
A couple months later, Amiri allegedly sent a text putting out a bounty for a man he suspected of stealing his mail and opening fake accounts in his name. Prosecutors claimed it led to a confrontation with the man, where Amiri threatened that, “if you ever steal mail again, I’ll f—— kill you.”
Prosecutors leaned heavily on a trove of graphic, racially-tinged texts between Amiri and a host of other officers from across the East Bay – many of them glorifying those hunts for “bites,” and the bloodied bodies left in their wake. In them, Amiri and his colleagues called Black residents “gorillas,” while asking to keep body-worn cameras turned off so their actions would go unnoticed.
“Despite acknowledging that these were unnecessary uses of force, what did Amiri say about it? ‘That s— is fun,’” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Chen, quoting one of Amiri’s texts during closing arguments Wednesday.
Prosecutors buffeted those texts with the words of Amiri’s own colleagues – the most devastating of which came from Eric Rombough, a close friend who previously pleaded guilty to many similar charges. In a sober, measured tone, Rombough gave an unflinching account of their plan to “dehumanize” people, all to exact a “sense of punishment” on a city they viewed as lawless.
Other officers proved more difficult when called to the stand by prosecutors. At least a few gave testimony that conflicted with their earlier statements to investigators or grand jurors – often in ways that appeared to minimize Amiri’s actions. One Oakley lieutenant, for example, said that Amiri sicced his dog on the sleeping man in August 2020 while 20 feet outside of his tent, as opposed to while inside of it.
Before the jury began deliberating, Amiri’s attorney pleaded with the jury to “slow down or stop that runaway freight train known as the government.” The texts, he said, amounted to mere “dark humor,” and “a common human function for how to cope” with a difficult job.
“They are not accurate, they are not factual, they’re not any kind of admission admission,” said the attorney, Paul Goyotte, during closing arguments Wednesday. He stressed that Amiri’s actions were owed to the police department’s culture, “which, as we talked about, was a product of that city, and a product of that environment they’re in.”
Goyette repeatedly laid into almost all of the prosecutors’ witnesses, calling Rombough a “bad cop” who had “a major, full-speed-on-steroids motive to throw Mr. Amiri under the bus here.” When referencing multiple men who recounted on the witness stand being bitten by Amiri’s dog, Goyotte repeated the same line: “He lied to you.”
Amiri began the trial alongside another Antioch officer, Wenger, who faced a similar conspiracy charge, as well as one count related to allegedly using excessive force. Yet he ended it alone, after U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White declared a mistrial last week amid concerns about his attorney’s ability to adequately represent him.
A new trial date for those charges has yet to be set. Wenger — who has spent his time recently mocking the federal prosecutors overseeing his case — also is slated to face trial next month on steroid distribution charges.
Check back for updates to this developing story.