Lakewood Better Days For All - WTF?

[marklingm]

Thanks for sharing, Ryan. This is great news for the Geiger Family! And, I hope that the Cleveland Police Department finds the car and individual involved in the incident.

[Stan Austin]

OUTRAGEOUS NEWS!!!!!!!!!!

How could such a mistake have been made?

[Jerry Ritcey]

Could he sue for false arrest? My only legal knowledge comes from "LA Law".

Having said that, it would be unreasonable for the PD *not* to have run a story on someone being arrested under these circumstances. Hope they give the same prominence to the dropped charges?

[Betsy Voinovich]

While I'm pleased to see that the Geigers have been cleared of any wrongdoing, I don't understand why I'm getting this as email from Lakewood Alive. I didn't realize they functioned as personal press agents for people. I didn't know that was part of their function.




From Lakewood Alive email:

Dear Friends of LakewoodAlive - many of you are aware of the unimaginable experience that Chas and Patti Geiger have lived through during the past two weeks.

Throughout their lives, Chas and Patti have been widely known as model citizens and public servants. Seeing someone so beloved and so well respected falsely and publicly accused of wrongdoing has been a shattering experience for the Geiger family and the Lakewood community.


Below is a news release confirming police acknowledgement of Chas' innocence.


Please join us in a shared effort to maintain the inscrutable* reputation so well-earned by three generations of Geigers in Lakewood. Please forward this news to your friends and neighbors.


We love you and are proud of you, Chas and Patti!



chas and patti geiger

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 17, 2011



CONTACT: William "Bud" Doyle

216-363-6025





CLEVELAND POLICE DROP CHARGES AGAINST GEIGER



(Cleveland) A series of charges brought by Cleveland Police against Lakewood businessman and former Lakewood Board of Education President Charles Geiger have been dropped, according to police sources.



"The investigating detective informed me that, after further study of video tape evidence, they have concluded that there was a faulty identification of Geiger and that any further proceedings against him are going nowhere, "said Geiger's attorney, William "Bud" Doyle.



"The car in question was not Geiger's car."



Police indicated they were continuing the investigation in another direction and that they had sent the video evidence in question to NASA for possible further enhancement.



Geiger, who owns several retail stores in the area, is well-known community supporter serving the Lakewood Board of Education for 22 years, and also serves on the Lakewood Hospital Foundation Board and the Board of LakewoodAlive.



FACTS



1. Cleveland Police have dropped all charges against W. Charles Geiger.



2. A faulty identification of Geiger was the basis for the charges; the police, after detailed examination of videotape evidence, have concluded that the car involved in the incident was not Geiger's car.



3. The investigating detective in the case informed Geiger's attorney, William Doyle, that all charges are dropped and that the department will continue to search for the car and the individual involved in the incident.



####

* I also can't understand why Lakewood Alive would ask us to "join them in a shared effort to maintain" the reputation the Geiger family has earned as being "inscrutable." I didn't think that this was how the Geiger family was thought of in Lakewood.

inscrutable: DEFINITION: mysterious, incomprehensible, inexplicable, unreadable, cryptic, unknowable. ANTONYM: transparent

As I said, I'm pleased that the Geigers have been cleared; all of my interactions with them have been quite straightforward. I'm not sure why Lakewood Alive would characterize them in this way, after all that they have been through.

Betsy Voinovich

[Charlie Page]

I had to look up inscrutable as well. Here's what I have from dictionary.com app:
- adjective
1. incapable of being investigated, analyzed, or scrutinized; impenetrable.
2. not easily understood; mysterious; unfathomable: an inscrutable smile.
3. incapable of being seen through physically; physically impenetrable: the inscrutable depths of the ocean.

Chas is a board member of LA (per their website). There may or may not have been concerns from LA's volunteers or contributors on this story. I think the email was a way to relieve those concerns. just my thoughts.

[Jim O'Bryan]

Wow, two weeks of terror over as so many wondered "how it could happen," "they seem
so nice..." "Hard to believe."

This is why there is a legal system, so that people do not have to be judge in the court of
public opinion, but get a fair chance. The infamous Perp Walk was designed by police to help
sway public opinion against a person they want to see in jail, or to start to sway public
opinion against someone going to trial. It is the voyeuristic needs of people to see this even
though it should never be legal. And it has been amplified x100 but the need for so many
bloggers and "real news" sources to keep people coming back to read more.

It is just pitiful, when clicks become more important than lives. When sensational headlines
are needed every 15 minutes, no matter the outcome to the city.

To Chas and Patti, as always you were total class through this. I am glad to see it came
out as many of us knew it would. A bad mistake.

The face of Lakewood should be red today, some of the things I heard and from who...


FWIW


.

[dl meckes]

The Plain Dealer finally decided to print the "charges dropped" story. I'm happy they finally did. I would have been a lot happier if they had also included a picture of the Geigers as they appear 99.99% of the time.

This story was not believable from the beginning. It's bizarre.

I am not surprised that press release contained that word. LakewoodAlive is inscrutable.

[Steve Hoffert]

They probably meant indisputable but in Palinese inscrutable makes a lot sense.

[Mike Zannoni]

OUTRAGEOUS NEWS!!!!!!!!!!

How could such a mistake have been made?

Yes. This is the question. I hope NASA (!?!?) can shed some light, because things as they stand make no sense at all. How indeed. AND I NEED TO KNOW!!

(I don't really need to know, as the obscurity and "inscrutability" of the workings of the police and courts are tiresome realities that we have all gotten used to.) Will we ever know what happened here? I seriously doubt it, however outrageous. Not outrageous enough, maybe, speaking literally.

(NASA?)