A judge Friday denied a request from three former Houston
police officers charged in the beating of Chad Holley to move their upcoming
trials to another county.
Raad Hassan, Phil Bryan and Drew Ryser are accused in a
videotaped beating of Holley during an arrest in 2010 when he was 15 years old.
State District Judge Ruben Guerrero said he believes a jury
of six impartial people can be found in Harris County. The three are charged
with misdemeanors for official oppression.
Andrew Blomberg was acquitted in May of any wrongdoing in
the March 24, 2010 mid-afternoon beating that was caught on tape by surveillance
cameras at a southwest Houston business. Holley was later convicted of burglary
in that case. He was arrested last month, accused of a different burglary.
Disappointment
Lawyers for the former officers said they were disappointed
by the ruling.
"We're nervous because the mayor, the chief of police
and, to an extent, the district attorney have said they don't have confidence
in the first verdict," said Joe Owmby, an attorney for Hassan. "They
have 'educated' jurors that a 'correct' result should have been the other
way."
Harris County District Attorney Pat Lykos and Mayor Annise
Parker both publicly disagreed with the verdict in Blomberg's trial.
HPD Chief Charles McClelland fired the officers and said
they should have been indicted on more serious charges.
Owmby said he hopes the six months until the next trial
would lessen the effect of the publicity surrounding the beating and the
verdict in Blomberg's trial.
"Time tends to mitigate some of the effects we were
talking about," Owmby said. Hassan is scheduled for trial Jan. 28.
Blomberg, Ryser, Bryan and Hassan were indicted for official
oppression. Bryan and Hassan also were charged with violating the civil rights
of a prisoner. Both charges are class A misdemeanors, punishable by a year in
jail.
'It's the unknown'
Because the charges are misdemeanors, the jury will be six
people, not 12.
"It's not the number, it's the unknown - it's whether
people are forthcoming, whether they have an agenda," said Aaron Suder, an
attorney for the Houston Police Officers Union, representing Bryan.
"It could be six, it could be 26 and you still have the
same concern that you don't know what you're going to get."