Phoenix Police Raid Home of Blogger Who Criticized Them

The Phoenix police are mad as hell, and they’re not going to take it anymore.

Several officers from the Phoenix, AZ police department stormed the home of a blogger who has been criticizing their work.

Jeff Pataky, a 41-year-old software engineer who runs the blog Bad Phoenix Cops, claims that the officers took three computers, routers, hard drives, memory cards and everything else needed to keep blogging.

They also swiped multiple personal documents regarding a pending harassment lawsuit Pataky has filed against the Phoenix police department. Pataky says this clearly indicates that the raid was a retaliatory act.

About 10 police offers raided the engineer’s home for three hours on March 12 under the authority of a search warrant signed be Maricopa County Judge Gary Donahoe. Pataky’s female roommate was also handcuffed while police tore through the residence.

Much of the content on Pataky’s blog comes from sources within the department, which may be another reason for the allegedly retaliatory raid.

The friction between Pataky and the Phoenix police began after Pataky’s nasty divorce about two years ago.

He claims his wife didn’t handle the divorce very well and that she started filing false allegations against him accusing him of stalking and harassing her.

He was eventually indicted for harassing his ex, even though many of the complaints his ex filed accused him of doing things while he was out of town.

Just before his trial, he rounded up a few buddies and launched Bad Phoenix Cops as a measure of revenge against the police department. Pataky’s case finally went to trial in May 2008 and the charges against him were then dismissed due to a lack because of lack of evidence, he said.

Pataky says:

“We were going to shut down the website after that but then all of a sudden all these good cops started hitting the site and sending us tips. We have about 50 to 100 retired and active cops who provide us information”

Phoenix police are inclined to believe that one of the informants is officer David Barnes, who went public with claims of evidence being mishandled at the city’s crime lab.

Not surprisingly, police stormed Barnes’ house too and, according to Pataky’s inside sources, they also plan to raid the homes of more police officers.

Here is the leaked memo from Phoenix City Attorney Gary Verburg advising Phoenix police that a litigation hold has been placed on the Pataky case, which means that all information regarding the case must be preserved under legal obligation. The letter also advises that officers should “exercise caution and discretion” when discussing the case electronically…