Tag Archives: Police

Police officer, three others killed in Wisconsin shooting: reports

By Brendan O’Brien

MILWAUKEE (Reuters) – A police officer and three other people were killed in a string of shootings, including at a bank and a law firm, in central Wisconsin following what police referred to as domestic incident, media reported on Wednesday.

A suspect was taken into custody by police at an apartment building in Weston, a community of 15,000 about 90 miles (140 km) west of Green Bay, in the wake of the shootings, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newspaper reported.

The incident began with a “domestic situation,” the Journal Sentinel reported, citing a press release from the Rothschild Police Department.

At about 12:30 p.m. central time shots were reported fired at the Marathon Savings Bank in the nearby town of Rothschild, Todd Baeten, police captain for Wausau, Wisconsin, told an afternoon press conference. Police found two people shot at the bank and that the suspect fled, the Journal Sentinel reported.

Shots were then reported at a law firm in Schofield, Wisconsin at about 1:10 p.m. About 20 minutes later, police received a call from an apartment building in Weston. Police converged on the apartment complex and took the suspect into custody about an hour later after more shots were fired, the Journal Sentinel reported.

It is unclear where the police officer was shot and killed. Police did not disclose the identities of the suspect and the four people who were killed. Wausau police and the Wisconsin Division of Criminal Investigations declined to confirm the casualties to Reuters.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Additional reporting and writing by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)

One shot, several injured in UK parliament ‘terrorist incident’

Police tapes off Parliament Square after reports of loud bangs, in London, Britain, March 22, 2017. REUTERS/Stefan Wermuth

By Toby Melville

LONDON (Reuters) – A policeman was stabbed, an assailant shot and several people injured on Wednesday close to Britain’s Houses of Parliament in what police said they were treating as a terrorist incident.

Reuters reporters inside the building heard loud bangs and shortly afterwards a Reuters photographer said he saw at least a dozen people injured on Westminster Bridge, next to parliament.

His photographs showed people lying on the ground, some of them bleeding heavily and one apparently under a bus. The number of casualties was unclear.

“Officers – including firearms officers – remain on the scene and we are treating this as a terrorist incident until we know otherwise,” London’s Metropolitan Police said in a statement.

The House of Commons, which was in session at the time, was immediately suspended and lawmakers were asked to stay inside.

Prime Minister Theresa May was safe after the incident, a spokesman for her office said. He declined to say where May was when the attack took place.

The leader of the House, David Lidington, said in the chamber that an assailant who stabbed a policeman had been shot by police.

An ambulance helicopter landed on Parliament Square, just outside the building.

The BBC said police believed there was a suspect vehicle outside parliament but police did not immediately confirm that report.

Amid confusing scenes, it appeared the incident may have unfolded in several locations, including on the busy Westminster bridge where tourists take pictures of Big Ben and other attractions.

Reuters reporters inside parliament said a large number of armed police, some carrying shields, were pouring into the building.

U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House he had been briefed on events in London but gave no details.

The incident took place on the first anniversary of attacks on Brussels in Belgium.

Britain is on its second-highest alert level of “severe” meaning an attack by militants is considered highly likely.

In May 2013, two British Islamists stabbed to death soldier Lee Rigby on a street in southeast London.

In July 2005, four British Islamists killed 52 commuters and themselves in suicide bombings on the British capital’s transport system in what was London’s worst peacetime attack.

(Additional reporting by William James, Kylie Maclellan, Elizabeth Piper and UK bureau, writing by Estelle Shirbon, editing by Stephen Addison)

Man shot dead after seizing soldier’s gun at Paris Orly airport

Repeating correcting date - Police at Orly airport southern terminal after a shooting incident near Paris, France March 18, 2017. REUTERS/Benoit Tessier

By Gus Trompiz and Emmanuel Jarry

PARIS (Reuters) – Security forces shot dead a man who seized a soldier’s gun at Paris Orly airport in France on Saturday soon after the same man shot and wounded a police officer during a routine police check, the interior minister said.

The man was known to police and intelligence services, Interior Minister Bruno le Roux told reporters. A police source described him as a radicalized Muslim but did not identify him by name.

The anti-terrorism prosecutor opened an investigation.

The busy Orly airport south of Paris was evacuated and security forces swept the area for bombs to make sure the dead man was not wearing an explosive belt, but nothing was found, interior ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet told Reuters.

“The man succeeded in seizing the weapon of a soldier. He was quickly neutralized by the security forces,” Brandet said.

Noone else was injured at the airport.

Flights were suspended from both terminals of the airport and some flights were diverted to Charles de Gaulle airport north of the capital, airport operator ADP said.

Earlier, a police officer was shot and wounded by the same man during a routine traffic check in Stains, north of Paris.

The incidents came five weeks before France holds presidential elections in which national security is a key issue.

The country remains on high alert after attacks by Islamic State militants killed scores of people in the last two years -including coordinated bombings and shootings in Paris in November 2015 in which 130 people were killed. A state of emergency is in place until at least the end of July.

The attacks would have no impact on a trip to Paris by Prince William, second-in-line to the British throne, and his wife Kate, who are due to end a two-day visit to the French capital on Saturday, a British spokesman said.

The soldier whose gun the man tried to seize was a member of the army’s “Sentinelle” operation responsible for patrolling airports and other key sites since January 2015 when Islamist attackers killed 12 people at the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo. It was reinforced after the Paris attacks.

Around 3,000 passengers were evacuated from the airport, the second busiest in the country.

In March 2016, Islamic State claimed responsibility for suicide bomb attacks on Brussels airport and a rush-hour metro train in the Belgian capital which killed 35 people, including three suicide bombers.

(Reporting by Gus Trompiz, Emmanuel Jarry, Brian Love, Bate Felix, Simon Carraud; Writing by Adrian Croft; editing by Richard Balmforth)

DNA links man to two Michigan police shootings: law enforcement

(Reuters) – A man charged in the shooting of two Detroit police officers earlier this week has been linked through DNA evidence to the fatal shooting of a university police officer last year, authorities said.

Raymond Durham, 60, who was charged in shootings of two Detroit officers on Wednesday, is now the “prime suspect” in the November shooting death of Wayne State University Police Sergeant Collin Rose, Detroit Police Chief James Craig told the media on Friday.

Craig declined to provide details on the DNA evidence that links Durham to Rose’s death, citing the ongoing investigation.

Durham was charged by the Wayne County Prosecutor on Friday in connection with the shootings of the two Detroit officers, the Detroit Free Press reported.

He was arraigned while in hospital, where he is receiving treatment after being shot in the leg during a shoot-out with officers.

One officer was shot once in the ankle and twice in the upper torso, but was wearing protective body armor that likely saved his life. The other officer was shot in the neck, police said. They are both recovering in hospital, the Detroit Free Press reported.

The shoot-out occurred while officers were investigating drug activity on the city’s West Side, just blocks from where Rose, 29, was shot on Nov. 22. He died a day later.

Police are compiling evidence to present to prosecutors regarding Rose’s killing, Craig said on Friday. He said he anticipated charges would be filed against Durham for that shooting.

(Reporting by Timothy Mclaughlin in Chicago; Editing by Paul Tait)

At least three injured in French school shooting, one arrested: officials

PARIS (Reuters) – At least three people were injured after a shooting at a high school in the small southern French town of Grasse, and a 17-year old student carrying a rifle, handguns and grenades was arrested, the interior ministry and police sources added.

“The individual does not seem to be known by police,” one police source said.

A second source said it appeared that two students had opened fire on the headmaster, who had been injured, adding that the suspects did not seem to be militants.

“One of the two was arrested and the second fled. There was panic and the students took refuge in the (neighboring) supermarket,” said the source.

Interior ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet told France Inter radio that three people had been injured, and advised families to remain patient as police took control to stabilize the situation. He had earlier told BFM TV eight were injured.

He said checks were underway on the possibility of a second assailant.

The incident comes with France in a state of emergency after several militants attacks over the last year. It is less than six weeks away from a presidential election in which security and fears of terrorism are among key issues.

An eye-witness student in the school interviewed by France Inter radio said the students had heard a bang and taken cover under the tables.

“I went to close the windows and saw a guy who looked at me in the eyes. He seemed to be a student and not very big. He shot in the air and ran away,” the student said without giving his name.

Local emergency services advised residents on Twitter to stay at home. The government launched its mobile telephone application warning of a “terrorist” attack.

(Reporting by Emmanuel Jarry, Sophie Louet, and John Irish; Editing by Adrian Croft and Sudip Kar-Gupta)

Short of options, Venezuela opposition stages flash protests

Carlos Paparoni (C, in yellow), deputy of the Venezuelan coalition of opposition parties (MUD), clashes with Venezuelan National Guards during a protest outside the food ministry in Caracas, Venezuela March 8, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins

By Andrew Cawthorne

CARACAS (Reuters) – A dozen activists alight surreptitiously from cars, walk determinedly toward Venezuela’s heavily-guarded Food Ministry, and dump two bags of garbage at its front entrance.

Soldiers quickly form a cordon and a young opposition lawmaker pounds their riot shields with his fists as government supporters appear from nowhere, throwing punches at the protesters.

The activists, who use garbage to symbolize how people are scavenging for food because of Venezuela’s economic crisis, chant “The People Are Hungry!” and “Democracy!” After a few minutes, they are chased back to their cars by a fast-growing crowd of supporters of socialist President Nicolas Maduro.

The mid-morning fracas in a working-class district of Caracas is the latest of near-weekly “surprise” protests by the opposition this year intended to embarrass Maduro, galvanize street action and highlight Venezuela’s litany of problems.

“Three million Venezuelans are eating out of rubbish today,” said the 28-year-old legislator Carlos Paparoni, nursing a few bruises after the Food Ministry protest.

“No one can shut us up. We will fight wherever we have to.”

While the small, flash protests briefly paralyze streets, turn heads and provide colorful photo ops for journalists tipped off in advance, they are little more than a minor irritant to Maduro.

In fact, they have only been on the rise this year because of the failure of traditional mass marches in 2016.

A year of marches, which peaked with a million-person rally in Caracas, did not stop authorities blocking a referendum on Maduro’s rule that could have changed the balance of power in the South American member of OPEC with 30 million people.

Instead, they led to a short-lived Vatican-championed dialogue that helped shore up the unpopular president and divided the opposition Democratic Unity coalition, leaving rank-and-file activists demoralized.

With Maduro’s term due to finish in early 2019, authorities are now delaying local elections and making opposition parties jump through bureaucratic hoops to remain legally registered.

“We’ll have to stop conventional rallies and use the surprise factor to make the government see it must respect the constitution,” said opposition leader Henrique Capriles, whose First Justice party is a main promoter of the flash protests.

‘NO TO DICTATORSHIP!’

After traditional-style marches around the country on Jan. 23 were again blocked by security forces, Capriles debuted the new strategy the next day with a surprise protest that briefly immobilized vehicles on a highway.

Demonstrators held banners demanding “Elections Now!”

Since then, activists coordinating clandestinely and rotating responsibilities, have popped up regularly to stop traffic, chant slogans and demand meetings with officials. One day, they held three simultaneous protests.

Numbers, however, are small, seldom more than a dozen or two. Security forces normally move them on quickly, and pro-Maduro supporters hang around government buildings precisely to display their political zeal in such moments.

“These fascist coup-mongers are seeking violence. They should go to jail!” shouted Jorge Montoya, 48, wearing a “Chavez Lives!” T-shirt in honor of late leader Hugo Chavez outside the Food Ministry where he helped chase off the protesters.

Officials did not respond to requests for interviews on the flash protests. Maduro and other senior government officials routinely denounce opposition activists as coup-plotters, intent on bringing down socialism in Venezuela.

Another opposition party, Popular Will, which has long promoted civil disobedience tactics, is also a main instigator of street activism.

Its members last month painted a mosaic of their jailed leader Leopoldo Lopez on a highway, decked lamp posts with black “No To Dictatorship!” signs overnight, and on Valentine’s Day handed flowers to security personnel.

“They are actions that have to be creative, have high impact for communication, dent the government’s sense of invincibility, transmit a message … and reduce fear,” said Emilio Grateron, Popular Will’s national head of activism.

The party’s more than 150,000 activists take inspiration from successful models of non-violent protest abroad such as those in the 1980s by then-trade union leader Lech Walesa against communism in Poland and opposition in Chile to the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

Such heady comparisons, though, seem far-fetched in Venezuela right now where not just government officials but even some cynical opposition supporters scoff at the flash protests as ineffectual stunts.

“No one sees these surprise protests,” said Julio Pereira, 25, a student and long-time supporter of opposition marches. “The government laughs at them.”

Even though the opposition coalition proved it had majority support by winning legislative elections at the end of 2015, and despite the disastrous state of Venezuela’s economy, the prospect of political change has dimmed this year.

“Not so long ago, I was ready to march to Miraflores (presidential palace),” said Pereira, now about to join friends who have found work in Argentina. “Now I’m instead heading to the airport to get out. The government is a disaster, the opposition is a disaster, my country is a disaster. I’m gone.”

(Reporting by Andrew Cawthorne; editing by Christian Plumb and Grant McCool)

German shopping mall shut on police fears of an attack

Police at the Limbecker Platz shopping mall in Essen, Germany, March 11, 2017, after it was shut due to attack threat. REUTERS/Thilo Schmuelgen

ESSEN, Germany (Reuters) – Police in the western German city of Essen sealed off a shopping center in the center of town and ordered it to remain closed on Saturday due to concrete indications of a possible attack.

Germany is on high alert following major radical Islamist attacks in France and Belgium and after a failed asylum seeker from Tunisia drove a truck into a Berlin Christmas market in December, killing 12 people.

“Yesterday we received very serious indications from security sources that a possible attack was planned here for today and would be carried out,” a spokesman for Essen police told Reuters Television. “That is why we were forced to take these measures.”

Earlier, a police spokesman told a German broadcaster that they had viewed the threat as a possible “terrorist” attack.

Armed police and vans surrounded the shopping center, one of Germany’s biggest with more than 200 retail outlets, but roads nearby were open to traffic.

Essen, in the industrial Ruhr region, has nearly 600,000 inhabitants.

(Reporting by Reuters Television; Writing by Madeline Chambers; Editing by Toby Chopra)

Hungary to arm new ‘border hunters’ after six-month crash course

Hungarian border hunter recruits take oath during a swearing in ceremony in Budapest, Hungary, March 7, 2017. REUTERS/Laszlo Balogh

By Krisztina Than

BARCS, Hungary (Reuters) – Sandor Jankovics is proud to be joining Hungary’s new “border hunter” force after a six-month crash course to help police and army units keep out migrants, part of a security clamp down that has raised human rights concerns.

Hungary’s southern border with Serbia and Croatia marks the external edge of the European Union’s Schengen zone of passport-free travel. Hundreds of thousands of migrants have entered Hungary via its southern frontier since 2015, though most have moved on westward to more prosperous parts of the EU.

The migrant flow has ebbed greatly since Hungary erected a fence along the southern boundary and the EU struck a deal with Turkey 18 months ago that curbed migration from that country into neighboring Europe.

But nationalist Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who on Tuesday described mainly Muslim migrants as a “Trojan horse for terrorism”, has cited the risk of a new influx from the Balkans and is beefing up his country’s defense.

This week Hungary also passed a law to detain migrants in camps along its border, a step the United Nations said violates EU humanitarian law and will have a “terrible physical and psychological impact” on asylum seekers.

Jankovic, 26, who quit his job as a laborer in nearby Austria last year, will start “border hunter” duty along with almost 1,000 other volunteers within three months.

He is one of dozens undergoing fast-track training at Barcs, a border crossing with fellow EU country Croatia.

Barcs witnessed the apex of the migration crisis in September 2015 when many thousands fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East flooded into Hungary after having passed through Croatia from Serbia.

Now Barcs is eerily quiet, with only a few passing trucks being spot-checked by police. Orban’s security plan focuses on the border with Serbia since Croatia has beefed up its boundary with its Balkan neighbor since 2015.

Jankovics said he had never met a migrant, but looks forward to training patrols and to his deployment with great pride since he had always aspired to becoming a police officer.

CRASH COURSE IN SECURITY

“We will be sent to the stretch of border where we will be needed,” he said. He will get a monthly gross salary of 220,000 forints (£614), well above the minimum of 161,000 forints guaranteed by Hungary for those with secondary education.

Recruits, who must be between 18 and 55 years old, are given training similar to police and learn other skills such as guarding a border fence, detaining large groups of migrants and tracking their paths.

Some multicultural studies are part of the program.

“Initially we started to learn about the major religions of the world, who believes in what,” Jankovics said.

Like police officers, border hunters will carry pistols with live ammunition, batons, pepper spray and handcuffs, and will also be equipped with night-vision goggles if needed.

“The defense of Hungary is the most important for us,” said Adrienn Heronyanyi, 23, a recruit who previously worked in catering.

Hungarian police aim to recruit up to 3,000 border hunters. Recruiting is continuous, including in secondary schools.

In the classroom, the new recruits assemble their pistols at the order of their officer within seconds. In the afternoon, they learn judo skills and moves to handcuff people.

Asked under what conditions border hunters could use force against migrants, regional police chief Attila Piros said the rules were the same as for police – to “break resistance” but only as a last resort.

He said any force must be proportionate and justified. “One of the most important things in this six-month training that we teach as law but in fact has moral and ethical foundations is that criminals are human beings, everybody has human rights.”

MIGRANT “STORM” HAS NOT DIED – ORBAN

At a swearing-in ceremony of border hunters in Budapest on Tuesday, Orban, whose anti-immigrant policies have gone down well with voters, said Hungary had to act to defend itself.

“The storm has not died, it has only subsided temporarily,” he said. “There are still millions waiting to set out on their journey in the hope of a better life (in Europe).”

In addition to the razor-wire border barrier, the government has begun installing a second line of “smart fence” along the Serbian border. Border police said they had detained over 100 illegal migrants in the past 30 days.

Nils Muiznieks, the Council of Europe’s human rights commissioner, voiced alarm at Hungary’s migrant detention plan.

“Automatically depriving all asylum seekers of their liberty would be in clear violation of Hungary’s obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights,” he said on Wednesday.

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said its teams in Serbia were treating a growing number of migrants who reported being beaten and stomped on by Hungarian border guards who intercepted them.

Orban’s government has denied mistreating migrants. His office said eight cases of alleged mistreatment had been investigated but in none “was it proven that refugees had been harmed by border personnel”.

Reuters could not independently verify reports of abuses.

(Reporting by Krisztina Than; editing by Mark Heinrich)

North Korea bars Malaysians from leaving, in ‘diplomatic meltdown’

Police cars form a roadblock outside the sealed off North Korea embassy in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

By Rozanna Latiff and Ju-min Park

KUALA LUMPUR/SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea barred Malaysians from leaving the country on Tuesday, sparking tit-for-tat action by Malaysia, as police investigating the murder of Kim Jong Nam in Kuala Lumpur sought to question three men hiding in the North Korean embassy.

Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak accused North Korea of “effectively holding our citizens hostage” and held an emergency meeting of his National Security Council.

The moves underscored the dramatic deterioration in ties with one of North Korea’s few friends outside China since the murder of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s estranged half-brother at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Feb. 13.

Malaysia says the assassins used VX nerve agent, a chemical listed by the United Nations as a weapon of mass destruction.

Police have identified eight North Koreans wanted in connection with the murder, including two of the three believed to be hiding in the embassy – a senior North Korean diplomat and a state airline employee.

The only people charged so far are a Vietnamese woman and an Indonesian woman, accused of smearing the victim’s face with VX. He died within 20 minutes.

North Korea’s foreign ministry issued a temporary ban on Malaysians leaving the country, “until the incident that happened in Malaysia is properly solved,” state-run Korea Central News Agency said.

“In this period the diplomats and citizens of Malaysia may work and live normally under the same conditions and circumstances as before.”

HOSTAGE-TAKING

Najib denounced the travel ban in a statement as an “abhorrent act” that was in “total disregard of all international law and diplomatic norms”.

He said he had instructed the police “to prevent all North Korean citizens in Malaysia from leaving the country until we are assured of the safety and security of all Malaysians in North Korea”.

Najib returned from Indonesia and held an emergency meeting of his National Security Council.

There was no statement after the meeting, but the prime minister addressed Malaysians’ concerns on social media.

“I understand the feelings and concerns of the family and friends of Malaysians held in North Korea. We assure that we are doing everything we can to make sure they come back to the country safely.”

Euan Graham, Director, International Security at the Lowy Institute in Sydney, called the latest events “a classic own goal of North Korea’s making”, triggered “by the most outrageous public murder than you can image, using a chemical weapon in a crowded international airport.

“You’d have to go back a long way for this kind of wholesale diplomatic meltdown.”

The Malaysian murder and the four ballistic missiles North Korea test-launched on Monday “creates a more supportive climate for even tougher rounds of sanctions and coercive measures” against Pyongyang, Graham added.

Before the murder, North Korea could count Malaysia as one of its strongest friends. But Malaysia has since stopped visa-free travel and on Monday it expelled North Korea’s ambassador for questioning the impartiality of the murder investigation.

Last week, Malaysia said it would investigate North Korea front companies after a Reuters report showed that Pyongyang’s spy agency was running an arms network in the country.

NO RAID

There are 11 Malaysians in North Korea, according to a Malaysian foreign ministry official, including three embassy staff, six family members, and two others.

Hundreds of North Koreans are believed to be in Malaysia, most of them students and workers. The focus, however, was on its embassy staff.

“We are trying to physically identify all the embassy staff who are here,” deputy home minister Nur Jazlan Mohamed told reporters outside the North Korean embassy.

He said staff would not be allowed to leave the embassy “until we are satisfied of their numbers and where they are”.

By early afternoon, Malaysian police had removed tape and a police car blocking the North Korean embassy driveway.

Speaking at a news conference in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday, Malaysia’s police chief Khalid Abu Bakar said police would not raid the embassy building to get the three North Koreans sought in connection with the murder.

“We will wait for them to come out,” the police chief said. “We have got all the time.”

Aside from those three suspects, police have said four other wanted North Koreans left Malaysia in the hours after the murder.

The only North Korean suspect to be apprehended was deported on Friday, released due to insufficient evidence.

U.S. officials and South Korean intelligence suspect North Korean agents were behind the assassination of Kim Jong Nam, who had been living in Macau under China’s protection. He had spoken out publicly against his family’s dynastic rule of North Korea.

North Korea has refused to accept the dead man is leader Kim Jong Un’s half brother, and has suggested the victim died of a heart attack.

No next of kin have come forward to claim the body, but the Malaysian police chief said he was confident of obtaining DNA samples to formally identify the murdered man.

(Additional reporting by A.AnanthaLakshmi and Liz Lee in KUALA LUMPUR and Jack Kim in SEOUL; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore and Bill Tarrant)

Seven Baltimore police officers arrested on racketeering charges

A protester looks on as clouds of smoke and crowd control agents rise shortly after the deadline for a city-wide curfew passed in Baltimore, Maryland April 28, 2015, as crowds protest the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died in police custody. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

By Ian Simpson

(Reuters) – Seven Baltimore police officers were arrested on Wednesday on federal racketeering charges for robbing and extorting up to $200,000 from victims, along with stealing guns and drugs, prosecutors said.

Many of the alleged shakedowns took place while the Baltimore Police Department was under intense media scrutiny and facing a U.S. Justice Department civil rights investigation for the 2015 police-involved death of a black man that plunged the largely African-American city into turmoil.

A grand jury last week indicted six detectives and a sergeant on charges of extorting money and robbing residents, filing false court paperwork and making false overtime claims, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Maryland said. The indictment was unsealed on Wednesday.

“These are really simply robberies by people wearing police uniforms,” U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein told a news conference.

The officers, all members in 2015 and 2016 of a gun-crime investigation unit, stole firearms, drugs and cash ranging from $200 to $200,000 from victims, some of whom had not committed crimes, Rosenstein’s office said in a statement.

The investigation began about a year ago as an outgrowth of a federal Drug Enforcement Administration probe into a drug-trafficking ring, Rosenstein said. One of the officers also faces a charge of possessing and planning to distribute heroin.

The officers had initial appearances on Wednesday in a U.S. court in Baltimore and were ordered held pending detention hearings, a spokeswoman for Rosenstein said.

In a statement, Police Commissioner Kevin Davis said: “Reform isn’t always a pretty thing to watch unfold, but it’s necessary in our journey toward a police department our City deserves.”

The head of the Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police union, Gene Ryan, said in a statement he was “very disturbed” over the charges, but declined further comment until the cases were resolved.

All the officers are charged with racketeering conspiracy for robberies and extortion while part of the gun-crime unit. Five of the seven are charged with racketeering for shakedowns before they joined the task force.

They face a maximum of 20 years in prison for each count.

Baltimore was torn by rioting in April 2015 after a black man, Freddie Gray, died from an injury suffered in police custody. Six officers were indicted, but none were convicted.

Baltimore and the Justice Department reached agreement last month on a consent decree that calls for police reforms. The decree is awaiting approval by a federal judge.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson in Washington; Editing by Peter Cooney)