This story has been updated since its original posting at noon





With Henry J. Gomez, The Plain Dealer





CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Cleveland police have turned over a potentially damaging surveillance video to Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Bill Mason -- the same video they denied existed when Mason's office sought it more than two months ago.

The video contradicts an officer's claim that he was struck in the face when a Pennsylvania man tossed a belt during a January incident at City Jail, according to a supervisor's report. Both Mason and The Plain Dealer sought the video to gauge the truthfulness of the officer's statement.

But city officials refuse to provide a copy to The Plain Dealer, which has been examining the case for weeks. Legal experts said the video is a public record and should be released.

The newspaper's findings have prompted police and the prosecutor to launch separate criminal investigations into the accusation made by Patrolman Martin Lentz.

Making a false police statement can be a crime. When signing off on the supervisor's report in February, Police Chief Michael McGrath and others did not question Lentz's honesty.

More about Cleveland officers facing force-related charges

An assistant prosecutor had asked to see the video in March but was told by a police lieutenant that the evidence had disappeared. A felony assault on a police officer charge stood against Jalil Anderson until April, when he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of resisting arrest.

"The failure to provide a copy to the county prosecutor is not believed to be intentional, but an administrative error," Sgt. Sammy Morris, police spokesman, said late Monday in an e-mail.

Morris said the video is not a public record because it is part of the police probe into whether Lentz lied. But no such investigation existed May 3, the day the newspaper, under Ohio's public-records laws, first requested copies of any video from Anderson's arrest and booking.

City officials confirmed this week that they did not launch their own probe until May 24, the day the newspaper asked about the city's delay in providing the video and other documents.

Cleveland Law Director Robert Triozzi, who ultimately is responsible for determining whether a record can be released, did not respond to a telephone message seeking comment.

First Amendment advocates rejected the city's excuse for withholding the video.

"It should not lose its public status just because they have decided to use the public record as an investigatory tool," said Lucy Daglish, executive director of the nonprofit Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press in Arlington, Va. "Public is public, and it doesn't lose public status just because the cops are interested."

Attorney David Marburger, a public-records expert who has done work for The Plain Dealer, agreed. He said he the city has no legal grounds to keep the video from the newspaper.

"I can't think of an instance where that argument has succeeded," he said.

Catherine Turcer, a good-government watchdog for Ohio Citizen Action in Columbus, said she's "always surprised at all the ways" public officials find to block access to public records.

"It just looks like shenanigans," Turcer said of the withheld video.

Scott Greenwood, a constitutional lawyer in Ohio who serves as general counsel to the American Civil Liberties Union went a step further: "They're making it up as they go along."

Morris did not answer additional questions about the refusal to provide the video.

Andrea Taylor, press secretary for Mayor Frank Jackson said Safety Director Martin Flask ordered the internal criminal investigation of the Anderson case after being made aware of the discrepancies. Flask was first alerted to the case by Plain Dealer coverage, Taylor said.

McGrath has been on vacation and has not replied to numerous requests for comment.

Lentz also is facing scrutiny from federal prosecutors, who are conducting a civil-rights investigation into a Jan. 1 incident that resulted in criminal charges against him and three other officers. The four were accused of assaulting Edward Henderson after a high-speed chase.

Mason withdrew those charges to allow time for the federal probe.

The Plain Dealer learned of the video while examining supervisors' reports from use-of-force cases involving Lentz and the other officers who have faced criminal assault charges.

Lentz arrested Anderson, of York, Pa., after a traffic stop on suspicion of driving under suspension. Lentz's written incident report from the evening, states that Anderson became combative during booking at City Jail and threw a belt that struck and injured the officer.

But Sgt. Kennedy Jones, who investigated because Lentz reported using force to gain control of Anderson after the altercation, noted in his follow-up that the video showed otherwise.

Jones, despite determining that the video invalidated Lentz's assault claim, wrote in his report that force was justified because Anderson appeared to be "very agitated."

Anderson's public defender and Assistant County Prosecutor Marc Bullard both sought copies of the video. But in March, Lt. David Carroll told Bullard the video no longer existed, said Ryan Miday, a spokesman for the prosecutor's office.

Anderson, who has said he wanted to avoid constant trips between York and Cleveland, pleaded to the lesser charge the following month.

Messages left for Jones and Carroll were not returned Tuesday.

Greenwood, the ACLU lawyer, said police should have secured the video and provided it to the attorneys. "It was a constitutional violation for them not to have done so," he said.

Terry Gilbert, a local civil-rights lawyer, said the issue might not be willful misconduct.

"It could be incompetence or just plain sloppiness in logging, securing, and maintaining evidence which seems to happen more than it should in the Cleveland Police Department."

Morris did not elaborate on why McGrath believes the failure to provide the video to prosecutors was unintentional. He and McGrath also did not respond to questions about why the chief did not demand an investigation after Jones' report cast doubt on Lentz's truthfulness.

Gilbert thinks the mystery of the vanishing video could help Anderson receive a new trial.

"If he chooses to re-open the case, goes back to trial with the video available, and is acquitted," Gilbert said in an e-mail, "he could file a lawsuit for violation of his due process rights, malicious prosecution against Lentz, and various other civil rights violations."