An appeals court overturned the conviction of a former Miami cop who was found guilty of battering a Black woman in 2019 after she called police for help when her white neighbor pointed a shotgun at her.
Alejandro Giraldo, who once worked as a field training officer for the Miami Police Department, was convicted of felony battery and official misconduct in the March 5, 2019, arrest of 31-year-old Dyma Loving.
Loving called 911 that day after a white neighbor pointed a shotgun at her and her friend, Adrianna Greene.
That neighbor, Frank Tumm, started calling them “hookers” and racial slurs as they walked by his home on the sidewalk. When the women yelled back and called him a “f****t,” he picked up his firearm and pointed it at them, according to police body camera video.
Cellphone video and bodycam footage show multiple officers responding to the call. One officer interviewed Tumm, who said he never had a gun. He was let go that day and not arrested until a week later, on March 12, when he was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, according to reports.
As Giraldo interviewed the two women, who were both animatedly describing the encounter with the neighbor, he began threatening to commit Loving to a mental hospital and arrest her if she didn’t “chill out.”
As Loving tries to explain that she needs to call her kids, Giraldo grabs her, shoves her toward a chain-link fence, and wraps his arm around her head to pull her to the ground, the footage shows.
Loving was initially charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. Both charges were dropped two weeks after the arrest.
Giraldo’s arrest report, which factored into his misconduct charge, was central to the appellate court’s decision to clear his conviction.
He wrote in the report that “Loving began acting belligerent and would not obey
commands,” and throughout his encounter with her, she became “further upset, very irate, and uncooperative.”
“Ms. Loving began to scream at us, causing a scene in the residential neighborhood. Ms. Loving was asked several times to stop screaming and cooperate. Ms. Loving was advised that the investigation was interrupted by her screaming and disruptive behavior,” Giraldo wrote in the report.
The appellate court judges ruled that prosecutors didn’t provide a sufficient objective argument that could support their assertion that Giraldo intentionally falsified the arrest report. They stated that Giraldo’s “subjective interpretation” of Loving’s behavior during the encounter wasn’t adequately refuted, so intent that he wrote bogus statements couldn’t be proven.
“Giraldo’s subjective account of the events depicted doesn’t rise to the level of knowing or intentional falsification,” the three-judge panel wrote in its opinion. “Upon a review of the footage, Giraldo’s description isn’t patently false or inaccurate. … Because Giraldo’s subjective interpretation wasn’t clearly refuted by objective facts, it didn’t — and couldn’t — rise to the level of intentional falsification.”
The three-judge panel from Florida’s 3rd District Court of Appeal in Miami further reasoned that because prosecutors told the trial court the false arrest report charge helped form the basis of the battery charge, that second charge was called into question.
“The trial court erred in denying Giraldo’s motions for judgment of acquittal. The State conceded at oral argument that if the motion for judgment of acquittal on the official misconduct count should have been granted, it should have not proceeded with the battery count, as the arrest would have been lawfully made,” the judges wrote. “We therefore reverse the final judgment of conviction and sentence and remand for entry of judgment of acquittal on both counts.”
The court dismissed both his misconduct and battery charges.
Giraldo’s attorney said he was “thrilled and satisfied” with the ruling. State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle expressed disappointment.
“Based on the Court’s direction, we are unable to retry the case. Though we are disappointed by the Court’s decision, we understand and respect their conclusion,” Rundle stated, according to Local 10. “Police officers have a very difficult job and hindsight is 20/20. As a result, the law gives them a great deal of latitude, making it difficult to prosecute them for their behavior and actions while performing their duties.”
Giraldo was fired from the Miami police force and was convicted on June 22, 2022, on charges stemming from Loving’s arrest. He was sentenced to spend 364 days in prison and 18 months probation. He was released on an appeal bond on the same day his jail sentence began.
His former boss told NBC6 he was surprised at the ruling to overturn Giraldo’s conviction.
“Although I respect the decision of the District Court of Appeals, I am surprised,” former Miami-Dade police director Juan Perez said in a statement, according to NBC6. “The guilty verdict was decided by a jury and not the state attorney.”
The Miami Herald reports that Giraldo is expected to attempt to reclaim his position as a police officer. To do so, he’ll need to reapply for re-certification as a police officer from the state.
