Video: Herndon Officer Accused Of Filing False Report

HERNDON, VA — The Herndon Police Department posted a video Tuesday night on its YouTube channel showing a conversation between a Herndon Middle School parent and the officer she has accused of filing a false police report involving her son.

The video, which was captured on a body-warn camera, was of an Oct. 15 meeting at HPD headquarters between Sandra Barksdale of Reston and Officer M.F. Murn, the accused school resource officer. Also present in the video are Dr. Sujatha Hampton, the education chair of the Fairfax County NAACP, and Barksdale's 13-year-old son, Khaleaf Ali. Before releasing the video, HPD had blurred out Ali's image to protect his identity.

On Tuesday morning, Barksdale, Hampton, and Fairfax County NAACP President Sean Perryman hosted a press conference in front of Herndon Middle School, where they accused Murn of racial profiling and filing a false police report concerning a Sept. 19 altercation between Ali and another boy on a Fairfax County Public Schools bus.

During the press conference, Hampton referenced the Oct. 15 meeting, claiming that Murn had become "openly hostile and angry" when confronted about the bus video of the altercation and his police report. She also said he pointed a finger at her in "a controlled rage."

Later in the day, Herndon Police Chief Maggie DeBoard hosted her own press conference, in which she called Barksdale and Hampton's accusations false and outrageous. She strongly defended Murn's handling of the case and promised to release the video of the Oct. 15 meeting as soon as HPD finished redacting references to Ali's identity.

The video shows Murn greeting Barksdale, Ali, and Hampton in the lobby of police headquarters and taking them to a meeting room.

"As a parent, if people were talking about my child and my child's behavior, I'd want to know about what people would be saying about my child's behavior," Murn said.

Barksdale asked Murn if he is recording the meeting on his camera and then asked if she can also record the meeting.

"The Herndon Police Department has body cams," Murn said. "We wear body cams. We record. We're required by policy to record everything."

The officer explained to Barksdale that he became involved in the investigation on Oct. 7, after being contacted by Herndon Middle School Principal Justine Klena. The principal told Murn of an earlier meeting she had with Barksdale and Hampton, in which the mother asked why HPD had not been called following the Sept. 19 altercation.

"Now you watched video of the bus incident and exclaimed, 'That's an assault!'," Murn told Barksdale. "This is what she said to me. Then she showed me the video. And from watching the video, aside from the incident, it was clear that the bus was not on school property any longer. That it was in the town. If it's in the town, then that's the Herndon Police Department's responsibility to investigate incidents."

Murn told Barksdale and Hampton that in viewing the video he saw what appeared to be an assault and therefore he was obligated to investigate. He also acknowledged that his full-time job was to be an SRO at Herndon High School and Herndon Middle School.

"The county has SROs in every middle school and high school," Murn said. "About three years ago, the town decided to make the capital investment to have an officer assist, with all the shootings going on around the country. ... My permanent job is to assist these county SROs. The idea is to keep bad people out."

Murn told Barksdale and Hampton that he had watched the tape and identified other children on the school bus. He then reached out to the parents of those children to obtain permission to speak with them about the incident.

"Some of the parents were aware of what happened, some were not aware," he said. "In other words, their children didn't go home and tell."

DeBoard said at her press conference Murn had interviewed eight students, all in the same age group as Ali and of mixed racial background.

"They all told not a perfectly exact stories, but extremely similar stories about your son's behavior," Murn said.

When questioned why he didn't interview the students at the police station since it was a police investigation, Murn said he conducted the interviews on school property for the convenience of the students and parents.

Barksdale pressed the point that Murn had said the incident took place off of school grounds, but the students were interviewed on school property and not at police headquarters, where she and her son were currently meeting with the him. She asked why they couldn't meet at the school like the other children.

"At this point, it's not a school issue," Murn said. "At this point, now it's two separate things. The school, they do whatever they do. Now there's a police department."

After viewing the video and completing the interviews, HPD presented all of its findings to an Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney who decided the incident did not rise to a criminal level, DeBoard said, during her press conference.

In addition, the attorney said she would not prosecute either of the boys involved in the altercation due to their ages and the facts involved in the case, DeBoard said.

At this point in the case, Murn reached out to Barksdale for a meeting because some of the students had described "very disturbing behavior" about Ali, according to the Oct. 15 video. The meeting at police headquarters was not part of the investigation, which he said was then closed. Instead, it was an opportunity for him to tell Barksdale what the witnesses had said about her son.

Hampton then asked what was being done about the assault on Ali, to which Murn replied there was no assault on Ali and that he had actually assaulted the other boy.

"The other child was defending himself. He's the offender," Murn said, pointing to Ali. "He committed assault, causing that child to respond in such a way. There is assault and battery. He was committing an assault without the battery prior to that other child reacting the way that child reacted. He is listed as the offender. He is the offender."

In the video, each time Murn said "he," he pointed at Ali.

Murn told Barksdale and Hampton that Ali was the offender because of what he said and how he positioned himself in front of the other boy.

"At one point, he was touching that child. Poking that child. Moving that child's chest, his breasts up and down," Murn said, using hand gestures to illustrate what he was saying. "Calling him fat. Calling him the n-word. Challenging him to get up and fight. Telling that child, 'Get up and fight. I will mess you up.' Calling him the n-word. Using the f-word several times. Telling him what'll happen."

According to Murn, the other students said Ali's behavior toward the other boy started almost as soon as he got on the bus. They also told Murn Ali picks a child to bully almost every day on the bus.

"Because he moved from the back of the bus where he was seated, and then he positioned himself in front of that child, with his legs in the aisle," Murn said. "That child's in the back of the bus. That child has no place to go and, again, that child's perceptions would be, my perceptions would be, 'That it's coming back and I have the right to defend myself,' and that child does."

Hampton said she was confused by Murn's "doubling down posture" in his words as he described the incident.

"We do know what we saw," she said, referring to the bus video. "We can extrapolate out based on just everything we know about the way things tend to happen if it was reversed, if the other boy had been doing the same things. ... I'm saying that if it had been reversed and this child or any other black child had been pounding on another white child, in the same manner that was happening, it's hard to imagine that justice would've been meted out in the same way."

Murn called Hampton's remark "out of line" and said he would not discuss the matter any further with her. All that he was relating is what the other children had told him. He then asked if they had any other questions.

Barksdale requested a copy of the police report and Murn told her she would have to file a Freedom of Information request to obtain a copy. He directed her to go through the records office at police headquarters.

Barksdale then asked if Murn had interviewed the other child involved in the altercation. He said no.

"Everything is solely based on the children sitting around what the observed and what they heard," he said. "So it's not a 'he said/she said.' That there's no bias on the part of all the other children sitting around of multi-color."

The meeting ended with Barksdale requesting Murn's business card and the case number for the investigation.

Fairfax County NAACP has filed a FOIA request to obtain a copy of the bus video, according to Perryman.

According to a statement from FCPS, the school system does not release bus video in order to comply with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. This federal law is designed to protect student privacy.

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