Murder Case (2023) on Campus at Risk Due to Allegations of Police Misconduct 

The location where Max Emerson was shot and killed. Photo by Patrick D. Lewis

By Patrick D. Lewis

Attorneys for the man accused of fatally shooting a Kentucky high school wrestling coach in a robbery gone wrong on Catholic University’s campus have moved to dismiss the felony indictments against their client, saying police and prosecutors conspired to destroy evidence of government wrongdoing in the case.

Jaime Macedo was indicted for the murder of Maxwell Emerson, which occurred on July 5, 2023. Emerson was visiting Washington for a professional development event and was walking to the Brookland-CUA Metro that morning when Macedo asked him for money, according to court filings. After Emerson gave him some money, Macedo held him at gunpoint in front of O’Connell Hall. When Emerson tried to beat him away, Macedo fired, hitting him in the stomach. Emerson died in a hospital.

Macedo was arrested days later after someone recognized him on a Metro train and was indicted for felony murder. Now, though, his attorneys say multiple Metropolitan Police Department officers involved in the case were under internal affairs investigations for wrongdoing. Allegedly, that a man who police called a civilian witness in filings was actually a police officer, and that prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. covered it all up. They moved on Tuesday morning to dismiss the indictment for good.

In the motion to dismiss, defense attorneys Rachel Cicurel and Jessica Willis, both of the D.C. Public Defender Service, wrote, “For over two years, the government has known about critical Brady evidence that it elected to withhold from the defense.”

The attorneys allege that the homicide detectives on the case, when they swore out search warrants to raid Macedo’s home and seize his phone, were relying on suspect identifications given by an MPD officer to swear out search warrantwho was on administrative probation due to allegations that he had threatened a woman who had refused his advances. In fact, internal affairs agents had recommended the officer be fired, but he was instead given a three-year “last chance” agreement. 

The attorneys said the other person whose identification was relied on was presented as a civilian witness but was in fact another MPD officer, which prosecutors never disclosed. That second officer was also serving an administrative probationary sentence at the time because he had been arrested for animal cruelty and had lied to animal control officers in an interview.

The attorneys also said that the lead homicide detective on the case had a long history of misconduct. They said that he had been under internal investigation since 2022, when supervisors within the Homicide Branch became aware that he had entered an unethical and undisclosed relationship with a female homicide detective and had made explicit tapes on his department-issued cell phone. He was ultimately transferred out of Homicide midway through the investigation and given a “last-chance” agreement as well, although internal affairs officials had recommended that he be fired.

In a letter sent to the detective by the director of the department’s Disciplinary Review Division and included in court filings, the official said, “Your behavior falls short of the high standards set in the Code of Ethics that you as a member of the police force are expected to uphold. In sum, your misconduct has cast a shadow over your credibility and reputation as a law enforcement officer.”

The defense attorneys said that MPD failed to turn over this information and that prosecutors assigned to the case previously, who left the department at some point during the investigation, were also aware of it, and argued the indictment should be dismissed.

Hearings on the motions began on Wednesday and continued on Thursday.