#WantedWednesday: Lieutenant Brian Rice

Dept: Crime Lab (Now), Western District (Then)


  • Murder
  • Abuse of Power
  • Excessive Force
  • False Arrest
  • Witness Tampering
  • Witness Intimidation
  • Destruction of Evidence
  • Harassment
  • Threats of Violence
  • Drunk Driving

Reports from the Carroll County Sheriff’s office reveal 7 years of alleged harassment, stalking, and threatening of Rice’s ex-girlfriend, the mother of his child, and her then-husband.

2012:

Rice was suspended following a suicidal incident in Carroll County. While his guns were confiscated, months later he showed up at his ex’s home waving weapons. He was protected by higher ups and never went before a trial board.

Carroll County deputies, starting in 2012, wrote reports indicating Rice’s behaviour, drunken driving, threatening gestures, and harassment of deputies. This included waving his badge and demanding that deputies help him retaliate against his ex, the mother of one of his children. 

2013:

On January 24, 2013, Rice’s ex’s then-husband filed a complaint with the Sheriff’s Dept outlining a series of incidents including threats of murder and physical abuse and threatening to use his police powers against the husband in retaliation. 

2014:

Rice was again placed on suspension in 2014. 

2015:

Two weeks before Freddie Gray’s arrest, Rice was under IAD investigation for another report of threatening Carroll County Sheriff’s deputies, saying that “heads will roll” if they didn’t arrest his ex’s new husband. 

Source: The Guardian

Freddie Gray:

Rice left his normal administrative duties as a Lt. and went on bike squad duty. He chased Gray for making eye contact and running. 

Rice is seen on video at Stop 1 yelling at bystanders that he will arrest all of them for watching Gray’s arrest. They were forced to leave the street. 

Several witnesses saw Rice throw Gray headfirst into the transport van at Stop 2, at which point Gray stopped screaming and police are seen acting worried. Gray’s fatal injury was consistent with a ‘shallow diving accident” similar to being thrown headfirst. 

Rice helped coach the police on scene into saying that Gray was heard banging and shaking the van despite no video evidence. 

A witness asked Officer William Porter for a supervisor, Porter pointed at Rice, and Rice pointed his taser at the witness. 

At Stop 5, Rice and the bike squad are seen hiding out of view of the CCTV cameras while letting his Sergeant and other police deal with Gray’s death. 

Police arranged for a coached witness, Donta Allen, to say that he was in the van and heard Gray banging his own head to death (a medical impossibility). However, evidence and the details of his statement suggest he wasn’t even in the van to begin with. 

Source: the Undisclosed Podcast

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