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Cuyahoga County deputies called ‘cowboys’ for pointing assault rifle out of window during high-speed chase
Isen Vajusi, a Cuyahoga County sheriff’s deputy, pointed an assault rifle out of a moving cruiser’s window while speeding more than 100 mph at times during a December chase of a stolen car, bodycam footage shows.
Once the fleeing car crashed and flipped into a telephone pole, Vajusi jumped out, pointed his rifle at one suspect and shouted numerous vulgarities. “We don’t want to kill people,” Vajusi yelled, according to a review of the footage by The Marshall Project - Cleveland and News 5 Cleveland.
He later boasted about the arrest: “We got the dudes. We got the car. We didn’t shoot anybody. It can’t get any better than this. … I’m glad I didn’t have to use my gun this time.”
Sheriff Harold Pretel declined an interview. He would not answer specific questions about the chase such as whether the chase violated the pursuit policy or whether he had viewed the video.
“We stand behind our pursuit policy, which prioritizes the safety of both the public and our deputies,” department officials said in a statement. “This policy allows deputies to respond quickly to serious threats while minimizing risks. The policy also reflects our commitment to protecting our community in a responsible and effective manner.”
Jeff Wenninger, a Cleveland-area expert on police tactics, called the bodycam footage troubling because deputies put bystanders at risk of being hit if an accidental discharge had occurred.
“This was sloppy, unsafe, and shows a lack of discipline — real cowboys,” said Wenninger, the founder and CEO of Law Enforcement Consultants LLC. “Their crude language and unprofessional barking of commands made it clear they were operating with no discipline, no composure and no regard for proper tactics.”
For months, The Marshall Project - Cleveland and News 5 Cleveland have been asking questions about how the downtown unit operates alongside Cleveland police — who are under different leadership and must follow strict rules under a federal consent decree to prevent abuses.
The December 2024 chase was not Vajusi’s first controversial incident. It came two months after he shot a teenager in the leg and before he fired four rounds at another teenager on May 16 in Cleveland.
The news outlets reported in June that Vajusi was forced off a suburban police force after he failed his field training and it was found that he lacked confidence, had “difficulty in stressful situations” and “hesitates because he is afraid of making a mistake.”
– Mark Puente
Commission prepares consequential recommendations for Ohio’s public defense standards
At a July meeting in Columbus, Ohio Public Defender Commission Chair William Creedon put the question plainly: “Do we do a wholesale change of the way indigent defense is delivered in Ohio?”
The answer could reshape how thousands of low-income defendants get a lawyer — how the state guarantees its constitutional promise of adequate criminal defense.
Public outcry in Cuyahoga County last year jump-started an exhaustive debate over Ohio’s indigent defense standards. An investigation by The Marshall Project - Cleveland found juvenile court judges selectively assigning cases to unqualified defense attorneys. The commission, at the time, was overdue for a review of the statewide rules for reimbursing counties that paid private attorneys to take public defense cases.
Cuyahoga County also played a role in the commission’s last review in 2013.
“Discussions at the time were in the context of … concerns about the appointment system in Cuyahoga, which I understand is still an ongoing issue to this day,” attorney Jefferson Liston, who then chaired the commission, told current members. “It centered a lot on not just how people were being reimbursed, but it also centered on pay to play in … who was being appointed.”
The current commission is concerned that stricter standards for trial experience or legal education could exacerbate a shortage of lawyers reported in 82 of Ohio’s 88 counties, according to a 2025 survey by the Ohio State Bar Association.
Paying attorneys more is one solution. The Office of the Ohio Public Defender, overseen by the commission, successfully lobbied lawmakers this year to lift the $75-an-hour reimbursement cap for appointed counsel. But the state has a finite amount for indigent defense. If some counties increased their hourly rates to attract more attorneys, the state would have to reimburse everyone at a lower percentage to offset the additional costs.
With so many cases ending in plea deals, especially juvenile cases, changing the trial experience requirement is another solution. Commission members heard proposals to allow substitutes for trial experience such as time in courtrooms cross-examining witnesses or challenging prosecutors in contested court hearings.
Some private attorneys told the commission that a first-year lawyer might be as effective as an attorney with decades of experience, or even more so.
But a coalition of public defenders staunchly opposed any watering down of the standards. And some aspects, notably how local judges design and run each county’s indigent defense system in Ohio, appear sacrosanct, and potentially problematic.
“The judges really enjoy and cherish their appointment power,” Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers President Blaise Katter told the commission. By law, attorney assignments must not be influenced by elected officials, including juvenile judges in Cuyahoga County who still assign or have their staff assign attorneys to cases.
Therein lies a more fundamental problem, Katter explained: It’s “a system that rewards attorneys who do not try cases and do not tie up the court system with multiple hours. And that is the No. 1 issue that I hear from our membership.”
– Doug Livingston
East Cleveland Jail closes after inspections detail various violations
The East Cleveland Jail — made infamous in Season 3 of the podcast “Serial” and at the center of a $30 million court judgment — quietly closed in December after two inspections found dozens of violations.
City officials discussed inspection findings and their failure to update the facility with Ohio Department of Rehabilitation & Correction officials and agreed to temporarily close the jail, spokesperson JoEllen Smith confirmed.
City officials could not say exactly when the facility closed, but Cuyahoga County officials suggested it was around Christmas Eve, the day East Cleveland officials requested that the Cuyahoga County Sheriff’s Department start housing its prisoners while it repaired and remodeled the jail.
“We don’t have an operable jail,” said a spokesperson for East Cleveland Police Chief Reginald Holcomb. “Our jail has been closed, and we haven’t had a jail here for a long time.”
On Dec. 13, Cuyahoga County Board of Health inspectors found missing glass panels in several cells, exposed wiring, broken lighting in more than a dozen cells, plumbing failures in cells and the shower area, malfunctioning toilets, solid waste buildup in plumbing closets and dead roaches in the holding area. One cell was missing a lock; others had peeling paint and water damage. Three beds were ripped, and inspectors observed “debris buildup throughout the facility.”
Five days later, state inspectors cited the jail for 147 violations of Ohio standards and recommended that the jail no longer house prisoners. Inspectors found all areas of the jail to be “unsafe,” “unsanitary” and “nonoperable.”
Cells lacked seating, towels and clean bedding. Mattresses were ripped. Use-of-force reports were missing officers’ names or details of injuries. One officer told inspectors that he had never seen the jail’s medical policies. The jail failed to separate violent from nonviolent offenders. Men and women could converse between blocks due to the layout of the building. The jail had security issues, including broken cameras, unsecured perimeters and a corrections officer carrying a service weapon while inside the facility. Read the full extent of the inspection report here.
Kelly Woodard, the county’s director of communications, said they charge East Cleveland $173 per day to house people arrested there.
Mayor Lateek Shabazz, who has been in office for three weeks, said he, too, is unsure when the jail closed.
“The sheriff’s been taking them to the county jail,” he said. “That’s the information I have.”
The jail’s closure comes years after “Serial” detailed the beating and incarceration of Arnold Black, who in 2012 was held for four days in a storage room in the jail that didn’t have a bed, toilet, window or running water. In July 2024, the Supreme Court of Ohio ordered the city to pay Black more than $30 million after city officials failed to pay a $20 million verdict awarded in 2019.
– Brittany Hailer
Around the 216
Cleveland police are passing out recruitment cards with traffic citations. Scene Magazine
A Cuyahoga County man escaped custody at a Cleveland hospital. News 5 Cleveland
