CLEVELAND, Ohio — Prosecutors in Detroit will handle the case of two Cleveland-area federal task force officers in connection with accusations that they illegally detained a man at a Hinckley Township bar.
The U.S. attorney’s office in eastern Michigan agreed to take over the investigation after northern Ohio’s federal prosecutor’s office recused itself.
Medina County Prosecutor Forrest Thompson said the case was assigned to Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Moran in Detroit. Thompson said Moran has already reviewed body-camera footage and police reports from the April incident.
Spokeswomen in the U.S. attorney’s offices in Cleveland and Detroit confirmed that Michigan prosecutors would handle the investigation. They declined further comment.
Northern Ohio’s U.S. attorney, Becky Lutzko, was previously a Hinckley Township trustee.
The FBI is investigating the case. Cleveland FBI spokeswoman Kimberly Schwarting would not say if another city’s FBI office will take over the probe.
No charges have been filed against the two officers — Cleveland police officer Donald Kopchak and Lake County Narcotics Agency officer Daniel Lajack.
Kopchak, at the time of the April incident, worked for a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives task force. Lajack worked for a Drug Enforcement Administration task force.
Both have been removed from the units. Kopchak, 40, was hired as a Cleveland police officer in 2007, while Lajack, 48, has worked for Lake County since 2000.
If charges are filed against the two officers, the Detroit attorneys would handle the cases in Cleveland.
Federal prosecutors around the country regularly ask for other offices to handle matters that could present the appearance of a conflict.
The incident under investigation happened April 26 at the Buzzards Roost bar on Ohio 303 and West 130th Street.
Body-camera footage posted on the YouTube channel Red Zone Watch and Hinckley police reports say Lajack and Kopchak were at the bar when they met a man who they believed was an illegal immigrant.
The man is a legal immigrant from Eritrea in East Africa. He is a truck driver who lives in Dallas and has been in the United States for 14 years.
The man told police that he was delivering items to the Aldi’s warehouse on West 130th Street, arrived early and went to the bar, according to police reports and the video.
The man was polite and having a good time when Lajack and Kopchak became aggressive with him and accused him of being an illegal immigrant, a bartender told police.
The two officers grabbed him as he attempted to leave and demanded his identification, according to the video. They led him out of the bar, and Kopchak pinned him to the ground and held him in a leg lock until Brunswick police arrived, the footage shows.
One of the task force officers told Brunswick officers they feared the man could be a terrorist.
Brunswick officers showed up at the bar because Hinckley Township officers were busy at the time. Hinckley officers took over the case before the FBI stepped in. A police report lists Lajack and Kopchak as suspects and potential charges of assault, disrupting public service, abduction and unlawful restraint.
Thompson said his office will hold off on its investigation of the officers because federal prosecutors are involved.
Adam Ferrise covers federal courts at cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer. You can find his work here.
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