Pittsburgh police officer under internal investigation for use of Taser at Downtown restaurant

Not a good move.

Thanks SSG(P) (Join to see) for letting us know that 23-year veteran Pittsburgh police officer Ronald Hough is under investigation for an October 30, 2017 incident inside Villa Reale Pizzeria and Restaurant on Smithfield Street after Dominic Reale and regular customer Officer Hough ate pizza together.
Officer Ronald Hough tazed Dominic Reale.
It is noteworthy that while under investigation Officer Hough remains on active duty.

Here is the text below for anybody who can't access it.
"A veteran Pittsburgh police officer is under internal investigation after he shocked a Downtown pizzeria employee with a Taser in an incident captured on video.
The city’s Office of Municipal Investigations and the Citizen Police Review Board both are investigating.
Officer Ronald Hough, a 23-year veteran who serves in the department’s motorcycle division, is accused of discharging his Taser at Dominic Reale, 46, of Robinson, inside Villa Reale Pizzeria and Restaurant on Smithfield Street about 7:20 p.m. Oct. 30.
Mr. Reale is the owner’s son and was working that day. He ate pizza with Officer Hough, a regular customer, before the incident, said Mr. Reale’s attorney, Joel Sansone.

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The two were friendly in the context of the restaurant but did not spend time together outside the pizzeria, Mr. Sansone said.
Video surveillance shows Mr. Reale, wearing a shirt and apron, standing at a counter and talking with Officer Hough, who is in full uniform, for about three minutes before Mr. Reale walks away. The officer follows him around a counter, then circles back to the other side.
Mr. Reale then stands behind a woman sitting at the counter, putting her between himself and the officer. Mr. Sansone said his client jokingly told Officer Hough that the officer would have to shoot her to get to him.
“As a joke, he put this young woman between himself and the police officer, thinking it would dissuade this officer from foolish conduct,” Mr. Sansone said. “But when he saw it didn’t, he got out of her way and went behind the counter.”
In the video, which does not include sound, Mr. Reale then leans on the counter and talks with the woman. Officer Hough pulls out his Taser, raises it and fires over the woman’s shoulder, striking Mr. Reale in the chest from several feet away.
Mr. Reale falls, dropping a water bottle, and tries to pull the Taser probes out, the video shows. Officer Hough then walks up to Mr. Reale and pulls out the probes, helps the man to his feet and pats him off.
Officer Hough stays at the restaurant for at least another four minutes, the video shows, and Mr. Reale walks away and paces the restaurant.

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“Mr. Reale is just standing there talking to this young woman and literally with zero provocation of any type or kind, this officer took out his Taser, discharged his Taser into my client’s chest within inches of the young lady,” Mr. Sansone said. He declined to say what Mr. Reale and Officer Hough said to each other in the moments leading up to the shooting.
Mr. Reale did not go to a hospital following the incident. He said Thursday that he was “totally shocked” when Officer Hough fired the Taser.
“I’m terrified,” Mr. Reale said. “I’m still terrified. I’ve been threatened.”
Mr. Sansone said Thursday that “numerous” police officers had visited the restaurant and “intimidated” Mr. Reale, with some suggesting he delete the video. Mr. Sansone would not reveal specifics but said the “intimidation” began the day of the incident and continued as recently as Wednesday.
“Some want to cover it up, and some want the officer to burn,” he said. “And we have no interest in either of those. We have an interest in my client being left alone.”
Pittsburgh police said Thursday that Mr. Sansone had refused to turn over the video to investigators. Mr. Sansone said he will cooperate with the investigation when he is able to be involved in the process, and implied he does not trust police to handle it on their own.
“I’ve had my share of disappointments with OMI [Office of Municipal Investigations],” Mr. Sansone said. He added that Mr. Reale did not want the incident to go public and would have preferred to “resolve it quietly.”

Pittsburgh police Chief Scott Schubert said Thursday the department will do a complete investigation.
“I take any complaint seriously,” Chief Schubert said. “We are going to thoroughly investigate and take appropriate action either way with the outcome.”
The Oct. 30 incident was not the first time Officer Hough pulled out his Taser inside the restaurant, Mr. Sansone said. About 7 p.m. Oct. 23, the officer pointed his Taser at a man repairing a cash register.
Mr. Sansone also released video of that incident. In the video, a man is talking on his cell phone and working to fix the register while Officer Hough, again in uniform, sits at a table behind him.
After a few minutes, Officer Hough pulls out his Taser, appears to remove the cartridge, and points it at the wall in front of the man, who turns around, apparently startled.
One of the people in the room said the officer made a joke along the lines of, “If you don’t hurry up and fix that, I’m going to tase you,” Mr. Sansone said.

The worker chuckles, pulls a small laser pointer out of his pocket and waves it in the officer’s direction. Officer Hough then puts the cartridge back in his Taser and holsters it.
“When police officers abuse their power, all of us are in danger,” Mr. Sansone said. “And so we must exercise our duty as the owners of this republic to monitor and control the conduct of those to whom we give the right to use deadly force. This family is an iconic Pittsburgh small-business family that should not have suffered the abuses that they have suffered at the hands of this misguided public servant.”
Villa Reale opened in 1976 and has traditionally had a friendly relationship with police officers, Mr. Sansone said. Now, however, Mr. Sansone is asking Chief Schubert and Mayor Bill Peduto to keep officers away from the restaurant.
Elizabeth Pittinger, executive director of the Citizen Police Review Board, said the video shows what appears to be an unjustified use of force.
“It was just an outright reckless use of a Taser,” she said. “What risk do we observe to the officer at the time the Taser was deployed? It’s a very high level of force. This guy is in his own store, it appears the officer follows him around, it didn’t appear the civilian was taunting or chasing the officer. It looked like the officer was following the civilian and the civilian walked away. So why was he tased? What did he do? What was the crime, and what was the risk that the officer was so fearful he had to deploy one level lower than lethal force?”
Officer Hough, who remains on active duty, did not respond to requests for comment.
Timothy McNulty, spokesman for Mr. Peduto, said Thursday the mayor’s office had no comment. Mike Manko, spokesman for Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr., said his office will sit down with the Office of Municipal Investigations when “it becomes appropriate.”
“A number of years ago, District Attorney Zappala appointed a commission chaired by former Pennsylvania Supreme Court Chief Justice Ralph Cappy to advise law enforcement and the community on the use of Tasers,” Mr. Manko said. “There were several directives that resulted from the commission’s work, the most important of which was to impress upon law enforcement and the community that Tasers are in fact weapons, to be deployed and used only when absolutely necessary.”

Officer Farve? Did he ask for a liter of cola?! LOL