A former Kentucky State Police trooper who illegally entered a home while investigating an arson has been sentenced to six months in federal prison.
The sentence for Jeremy D. Elliotte includes six months on home detention after leaving prison.
In sentencing Elliotte Monday, U.S. District Judge Claria Horn Boom said the vast majority of police officers follow the rules in doing a vital job under difficult circumstances.
But when an officer violates the law, it poisons trust in law enforcement and the fair functioning of the justice system, and taints the good name of upstanding officers, Boom said.
Boom noted that Elliotte gave investigators false information to try to cover up the crime.
“It was a flagrant disrespect for the law,” the judge said.
The case began after someone started a fire in August 2020 at a home under construction in Whitley County. The house was owned by Derrek Lovett, another state trooper.
Elliotte, Lovett and other officers began investigating the arson and decided to find and interview a man named Bradley Hamblin.
It was about 3 a.m. when officers got to the house where they believed they could find Hamblin. Elliotte got the job of going to the door.
Hamblin opened the door when Elliotte knocked. Elliotte stepped a few feet into the house and brought him out.
A grand jury charged that that was a violation of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which says people should not be subjected to unreasonable search and seizure.
Elliotte didn’t have a warrant to arrest Hamblin or search the house, and knew it wasn’t legal for him to enter without permission or an urgent situation that justified going in, federal authorities said.
Elliotte’s defense attorneys, Brandon Marshall and Alex Stewart, said in a sentencing memorandum that after several hours of investigating, Elliotte recognized Hamblin and made a poor decision, in the heat of the moment, to step inside.
“I definitely acted poorly and I didn’t live up to the high standards I set for myself,” Elliotte said during the hearing.
Several other police officers went into the house after Elliotte with guns drawn, roused other occupants from sleep and questioned them, according to the court record.
Lovett allegedly assaulted Hamblin and broke bones in his face after he was brought out of the house.
In addition to a charge against Lovett related to the alleged assault, Lovett, Elliotte and another trooper, Michael Howell, were charged with making false statements to try to cover up the crime.
Elliotte told investigators that Hamblin — who later pleaded guilty to arson — resisted arrest and tried to escape, which wasn’t true.
After the incident, the camera inside Howell’s cruiser picked up cell phone calls between officers, including talk about a story to cover up the incident and a reference from Howell describing the use of force against Hamblin as “pretty bad,” according to the court record.
Without those unintentionally recorded conversations, it’s unlikely the allegations against the three troopers would have been successfully investigated, the prosecutors, Assistant U.S. Attorneys Zach Dembo and Emily Greenfield, said in a sentencing memorandum.
The three were suspended after being indicted.
Lovett resigned, and Howell and Elliotte performed no official duties after being charged, according to the agency.
Elliotte pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of violating the civil rights of the people in the house and surrendered his law-enforcement certification.
Lovett and Howell pleaded not guilty and have not been tried.
Elliotte faced up to a year behind bars, but his attorneys sought a sentence of two years’ probation, with six months of that on home incarceration.
They pointed to his unblemished record as a police officer before the incident and his work to remake his life after losing a job he’d wanted since he was a boy, growing up as the son of a state police officer.
Elliotte works as a freight dispatcher and also carries a full load of college classes, his attorneys said.
Family members described Elliotte as a straight-arrow kid who grew up to be a dedicated police officer and exemplary husband and father.
A family friend, Circuit Judge Dan Ballou, said in a letter that he knew of no one more open, honest and fair-minded than Elliotte.
“Jeremy has always been mature, determined, dedicated, and with a calling to serve God, his family, and our community,” Ballou wrote.
Ballou submitted the letter in his personal capacity, and did not identify himself as a judge.
Prosecutors sought a sentence of a year behind bars for Elliotte, arguing he violated a bedrock principal of the nation’s founding — the right of people to enjoy privacy and security in their home.
“While any right being taken from a citizen by a rogue law enforcement officer is unconscionable, the Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable entry into a home goes to the very core of what the Bill of Rights was designed to protect against,” the prosecutors wrote.
Boom said Elliotte had many positive qualities, but said the sentence for him needed to be serious enough to deter potential bad behavior by other officers.
The incident must have been “absolutely terrifying” for other people in the house, and could have ended in bloodshed if the startled residents had reacted the wrong way, Boom said.
“It could’ve been disastrous,” Boom said.
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