Officer Ronald Smith and Joseph McGuire of Imperial Beach, Calif., are charged with assault and carrying a concealed pistol without a permit. Smith al

Officer Ronald Smith and Joseph McGuire of Imperial Beach, Calif., are charged with assault and carrying a concealed pistol without a permit. Smith also is charged with perjury.The shooting took place Aug. 9 at the Loud American Roadhouse during the annual Sturgis motorcycle rally.Smith was off-duty with members of the Iron Pigs Motorcycle Club. Four other members of the Iron Pigs are accused of carrying concealed pistols without a permit. They include a Seattle police sergeant, Dennis McCoy, and two members with Customs and Border Protection in Blaine, Scott Lazalde of Bellingham and James Rector of Ferndale. The fourth man is Erik Pingel of Aurora, Colo.Seattle police say their two officers are on paid leave because of the case.Smith testified last year at a federal racketeering trial involving members of the Washington Nomads chapter of the Hells Angels.Multiple charges have been filed today against Seattle police officer and Iron Pigs Motorcycle Club member Detective Ron Smith upon the recommendation of a Meade County grand jury over the August 9th shooting incident where Detective Smith, who was off-duty in attendance at the Sturgis motorcycle rally, had shot a Hells Angels Motorcycle Club member twice inside of a crowded Sturgis bar.At the recommendation of the grand jury, the officer has been charged with multiple counts including perjury, aggravated assault, and carrying concealed pistol without a permit or abiding by a permit of a reciprocal state. The grand jury had heard 7 hours of testimony on the Sunday following the incident and considered further evidence and testimony on Wednesday, August 27. Smith could face up to 15 years in prison for the aggravated assault charge and five years for the perjury charge. Both are felonies. The two alternative charges he faces are misdemeanors.While recent changes to the Seattle Police Department's disciplinary system makes committing perjury as part of an officer's official duty in the course of an internal investigation an offense that requires immediate termination, it is unclear if committing perjury while off-duty would apply. All officers involved in the incident have been put on administrative leave for the course of SPD's own internal investigation into the shooting incident. The city recently lost a case against them made by a police officer who was fired after he was charged with a felony and plead guilty of a misdemeanor instead, indicating that Smith and other officers will likely remain on paid administrative leave during the course of the investigation at least, which can last up to 180 days or more.
Additionally, the four other Iron Pig MC members who were with Smith may also face charges of carrying a concealed pistol or an alternative charge of failure to abide by a permit of a reciprocal state. Also, it appears as though the person who was shot will also face charges of assault as well. The other Iron Pig MC members who were with Smith in Sturgis who face charges of carrying a concealed weapon without a permit include: Scott Lazalde of Bellingham, James Rector of Ferndale, Erik Pingel, of Aurora, Colorado, and Dennis McCoy of Seattle.Two of the Iron Pigs MC members who were charged are SPD officers; Ron Smith and Dennis McCoy. Also, two other Iron Pigs members who were charged are US Customs Agents; Scott Lazalde and James Rector. There was no word yet as to Erik Pingel's occupation or relation to the Iron Pigs MC, which is reportedly comprised of only police officers and firefighters. Sturgis state attorney Sondreal said in an e-mail this morning that the grand jury found that Smith lied while testifying before them the day after the shooting. "The grand jury must've decided that Mr. Smith, having taken an oath to testify truly, in a state proceeding, stated intentionally and contrary to the oath, a material matter which he knew to be false."At this point there has been no comment from either officer Smith, who claims to have shot in self defense, or the Seattle Police Officer's Guild, who previously insisted that the officer would be exonerated by video evidence taken from the Sturgis bar. Smith, in addition to being a member of the Iron Pigs motorcycle group and a Seattle police detective is also a board member of the Seattle police guild and editor of it's monthly newsletter "The Guardian". Online editions of that newsletter were quickly pulled offline after the incident. Smith and other SPD officers who were with him have been put on administrative leave pending an internal investigation into the incident.