Railroad security officer stabbed www.privateofficer.com

MIAMI Fla Aug 16 2012–Miami Police have released a composite sketch of a man suspected in the stabbing of a security officer with the Florida East Coast railroad line Raul Guerra, 42, was hospitalized Wednesday after he was stabbed in the arm. Guerra was checking into some ‘suspicious’ activity on the tracks at NE 2nd Avenue and 72nd Street. According to FEC police officials, people have been putting objects on the tracks to make the train stop so they can jump onto the train. Officer Guerra spotted this group of people attempting to stop the train in this manner when he approached them.

Most of the group ran away but one confronted him and stabbed the officer in the arm. “The officer was able to deflect any type of attack that was attempted on him and as a result saved his life because this injury could have been more dangerous if it had struck him anywhere in the middle of the body or in the face,” said Miami Fire Rescue spokesman Lt. Ignatius Carroll. “He was able to protect himself by putting his arm up.” The officer was able to make it back to his radio and call for help. Miami Fire Rescue took the injured officer to North Shore Medical Center where he was treated and released. Police set up a six block perimeter around the scene of the stabbing. None of the suspects were located.

Rochester police chief’s son files lawsuit over disability discrimination www.privateofficer.com

Rochester NY Aug 16 2012 A son of the Rochester police chief is suing the city and members of the Rochester Police Civil Service Commission, with allegations including disability discrimination.
Jeremy Peterson, the son of Police Chief Roger Peterson, alleges the city broke a long-standing “practice and/or policy” by not allowing him to return to his community service officer position after he couldn’t complete his promotion to the rank of police officer last year.
The complaint alleges that two of the three members of the Rochester Police Civil Service Commission, David Henslin and Susan Marino, violated Minnesota’s open meeting law prior to the Aug. 2, 2011 meeting at which Jeremy Peterson’s request to be reinstated as a community service officer was heard.
Peterson, of Rochester, is seeking over $50,000 in damages plus attorneys’ fees in the suit. The Army veteran was discriminated against in violation of the Minnesota Human Rights Act, the complaint alleges, because of impaired hearing and speech that resulted from improvised explosive device injuries during two tours of duty in Iraq.
Allegations of fraud and negligent misrepresentation are also included in the lawsuit filed July 30 in Olmsted County District Court. Peterson’s Minneapolis attorney, John Fabian, claims the city of Rochester falsely represented that Peterson could return to his community service officer position if he didn’t meet the requirements of his 12-month probationary period as police officer.
Henslin, Marino and the city of Rochester are prepared to defend themselves in the case, and a formal answer to the complaint will soon be filed in Olmsted County District Court, said defense attorney Patricia Beety, a lawyer with the League of Minnesota Cities.
“The facts as we understand them do not support the claims,” Beety said.
Alleged meeting at issue
Peterson started working as a Rochester Police Department community service officer—a position that has no arrest powers but can issue citations—in 2008.
He was promoted to police officer on March 10, 2011. Four months later, according the complaint, the Rochester Police Department notified Peterson that he was not meeting the requirements of his 12-month probationary period. The department recommended his termination as police officer.
About two weeks later, on Aug. 2, 2011, the Rochester Police Civil Service Commission held a meeting at which Jeremy Peterson’s request to be reinstated to his previous position of community service officer was heard.
It was at that hearing, according to the the complaint, that it allegedly emerged that Henslin and Moreno had previously met with a retired Rochester police sergeant who opposed Peterson’s reinstatement, an apparent violation of open meeting law.
The commission determined it did not need to respond to Peterson’s reinstatement request, according to the complaint, and Peterson was removed from his police officer position on Nov. 16.
Roger Peterson, who has another son who is a community service officer on the Rochester Police Department, declined comment. The police chief is not named as a party in the lawsuit.
The case is in the very early stages, Beety said, and no hearings have been scheduled.

Orange County fires security company at courthouse for failing tests www.privateofficer.com

Orange County Fla aug 16 2012 Officials have fired the contractor that recently took over security at the Orange County courthouse after a recent security check in which the company failed to keep prohibited items from getting in, a county spokesman said.

Spokesman Steve Triggs said the situation “came to a head” on Friday, when Orange County deputies conducted the latest in a series of security tests at the courthouse. They tried to get prohibited items — some of which “could be construed as weapons,” Triggs said, but not guns — into the courthouse in the hope that private security officers would detect and intercept them.

Some of the items that they were testing the guards for managed to get through,” Triggs said, and the county terminated its contract with Jenkins Security Consultants, Inc., which went into effect in May. In addition to the failed test, Triggs said judges had complained that the company had failed to adequately staff the courthouse leading to long lines at the entrance, delaying jurors and interfering with court proceedings.

The company also allowed a law enforcement officer into a secure area he shouldn’t have been in, and without confirming his credentials, Triggs said. Triggs said the previous courthouse security provider, G4S, has been put back in charge on a temporary basis for the next five months. The county will re-open the contract to bidding, Triggs said on Wednesday.
Source:tribune.com

Police arrest security guard,three others in armored car robbery www.privateofficer.com

Manhattan NY Aug 16 2012  When a man staged a brazen daylight robbery of an armored-car guard in Manhattan four years ago and made off with $330,000, the police immediately suspected an inside job.

Sure enough, within hours, the police had arrested Robert Blackmon, an employee of the armored-car company, Dunbar Armored, saying he had called in sick that day so that he could rob a co-worker as she was dropping off cash at a branch of M & T Bank, at 397 First Avenue.

But investigators from the Federal Bureau of Investigation had always believed more people were involved, law enforcement officials said.

It took years, but on Wednesday the F.B.I. announced that it had arrested the rest of those it said were involved — including the guard who was robbed on that September day in 2008.

“It took some real hard, diligent investigative work to locate these people and put this case back on the map,” J. Peter Donald, an F.B.I. spokesman, said.

The suspects arrested on Wednesday included Janell Nelson, 26, the armored-car courier who was robbed; Kyonta Bailey, 27; Wadner Philippe, 29; and Pearl McDougald, 30.

By the time the authorities closed in on the suspects, the money had all been spent and all four thought they were in the clear, living comfortably in New Jersey, according to law enforcement officials.

The indictment, filed on Wednesday, portrays a plan undone by carelessness and a confidential witness who provided the authorities with key details in the case.

On Sept. 30, 2008, around 9:20 a.m., a man wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt approached Ms. Nelson as she made her way into the bank, according to the indictment.

The man took her bag with the cash, as well as her gun, and ran off to a waiting getaway car, according to the indictment.

The man who grabbed the bag is not identified by name in the indictment, but is referred to as a confidential witness; when he was arrested in 2008, Mr. Blackmon was identified as the robber. Law enforcement officials would not comment on the identity of the confidential witness, and they also declined to comment on the status of any prosecution of Mr. Blackmon.

The group later divided the profits at the Spring Lane Motel in Elizabeth, N.J., the indictment said.

The day after the robbery, Ms. Bailey was feeling so confident that she spoke to reporters, who called to inquire about her girlfriend, Ms. Nelson.

“I was so scared for her, and I know she had to be scared,” Ms. Bailey told The Daily News. “She loves her job.”

But the police already suspected that Ms. Nelson, far from being scared, was a possible accomplice. They searched her cellphone on the day of the robbery, but found no hard evidence to implicate her.

In the years that followed, the joint F.B.I. and Police Department task force on bank robberies was disbanded, and the case languished. But about a year ago, a new F.B.I. investigator began to pursue new leads aggressively and to re-examine old evidence, according to a law enforcement official familiar with the investigation.

In addition to Mr. Blackmon, another person had already been arrested in the case. According to the indictment, an unnamed person arrested had helped investigators track down Ms. Nelson.

In a conversation with an unnamed co-conspirator monitored by investigators last spring, Ms. Nelson flaunted the fact that she was not worried about being arrested.

“I’m not really doing nothing as far as, like, hiding,” Ms. Nelson said, according to court documents. “If they wanted to come to my house, they could easily find out where I live.”

On Wednesday, investigators knocked on her door and arrested her.

Janice K. Fedarcyk, the F.B.I.’s assistant director in charge of the New York office, said that although no one was hurt in the robbery, it was important to remember that lives were put at risk.

“Inside job or not, the defendants’ scheme involved real weapons, and innocent people were put in real jeopardy in the process,” she said in a statement.

Three men plead not guilty in armor car robbery www.privateofficer.com

SANTA ROSA, Calif. — Aug 16 2012

Three Santa Rosa men pleaded not guilty in Sonoma County Superior Court Wednesday morning to conspiring to rob millions of dollars this month from an armored car service that was also previously robbed a year ago.

Monico Dominguez, 39, Juan Dominguez, 26, and 33-year-old Shawn Geernaert pleaded not guilty to attempted kidnapping with the intent to rob the Garda Armored Car Service in southwest Santa Rosa on Aug. 6. Santa Rosa police arrested them the next day.

Monico Dominguez also is charged with robbing the armored car service of $1 million on Aug. 11, 2011. He pleaded not guilty this morning to two counts each of kidnapping and robbery in connection with that incident, and to soliciting someone to commit criminal acts.

All three defendants are being held in the Sonoma County jail under bail between $1 million and $5 million. At a bail review hearing this morning, Deputy District Attorney Robert Waner disclosed details about the robbery last year and the alleged conspiracy to rob the armored car service this month. Waner said Monico Dominguez and other unnamed defendants who have not been charged with the robbery were wearing body armor and carrying assault weapons when they robbed Garda Armored Car Service of $1 million last year.

The masked robbers ducked under a door that was closing after an armored car entered the building at 1650 Northpoint Parkway. The thieves left with approximately $1 million but left several million dollars behind, Waner said. Monico Dominguez conspired with Juan Dominguez and Geernaert to rob the armored car service again, Waner said.

To make sure that millions of dollars would not be left behind, the plan was to drive away in an armored car and hide it in a “safe harbor”, Geernaert’s cabinet shop, Waner said. “This is a huge, sophisticated conspiracy,” he said. Geernaert’s attorney Joe Stogner said his client, who was acquainted with Monico Dominguez, knew nothing about the planned Aug. 6 robbery. He asked Judge Robert LaForge to reduce Geernaert’s bail from $1 million to $100,000 and allow him to be supervised under electronic home confinement when he posts bail. Stogner said Geernaert and his family have “deep connections in the community” and he asked the 20 people who were in court to support him, including one law enforcement officer, to stand up. Waner objected to lowering Geernaert’s bail. He said law enforcement intercepted communications between Geernaert and the alleged co-conspirators that the robbery was going to happen and that Geernaert would allow access to his cabinet shop. The judge kept bail at $1 million. The three defendants will return to court Aug. 22 to set a preliminary hearing date.
Source:KTVU

Gary Ind. police officer arrested for federal drug trafficking www.privateofficer.com

MERRILLVILLE, Ind. Aug 16 2012— A northwestern Indiana police officer faces federal charges of drug trafficking and illegally buying a gun for someone else. Federal agents arrested Gary officer David Finley on Tuesday outside a bar a few blocks from his Merrillville home.

FBI supervisory agent Bob Ramsey tells the Post-Tribune that agents sent an informant to buy cocaine from the 31-year-old Finley during their investigation and acted quickly in the case.

Gary Police Chief Wade Ingram tells The Times of Munster he is saddened by Finley’s arrest. Ingram says Finley was on vacation when he was arrested and had recently been assigned to administrative duties. A federal magistrate ordered that Finley remain jailed until a detention hearing on Friday. It wasn’t immediately clear whether he has a defense attorney.Dource:AP

Delray Beach police officer arrested for purjury www.privateofficer.com

Delray Beach Fla Aug 16 2012  A Delray Beach police officer has been arrested on perjury and official misconduct, the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office said today. Officer Dave Melville Chin, 35, is facing one count of perjury and three counts of official misconduct after he allegedly lied about his relationship with a woman who acted as a confidential informant. It is the second time this month that prosecutors have investigated charges involving a Delray Beach police officer.

On Aug. 2, the state attorney’s office declined to prosecute Officer Frank Umbriac on charges that he had sex with a woman while on duty. Umbriac is still the subject of the internal department investigation. According to the state attorney’s office, Chin, a member of the department’s Street Narcotics Enforcement Unit, made false statements during the arrest and prosecution of 26-year-old Hobe Sound woman. Delray officers arrested Natalie Jerue last September on charges of trafficking in oxycodone. According to a report related to Chin’s arrest, he made false statements about asking Jerue to go out on dates, made false statements that caused another officer to falsify a probable-cause affidavit related to her arrest, and lied about Jerue having provided information that led to a drug-related arrest. He did so in order to prevent the exposure of his personal cell phone records that revealed a relationship between Chin and Jerue, the report said. According to the report, Chin detained Jerue during a traffic stop in June of 2011, but did not arrest her at the time. Jerue was ultimately arrested on the oxycodone charge. Chin initially met her months earlier while she was having lunch with a person whom Chin recognized as a department informant, the report said. He expressed an interest in dating Jerue and and sent her several text messages asking her to go out on a date, the report said. Chin initially denied to investigators that he asked Jerue out, but later admitted to doing so. They never actually went out on a date, he said. Chin told investigators that the confidential informant was with Jerue during the traffic stop, and that he retrieved a bottle of illegal pills from the car. He later provided contradicting statements for the probable-cause affidavit, omitting the fact the informant was present, the arrest report said. In an effort to persuade prosecutors to dismiss Jerue’s case, he presented a memo stating that she provided information that led to several drug-related arrests within the city. Jerue’s roommate was arrested the day following the traffic stop and Chin credited her with providing information that led to the arrest, according to the report. However, Jerue later denied that she provided the information. She told investigators that Chin contacted her days after the traffic stop and discussed her becoming a cooperating source. He told her that because of the discovery of pills in her car, she would be arrested if she refused to cooperate, the report said. Jerue ultimate agreed to cooperate, but none of the information she provided led an arrest or the recovery of contraband as indicated in the memo that Chin provided to the state attorney’s Office, the report said.

Washington DC conservative Christian lobbying group security officer shot www.privateofficer.com

WASHINGTON DC Aug 16 2012— An armed man walked into the Washington headquarters of a conservative Christian lobbying group Wednesday morning and was confronted by a security guard, whom he shot in the arm before being wrestled to the ground, authorities said. It wasn’t immediately known whether the confrontation was related to the work of the Family Research Council, which strongly opposes gay marriage and abortion. The man was taken into custody by the FBI and was being interviewed. Authorities haven’t released his name. “We don’t know enough yet about him … or mentally what he’s thinking,” said James McJunkin, assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Washington field office.

The guard, who was an employee of the FRC, was taken to a hospital in stable condition. “Our first concern is with our colleague who was shot today,” the group’s president, Tony Perkins, said in a statement. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said in a statement that he was appalled by the shooting. “There is no place for such violence in our society,” he said. “My prayers go out to the wounded security guard and his family, as well as all the people at the Family Research Council whose sense of security has been shattered by today’s horrific events.”

The headquarters of the Family Research Council is in the city’s bustling Chinatown neighborhood, near the Verizon Center, the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery and several museums, restaurants and shops. Amy Biondi and her husband Steve were visiting Washington from Long Island with their daughter and a friend and tried to ask officers for help with a parking meter when they were told there was a situation they had to deal with. The door to the FRC was opened, and an officer repeatedly shouted, “Put the gun down, put the gun down.” “Next thing you know there are police officers swarming the area,” said Biondi, 45, a massage therapist from St. James, N.Y. The family didn’t get a close look, but they said the man officers were talking to seemed to comply with the orders immediately. The Family Research Council advocates conservative positions on social issues and strongly opposes gay marriage and abortion. Perkins was an outspoken defender of Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy’s public stand against same-sex marriage, which made the fast-food chain a flashpoint in the nation’s culture wars. The Cathy family foundation has funded the Family Research Council. “He’s taking a bold stand,” Perkins said after Cathy’s comments were reported. “Chick-fil-A is a Bible-based, Christian-based business who treats their employees well. They have been attacked in the past about their stand. But they refuse to budge on this matter, and I commend them for what they are doing.”

Ct State Police arrest armed men at airport www.priivateofficer.com

WINDSOR LOCKS CT AUG 16 2012 - Connecticut State Police arrested two men at Bradley International AirporTuesday, in unrelated incidents, after security personnel intercepted a loaded handgun and a BB gun at baggage checkpoints.
In the first incident, reported shortly before 12:30 p.m., Transportation Security Administration personnel discovered a BB gun in a bag at a security checkpoint.
BB guns, according to a release issued by state police, are considered a dangerous weapon under state statute.
Stefan Leonedovizh Tslkhotskit, 34, of Wheeling, Ill., was charged with failing to comply with airport security measures, state police said.
In the second incident, reported shortly before 4:30 p.m., TSA personnel found a loaded 9 mm handgun and additional ammunition inside a bag at a security checkpoint.
Although the suspect possessed a valid Florida concealed firearm permit, it does not have reciprocity with the state of Connecticut. The suspect made no effort to declare the firearm with the airline or TSA personnel during his check-in, state police said.
Joseph Hunt, 81, of Merritt Island, Fla. was also charged with failing to comply with airport security measures and carrying a pistol without a permit, state police said. Both men were ordered held in lieu of $2,500 cash or surety bonds and will be arraigned today in Enfield Superior Court.
Lt. Paul Vance, spokesman for the Connecticut State Police, said it is relatively unusual for passengers to attempt to get firearms through security checkpoints.
“Hats off to the people doing the work at Bradley,” Vance said. In a third unrelated incident, state police arrested an employee of a business at the airport after a pilot reported that his phone was missing.
A review of closed circuit video showed the employee taking the phone. Tylon Starks, 26, of 22 Addison St., Hartford, was charged with 5th degree larceny and interfering with an officer, state police said.
State police arrested Starks shortly after 9 a.m. He ws ordered held in lieu of $1,000 surety pending his arraignment.

Duval County teacher pleads not guilty to sex charges www.privateofficer.com

JacksonvilleFla aug 15 2012  Former Duval County elementary school teacher Christopher Bacca was in court for his arraignment Wednesday morning and pleaded not guilty to multiple sexual abuse charges against a child. Bacca, 26, was arrested July 27 on three charges of sexual battery against a child younger than 12 and single charges of lewd and lascivious battery, lewd and lascivious conduct and molestation. The State Attorney’s Office filed for new charges Monday, however, adding one sexual battery charge and modifying the remaining charges, resulting in four counts of molestation. He remains in jail without bail. Bacca was teaching at Windy Hill Elementary School on the Southside when he was arrested. He had been moved there from his former school, Long Branch Elementary School, on recommendations by the state Department of Children and Families after a police investigated claims that he had kissed a boy on the lips and slept in the same bed with him in 2009. Authorities ultimately found no criminal wrongdoing. Capital sexual battery carries a life sentence. Bacca will return to court Sept. 13.
Source:jacksonville.com

California private investigator charged with police impersonation www.privateofficer.com

YOLO COUNTY (CA Aug 16 2012– Cops say he’s a private eye turned police impersonator, caught allegedly trying to get unauthorized police records for his clients. He’s a private eye, now in the public spotlight. Anthony Vegas allegedly lost a big bet, and he wouldn’t answer CBS13’s questions. Vegas lowered the garage door when CBS13 approached. Cops say the retired parole agent was trying to retrieve redacted police reports for a client by illegally impersonating an officer. “There are some police reports where the victim’s protected. We protect their identity, so that the suspect can’t find them later,” said Cucchi. Vegas allegedly doctored his old corrections ID and used a phony badge to trick several local police records departments into giving him what he wanted. It was working, he gathered unauthorized records from Woodland and Sacramento police, and the Solano County Sheriff’s Department before getting arrested in the act at Yolo County’s Sheriff’s Department. Vegas closed the door on CBS13 but he’s now at the center of an open and ongoing investigation, charge of impersonating an officer. He may also see an additional charge of forgery when he goes before a judge for the first time.
Source: CBS13