Archive
Muscle Shoals Al. police officer arrested for shooting deer from patrol car www.privateofficer.com
Colbert County, Ala. Dec 30 2012– Muscle Shoals police officer, Greg Scoggins has been arrested for allegedly shooting a deer from his patrol car.
Colbert County District Attorney says Scoggins is charged with hunting without permission, hunting with the aid of a motor vehicle, and reckless endangerment.
According to the district attorney, the direction of the bullet projectile could have put other people in harm.
Scoggins is accused of using a rifle to shoot a buck on TVA property.
Scoggins will face a Colbert County judge on February, 5th.
Source:WHNT
Birmingham police officer, third suspect charged in arson www.privateofficer.com
BIRMINGHAM, Alabama June 16 2012– A second Birmingham police officer arrested in connection to an arson investigation has been charged, Birmingham police announced this afternoon.
A third suspect in the case — who is not a city employee — has also been charged.
The officer, Jason Arnold, 35, of Hoover, has been charged with arson and is being held on $150,000 bond. He has been a West Precinct officer since 2009.
The third suspect is Anthony Weaver, 48, of Birmingham. He is charged with arson and is held on $60,000 bond.
These arrests are associated with fires at 2901 Ensley Avenue and 2532 Warrior Road, said Sgt. Johnny Williams.
Already charged is Officer Curtis Jeffrey Thornton, 27, is charged with second-degree arson in connection with a May 21 house fire in the 1700 block of 29th Street Ensley.
Source:AL.com
Knox County Schools security officer injured while directing traffic www.privateofficer.com
KNOXVILLE TN Jan 19 2012- A part-time Knox County Schools security officer was injured this morning at Ball Camp Elementary when he was hit from behind as he directed traffic by a parent dropping off a student.
The officer, Larry Woods, was taken to Parkwest Medical Center, where he was treated and released, said Steve Griffin, Knox County Schools’ security chief.
The accident happened about 7:20 a.m.
Griffin said Woods has been an officer with the district since 2009, and is one of seven people employed at different campuses to help direct traffic in the morning and afternoon.
The Knox County Sheriff’s Office was called to the school, where they cited the parent for reckless driving, he said.
Source:knoxnews.com
Off-duty Pentagon police officer kills robbery suspect www.privateofficer.com
Prince George’s County police said that Thomas pulled into a Mobil gas station in the 9800 block of Piscataway Road about 1:30 p.m. and saw Ronald Delonte Royal beating a man who was on the ground.
As Thomas approached them, he saw Royal pull out a handgun and point it at the man on the ground, police said. Thomas told Royal that he was a police officer and ordered him to drop his weapon, according to police.
Royal refused and turned toward Thomas, police said. Thomas then fired his personal gun, hitting Royal in the upper body. Royal was taken to a hospital, where he died.
The man on the ground, a 57-year-old, was treated for injuries that were not life-threatening, according to Cpl. Erica Johnson, a police spokeswoman.
Thomas was not in uniform at the time and was carrying a weapon that he owned, according to Terry Sutherland, a Pentagon Force Protection Agency spokesman.
Sutherland said Friday that the agency’s internal affairs department will investigate the shooting, as is routine in such cases.
Thomas, who will have served eight years in September, might be given a few days of personal leave, but it would not be punitive, Sutherland said.
Royal was scheduled to appear in Prince George’s County Circuit Court in September in connection with robbery, assault and gun charges stemming from a July 7 incident, according to state court records. A man listed as Royal’s attorney in a different case did not return a call for comment.
Baltimore police officer arrested for operating heroin distribution network www.privateofficer.com
Baltimore police officer arrested for operating heroin distribution network http://www.privateofficer.com
Baltimore MD July 20 2011 A Baltimore City police officer was arrested and charged Tuesday with leading a heroin distribution operation, including allegations that he arranged drug transactions while on duty and met conspirators in the parking lot of his district station, records show.
The officer, Daniel G. Redd, 41, was taken into custody Tuesday at the Northwest District police station, officials said. Several law enforcement sources say Redd had been under suspicion for years, but within the past six months city police asked the FBI to investigate.
The ensuing wiretap investigation, according to records, showed that Redd was at the top of a “significant drug trafficking” organization that “flooded the streets of Baltimore with heroin,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Richard McFeely said in a statement.
The arrest is the latest black eye for the city Police Department, which in the past six months had more than 50 officers implicated in a kickback scheme involving a towing company and saw an on-duty officer fatally shot by other officers as they responded to a disturbance outside a nightclub. The kickback scheme has resulted in a slew of guilty pleas, while Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake appointed a commission to study the fatal shooting of Officer William H. Torbit.
Police said Redd’s arrest shows that the agency is determined to root out corruption.
“The allegations against Daniel Redd are an affront to and undermine the integrity of the hard-working men and women of the Baltimore Police Department,” Police Commissioner Frederick H. Bealefeld III said in a statement. “We will not tolerate corruption among our ranks.”
Redd is believed to be the first city officer charged with having a role in drug trafficking since city police officers William King and Antonio Murray were charged in 2005 with shaking down drug dealers and re-selling their product on the street. The officers were each sentenced to 100 years in prison.
On his Facebook page, Redd lists “Training Day,” a movie in which Denzel Washington plays a corrupt police officer in Los Angeles, as one of his favorite movies.
Despite the investigation into Redd’s alleged activities, he remained on the street making arrests. Court records show Redd is listed as a police witness in a handful of cases that are still pending, including attempted murder and robbery charges against two men.
But according to one source familiar with personnel matters, the department prevented him from ascending the leadership tree by repeatedly passing him over on the agency’s promotional list.
At a brief afternoon court hearing, Redd, who is charged with firearms violations in addition to heroin distribution charges, was ordered held pending a detention hearing, with Assistant U.S. Attorney James Wallner citing “dangerousness and risk of flight.”
Redd did not respond to the allegations during the hearing.
Documents show the drug organization was headed by Redd and a man named Abdul Zakaria, also known as Tamim Mamah. A search warrant affidavit alleges that Zakaria, 34, of Owings Mills, and others obtained heroin from suppliers in Africa and distributed heroin to Redd and two other men named in the indictment: Dyrell Garrett, 33, of Randallstown, and Malik Jones, 40, of Owings Mills.
Redd is accused of distributing heroin to others, including Shanel Stallings, 32, who is named in the indictment.
Conversations intercepted on wiretaps show that on March 2, Redd, who was on duty, made a series of calls to Mamah in which FBI agents say the pair used heavily coded language to arrange a drug deal. Stallings called Redd and said simply, “40,” which FBI Agent Craig Monroney wrote referred to 40 grams of heroin.
“Alright … let me .. let me make a call,” Redd said, according to records.
Redd then phoned Mamah, and said, “Hey, I need 40.”
About an hour later, Redd told Stallings to meet him “at the district,” which authorities say refers to the Northwest District police station.
That belief was reaffirmed on March 31, when Redd was overheard telling Mamah to meet him “at my station.” Video surveillance from the Northwest District police station obtained by agents shows Redd retrieving something from his vehicle and walking out of view, records show. A short time later, Redd is observed climbing out of Mamah’s white Lincoln Navigator.
Police believe Redd was giving Mamah heroin, and that Mamah turned the drugs over to Garrett.
Officers then attempted to stop Garrett to retrieve the heroin, but Garrett fled, prompting a high-speed chase in which he was able to escape. Police later found his vehicle abandoned, with a cell phone and a BG&E bill with his name inside.
Authorities wrote in documents that they also captured Redd arranging deals for 500 grams of heroin, and in another instance offering protection for Stallings as she completed a drug transaction for him.
“I’m a have my phone open on the side and I’m a scroll down to your name so that way … I’ll just hit the talk button,” Stallings told Redd during the March 6 conversation.
At another point, Redd complains that he is losing customers, according to records. “I need some damn money. I ain’t getting no phone calls, ain’t no nothing, it ain’t looking good,” he said. “You start losing people if you keep, people gotta keep waiting, they go to somebody else.”
Mamah was arrested on May 13 after getting into a foot chase with a city police detective assigned to the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Task Force, records show. The detective, Brian Shutt, wrote in documents associated with that arrest that officers recovered 205 grams of suspected heroin from his vehicle, and documents unsealed Tuesday show another 400 to 500 grams was recovered from his home in the 8300 block of Church Lane.
Court records show Mamah is from Ghana. Last week the Drug Enforcement Administration announced that they had broken up a drug ring in which couriers smuggled heroin from Ghana into the United States through Dulles International Airport, which officials said highlighted West Africa as a “major hub for international drug trafficking.”
A search warrant also names Redd as a supplier to other, unindicted men.
Redd joined the Baltimore Police Department in 1994, but was fired in 2002 after being found asleep on the job at the reservoir at Druid Hill Park, where he was supposed to be on anti-terrorist duty, The Sun reported in 2004. Redd sued and was rehired under a court order, and the city had to pay him $75,000 in back pay.
“This is not what taxpayers of Baltimore expect from police officers,” the Police Department’s then-legal counsel said after Redd and another officer were disciplined. “You have to send a message to troops that gross neglect of conduct will not be tolerated.”
Garrett was convicted in 2008 of marijuana possession and in 2005 received two years supervised probation for drug distribution charges. Jones, Stallings and Zakaria did not appear to have a prior record.
Source:Baltimore Sun
DC cop charged with murder, possible gang enforcer www.privateofficer.com
The robbery went bad, and now authorities have charged the officer, 40-year-old Reggie Jones, with felony murder in the Dec. 1 shooting death of Arvell Alston.
Jones came to work at about 5:30 p.m. Tuesday and was met by his chief, Cathy Lanier, and homicide detectives, who clapped him in handcuffs.
D.C. police officials are now facing the possibility that a rogue cop acted as a street enforcer for a vicious drug crew, Lanier said Tuesday. She acknowledged at a hastily called news conference Tuesday night that her internal affairs investigators were probing the possibility that Jones, a six-year veteran who worked in the gun recovery section of the department’s major narcotics unit, also helped his friends and relatives in the crew tamper with evidence.
“The worst that a police officer can do is betray the public’s trust, and this officer went well beyond that,” Lanier said. “This officer desecrated the very office he was sworn to uphold.”
Authorities don’t believe Jones was involved in the gunfight. But under the felony murder laws, all conspirators to a crime that leads to murder can be held equally responsible.
Lanier said Jones helped Alston and his crew — including Alston’s son, Arvell Crawford — plot the robbery of the rival. The rival’s name was withheld because he’s a key witness in the prosecution.
A top law enforcement official told The Examiner that as Alston’s crew moved into position at about 9 p.m. Dec. 1, Jones played his part in the scheme: He drove through the 4300 block of Fourth Street SE, the lights on his police cruiser flashing. The crew hoped the police car would scatter friends of the rival and make it easier to pull off the robbery.
Instead a gunfight erupted. The robbery victim was wounded. In the chaos, Crawford accidentally shot and killed his father, Lanier said. Crawford and his friends fled the scene.
Police initially treated the case as a relatively straightforward street crime. That changed last Friday, when detectives arrested alleged crew member Rashun Montea Parker. Parker told astonished detectives that a cop had helped in the robbery.
Crawford was arrested a few hours before Jones came to work Tuesday, Lanier said.
For some in law enforcement, the allegations against Jones brought up unpleasant memories of rampant corruption in the D.C. police department. In the early 1990s, more than two dozen officers were indicted on criminal charges, including veteran Fonda Moore, who was convicted of felony murder after prosecutors charged her with acting as an enforcer for a lethal drug crew in Southeast.
Milford police officer fired in fatal crash www.privateofficer.com
The Board of Police Commissioners fired Jason Anderson, a five-year department veteran, and suspended another officer, Richard Pisani, for 30 days without pay in connection with the incident. The board also extended Pisani’s probationary period, due to end in February, for another year.
Anderson and Pisani were heading back to Milford from a mutual-aid call in West Haven on the night of the accident. A video camera installed in Pisani’s cruiser recorded both officers speeding far above the posted limit of 40 mph. Pisani accelerated up to 72 mph and was driving at about 65 when Anderson barreled by him on the right, shortly before crashing into the teens.
He has been charged with two counts of second-degree manslaughter and one count of reckless driving, and is free on $250,000 bond. Anderson is next scheduled to appear Jan. 13 in Milford Superior Court. Pisani does not face criminal charges.
Anderson was joined in the packed hearing room by Jeffrey Matchett, a retired Milford police sergeant who is now executive director of Council 15 of the Connecticut Police Unions, and Eric Brown, legal counsel for the association. After the board voted to terminate him, the officer and his brother Richard, a Milford police sergeant, moved through a crowd of family, friends and fellow officers, accepting hugs. Jason Anderson declined to comment to a reporter.
The commission’s action doesn’t change a thing, according to the lawyer for the family of David Servin, one of the 19-year-olds who died in the crash. “Whether or not they are fired or suspended is not the issue to me and my clients,” attorney Bart Halloran said before the meeting. “I think the chief and the commission have a duty to clarify what the two officers were doing that night.”
Witnesses told State Police that the two Milford officers appeared to be drag racing. A State Police investigation found Anderson was driving 94 mph when he crashed into the car carrying Servin and Ashlie Krakowski. The couple was traveling in the opposite direction and attempted a left-hand turn onto Dogwood Road in front of Anderson’s cruiser shortly after 2 a.m.
Halloran confirmed that toxicology reports show that Servin’s blood alcohol level was 0.13 when he died at the crash scene, far above the 0.02 limit for those under 21 and the 0.08 limit for adults. Although State Police have said that Servin was driving, Halloran and John Wynne, the Krakowski family lawyer, are not sure. They haven’t been able to have their experts inspect the car, Halloran said.
“But the (toxicology results) are a red herring anyway,” the Servins’ lawyer said Monday. “To have someone driving 94 miles an hour in the right lane — passing someone — is so far beyond the human experience of making a left turn. We’ve all made left turns and had it be closer than we wanted because we misjudged the speed. But this guy was going 94 miles an hour — nothing prepares you for that.”
The police commission agreed with Chief Keith Mello’s conclusion that both officers violated department policy, particularly the requirement that officers follow posted speed limits when not responding to an emergency.
“I would like to remind everyone that there are 111 police officers in this department who have and will continue to put their safety on the line to protect others,” Mello said. “With rare exception, they perform admirably and honorably and they have served this community well for decades.”
The difference in the severity of the discipline is partly due to the outcome of the incident, said Sgt. Vaughan Dumas, a department spokesman, and partly because the officers were travelling at different speeds. State statutes treat speeds above 80 mph as reckless driving violations, and below 80 as speeding infractions.
The commission voted unanimously on both officers’ discipline, spending 30 minutes reviewing the internal investigation of Anderson and nearly an hour on the report concerning Pisani. Six members voted; Chairman Carleton Giles, a Norwalk police officer, recused himself, citing his professional contact with Council 15 union officials. Labor lawyer Lawrence Sgrignari, of Hamden, represented the city on both matters.
Anderson had been on paid administrative leave since Nov. 10, the date of his arrest. Pisani had been working his regular 4 p.m. to midnight shift while the internal investigation was going on
St. Louis police officer commits suicide www.privateofficer.com
St. Louis police officer commits suicide http://www.privateofficer.com
Just a few hours after he learned he might be the target of a child pornography investigation in St. Louis County, a St. Louis City policeman committed suicide.
The 37-year-old man, originally from Bosnia, was identified by local Bosnian leaders as Vladimir Vujica. He had been a city officer for two and a half years.
Tuesday, St. Louis County detectives notified Vujica that they had a search warrant to seize his home computer. He gave them the key to his condominium in Mehlville.
Officers entered the home while Vujica was on duty in the city and took the computer and some papers, according to County Police spokeswoman Officer Tracy Panus. She said a computer software program had traced the transfer of child pornography to a computer IP address that was located at Vujica’s home.
At the end of his shift Tuesday night, St. Louis City Internal Affairs officers picked up Officer Vujica to take him to police headquarters to question him about his residency. City officers are required to live in St.Louis City during their first seven years of duty.
But at Tucker and Park, Vujica left the police car and ran into a neighborhood. Officers were unable to find him.
Several hours later a citizen found the wounded officer and called 911.
Police chose not to wait for an ambulance. They carried him to the back seat of a patrol car and quickly drove to Saint Louis University Hospital. But he was pronounced dead of a self-inflicted wound to the head.
Friends and neighbors of Officer Vujica said they were shocked by the news.
Trace Robinson described him as a part of her family. She said he had worked at a local hotel with her mother for at least four years before entering the Police Academy. “He was a loving gentleman. He called by mom ‘grandma’ and he looked out for her,” she said.
Robinson questioned the child pornography investigation saying she always felt comfortable around Vujica and never worried about her children when he was visiting.
The head of a community group, the United Bosnian Association, Ibrahim Vajzovic described the officer as “very nice and a good member of the community.”
Friends say he is survived by his mother, sister and a nephew.
St. Louis City Police Chief Dan Isom authorized a critical incident review following the suicide to determine if any department policies should be changed regarding the transfer of individuals to the Internal Affairs Division Office.
JOIN THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF PRIVATE OFFICERS
Join us at www.myspace.com/privateofficernews
Come be part of our social network! http://www.privateofficer.com
OFFICER DOWN FLORIDA www.privateofficer.com
OFFICER DOWN FLORIDA http://www.privateofficer.com
Biographical Info-Age: 31
