Two Texas state troopers indicted for roles in roadside body cavity search of two women www.privateofficer.com

Dallas TX March 26 2013 A pair of Texas state troopers involved in an allegedly “horrific” hands-on cavity search of two women last summer have been indicted on criminal charges, according to reports.

Former Trooper Kelley Helleson was charged with two counts of sexual assault and two counts of official oppression in the July 13 incident caught on a dashboard camera along an Irving highway, reported CBS affiliate KTVT in Dallas.

The Texas Department of Public Safety fired Helleson following an investigation. The other trooper, David Farrell, was charged with theft after one of the women said her prescription bottle of hydrocodone went missing following the traffic stop near Dallas, according to KTVT.

They were charged after a grand jury handed up the indictments against them Friday. Texas women Ashley Dobbs, 24, and her aunt Angel Dobbs, 38, filed a suit last year saying they were traumatized by the search. “Angel Dobbs was overwhelmed with emotion and a feeling of helplessness and reacted stating that Helleson had just violated her in a most horrific manner,” the lawsuit reads. Farrell had pulled the women over after he said one of them flung a cigarette out of the car.

He questioned the women about using marijuana and had Angel Dobbs, the driver, perform a sobriety test. She reportedly passed. Helleson also was called over to search the women, and stuck her hands down their pants. “This has been an eye-opening experience for me,” Angel Dobbs tells Farrell in the video.

“I’ve never been pulled over, never searched like this. … I was like totally violated over there a few minutes ago. I had a finger in my a– and a finger in my p—-. …This is so embarrassing to me.”

The women also claimed that Helleson used the same latex glove to check both of their anuses and vaginas — all while other cars zipped past them on the public roadway. The women were eventually slapped with a warning for littering. Helleson’s attorney, Robert Baskett, didn’t immediately return a request for comment Sunday.

He told KTVT that his client is not guilty and is appealing her firing. Steven McCraw, the director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, was also named in the women’s suit because he allegedly knew about other similar strip and cavity searches and failed to stop them.

His department couldn’t be reached for comment Sunday. The Dobbses’ attorney, Scott Palmer, previously told the Daily News that Helleson’s invasive search tactic “isn’t supposed to happen and should never happen again.”
Source: http://www.nydailynews.com/

South Carolina State Trooper charged with DUI www.privateofficer.com

COLUMBIA, SC Sept 14 2010 – An off-duty South Carolina Highway Patrol Trooper was fired early Sunday morning after Richland County deputies charged him with driving under the influence, after the Trooper crashed his personal car in Five Points, according to DPS Director Mark Keel.

The Trooper, Joe Buchwald, was leaving the popular downtown Columbia bar area when he ran through an intersection and hit a wall, according to Keel. Buchwald entered the patrol’s Trooper class in January and joined the patrol on May 28. Buchwald’s vehicle was the only one involved in the incident.

Patrol Commander Colonel Kenny Lancaster met with Buchwald at the jail around 5 a.m. Sunday morning, and “fired him on the spot,” Keel said. “We have a zero tolerance approach to DUI, and we don’t put up with it,” Keel said, “He violated that rule and we fired him.” It took the patrol less than an hour after hearing about the incident to terminate the Trooper.

“We put an emphasis on DUI and our own people have to abide by that same standard,” Keel said. Both Keel and Lancaster have met with each Trooper personally over the past year to discuss the patrol’s zero tolerance policy, Keel said. “He knew better,” Director Keel told WIS.

Buchwald is a native of Hillsdale, New Jersey and was assigned to Richland County, according to the patrol’s Web site. Buchwald was released from the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center Sunday on bond. There is no trial date set yet.