Probation officer gives office BJ to boot-camp teen
Richard Kern, New York Officer, On Trial For Sodomizing A Suspect
Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 9:00 am
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| Gabrielle Trudeau |
Our number five spot this week doesn't go to just one inept man or woman in uniform -- but an entire department -- or the Broward County Sheriff's Office in Florida, to be more specific.
In November, the department arrested 78-year-old Gabrielle Shaink Trudeau. Her crime? Driving too slowly.
Trudeau was pulled over in her 1995 green Mercury sedan when officers noticed her driving at a turtle's pace. She was ticketed for driving on a suspended license and ordered to appear in court. Unfortunately, Trudeau doesn't have much of a memory anymore, God bless her, and forgot about the incident all together.
Six weeks after she failed to show up in court, three officers from the Sheriff's Office appeared at her door and arrested her. Apparently, they were seriously concerned about Granny Trudeau's mean martial arts skills or something -- they not only cuffed her, but placed her in chains as well. "They came on real strong, like I had killed somebody or something," she told Crimesider.com.
As if the situation couldn't get any further out of hand, Trudeau sat in jail for over two weeks. She even spent Thanksgiving in the slammer.
On the day of her arraignment, Broward County Court Judge Lee Seidman was so appalled by the department's mishandling of the old lady, he lambasted the Sheriff's office in court and threw out the case entirely. Evidently, Trudeau's license wasn't even suspended.
The only apology so far has come from public defender Howard Finkelstein, who told the Broward Bulldog, "we fell down and we fell down badly."
4. John Quigg
We'd like to believe that Pennsylvania State police veteran John Quigg was just doing a bit of research.
After all, Quigg had been on the force for over 24 years. Not only was he in charge of overseeing the state's DUI checkpoints, but he was also an expert in crash reconstruction and the department's go to guy for recognizing exactly what type of substance caused a suspect to act a certain type of crazy.
It's Quigg's impressive list of credentials that makes it rather hard to believe that, a week before Christmas, the king of DUI-enforcement found himself in a drunk driving accident of his own making.
Apparently, Quigg was getting a head start on celebrating the holidays when he got behind the wheel of his Honda Accord, which he then smashed into a guard rail. When cops arrived at the site of the accident, they found an open container in Quigg's car. After being admitted to the hospital, it became clear that Quigg had become a whole different type of expert on drunk driving.
Quigg has been charged with driving under the influence, careless driving, and driving with an open alcoholic beverage. For now, Quigg has been placed on administrative duty -- meaning he hasn't been suspended, but resigned to doing paperwork pending an internal investigation.
A preliminary hearing in his case has been set for February 5.
3. Bryan Crews
Beware a woman scorned. These were words lost on Dallas Police Officer Bryan Crews, who was recently fired from the Dallas Police Department after he was caught sending nude photos of himself to an 18-year-old high school girl.
The case first came to the department's attention in February, amidst a messy divorce between Crews and his wife. Upset by her husband's indiscretions, Crews's wife contacted the department about her husband's exhibitionist tendencies, figuring they wouldn't want a perv for an employee. She even turned over hard evidence, including his cell phone's memory card, ticket books, and other incriminating items.
The department launched an investigation into his wife's allegations, discovering that the 30-year-old Crew had also had a sexual relationship with the high schooler since she was 17-years-old. No criminal charges were filed, since the girl was legally considered an adult, but the story didn't end there.
It turned out that Crews had also been sending nude photos of himself to at least one female sergeant on the force. He'd also collected naked photos of other female co-workers and happily shared them with other police officers while on duty.
Crews says that, while he doesn't defend his behavior, he is still planning on appealing his firing, claiming that the department obtained evidence against him in an unethical manner.
We wondering if that's the same "unethical" manner in which he cheated on his wife with a high school student or the sort of "unethical" manner in which he swapped nude photos of himself with colleagues while on the clock?
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| Alonzo Esco |
2. Alonzo Esco
In many ways, we're just glad that Alonzo Esco wasn't a "real" police officer, responsible for arresting human beings rather than capturing stray animals.
An animal control officer working for the Canton Police Department in Mississippi, it was Esco's job to capture stray, lost, or abandoned dogs and transport them to a city-contracted private kennel.
But rather than deliver the animals to their new safe haven, Esco used the helpless creatures for target practice -- more than 100 of them, according to complaints filed by Defense of Animals.
Debbie Young, a volunteer with the animal protection agency, says her sources told her that Esco admitted to being "too lazy to drive them to the kennel." Instead, he shot scores of dogs, as well as cats, and dumped their bodies into a public water way.
No charges have been filed against Esco just yet. The department is still investigating the group's complaint and is also looking into the possibility that Esco used the animals for bait in a dog fighting ring.
But even if Esco is charged with animal cruelty, such an offense amounts to little more than a misdemeanor in the state of Mississippi, where dogs and Democrats are apparently still second class citizens.
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| Richard Kern |
1. Richard Kern
Topping off our list for this week is none other than New York police officer Richard Kern. And why is he so deserving of this special spot, you might ask?
That seems like a good question for Michael Mineo, the man who is accusing Kern of sodomizing him during an arrest over pot in October 2008.
It turns out that Mineo was enjoying a leisurely stroll to the Prospect Park subway station, when a gaggle of police officers spotted a spliff in his hand. Mineo is no stranger to law enforcement. He's been picked up for several petty crimes before, from possession of marijuana and stolen credit cards to a melee that occurred at the Brooklyn tattoo parlor where Mineo worked as a piercing artist.
So when Mineo noticed the cops pursuing him, he decided to run. When the cops finally caught up with him, he resisted arrest, until they were finally able to cuff him near a token booth inside the station. That's when he claims officers Andrew Morales, Noel Jugraj and Alex Cruz pulled down his pants and restrained him while Kern pulled out his two-foot-long collapsible baton and began sodomizing Mineo as he screamed out in pain. When it was over, Kern gave Mineo a ticket for disorderly conduct and released him, but warned that if he reported the incident he'd be charged with a felony.
But Kern's threats apparently didn't work on the 24-year-old Mineo, who was hospitalized for four days due to rectal tearing and then readmitted less than a week later for a stomach abscess that was also a result of the attack. Mineo quickly hired a lawyer, filed a complaint against the officers, and launched a $220 million lawsuit against the NYPD.
Thanks to medical evidence and the testimony of two police officers, who both witnessed the attack, Kern has been indicted with sexual assault. If convicted, he faces up to 25 years in prison. Morales and Cruz were also charged with covering up the crime and each now face four years in prison. All three officers deny the charges. Their trials begin this month.
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