According to the Culpeper Star-Exponent, two weeks ago a convoy of police officers from New Jersey, on their way back from hurricane duty in the gulf, were pulled over by Deputy Roane, after they were found driving well over the speed limit on I-81 in Virginia.
It was on Sept. 18 that Augusta County Sheriff”s Deputy Mike Roane spotted a convoy of New Jersey officers - from Passaic County and the Wayne Police Department - in police cruisers returning home from a Hurricane Katrina relief mission.
Virginia State Police had received multiple 911 calls from I-81 motorists complaining the convoy, with as many as 13 cars, had forced them off the road. Roane was dispatched because a trooper was not available.
Roane managed to stop five or six cruisers, while the rest continued down the interstate. He asked them to cut off their emergency lights and to slow down.
Virginia law bans police cruisers from topping the speed limit and using lights unless responding to an emergency.
That stop earned Roane a rebuke over the telephone later that day from Speziale.
“If you think that that’s not a disgrace, you should take that badge off your shirt and throw it in the garbage,” Speziale said in a taped conversation with Roane. “This is unacceptable, and I’ll tell you what, I hope I get the opportunity to show you the same courtesy up here in New Jersey.”
I could understand if the cops were slightly speeding, but they were apparently using their emergency lights at an extreme rate of speed. According to the article, they were traveling at speeds in excess of 90 miles an hour, endangering everyone else on the road. Deputy Roane, it seems, was trying to cut the speeding officers some slack, because he only gave out warnings.
According to the same article, Deputy Roane also turned off his surveillance camera, which I assume is that video camcorder that you always see on police TV shows, filming the traffic stops. (Why should police have the ability to turn this on and off throughout their shift? Are they not public servants? Who watches the watchman?)
Speziale’s call to Augusta County Sheriff Randy Fisher on Thursday was more cordial than his fiery diatribe against a county deputy almost two weeks ago. Yet the only compromise that Fisher and the Passaic County sheriff could reach left them at a standstill.
“We ended up agreeing to disagree,” Fisher said.
Even with Fisher’s claims that a deputy clocked the New Jersey convoy traveling the Weyers Cave stretch of Interstate 81 at 95 mph, Speziale’s office demands proof.
“The Virginia authorities never produced any documentation, any radar, any evidence,” Passaic County Sheriff’s spokesman Bill Maer said. “All we have is their word, and we have not found them to be very truthful in the past, so we have no reason to believe them now.”
Replied Fisher: “I’ve got my officer’s testimony, and I’ve got about 10 people that have e-mailed me about the thing.”
The thing that most blows my mind about the whole thing is both parties to the stop are from counties where they elect their lawmen directly. I would expect something like this from an area where the police chief is appointed, not elected.
The excuse that they were in a hurry to return home after duty is insufficient. Emergency lights and speeds of that caliber are for emergencies only.
Elected lawmen are both law enforcement and politicians, and there isn’t anything more political than how the police enforce the law. Sheriff are elected, and if they piss off their constituents, they have to face the music, either as a recall right now (sounds like something worth looking into), or next election. Perhaps Speziale is on the cusp of retirement, if not, let’s hope the voters remember this next election.
Let’s hope Speziale gets to learn that that apologies cost nothing, but sometimes the lack of one might cost you everything.
(Thanks, Tam)
