Officer Fixit
A police officer in Lawtey, Fla., has been arrested on charges of bribery and unlawful compensation for official behavior.
Lawtey has a reputation for being a speed trap, First Coast News reports, but now, they say, it's getting another bad rap. "Speed traps are one thing. Taking money, bribing is another thing altogether," said Lt. Gail Russell of the Bradford County Sheriff's Office.
Officer Kenyatta Sheffield is accused of offering to let speeders pay tickets in cash while he had them pulled over. In one instance, he allegedly told a woman she could pay a roadside fee of $191, and that in doing so she could avoid the points on her driver's license. The woman didn't have the money and called a friend for help. The friend called the police.
Thus far, investigators have found three women that Sheffield allegedly scammed. One was a woman he followed to an ATM to get cash to pay her ticket. "She went to an ATM, escorted by the officer to the ATM, and withdrew a couple hundred dollars to pay that," Russell said.
Sheffield wasn't turning in the tickets he was paid for, Russell said. "What it appears the officer was doing was voiding tickets and obliterating all identifying information, such as tag numbers, everything." Police say they are going through the stack of about 350 tickets Sheffield wrote over the last couple of months, looking for other possible victims.
He is being held at Bradford County jail in lieu of $60,000 bond.
Source: First Coast News
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Posted by Robert in Missouri on June 15, 2010:
Anyone want to guess what will happen to him once he's in a state prison?
Posted by Jim in southwest Illannoy on June 16, 2010:
He'd probably set up some kind of racket there too. Probably run an operation reminiscent of Sgt. Bilko.
Posted by Mike from Dallas on June 16, 2010:
How about that? It really WAS quid pro quo, depending on the exchange rate at the time, $150-$200 per quid.