INSIDE the Lakeland Police Department

Incredible Criminal Excuses

Over on our Twitter side yesterday I retweeted a tweet from Boynton Beach Police Department regarding a news article about a criminal with an outrageous excuse for why he possessed some cocaine powder - he claimed it was flour for his pork chops.

That got me thinking about some of the most incredible excuses I have encountered during my career so far. Two stand out as the best I've heard.

During my time as a vice and narcotics detective many years ago, we would occasionally conduct surveillance in the Munn Park area for lewd activity. This was years before downtown was redeveloped to the wonderful area it is today. One night we observed two subjects engaged in open lewd conduct in the park and moved in to make arrests. Upon getting the subjects separated and up from the ground to handcuff them, one of them commented "Officer, I just want you to know I had nothing to do with this."

Really? Then please tell me who is responsible for what you were just doing on your knees in public view if you had nothing to do with it. He went to jail that night.

The second favorite event was also during my time in vice and narcotics. We were executing a drug search warrant at a residence when a subject came up to the house to buy drugs. We identified ourselves as police officers and upon searching the subject located a small piece of crack cocaine in his pants pocket. The subject uttered, "Officer, these aren't my pants."

Really? I completely understand. I often make the mistake of putting on someone else's clothes in the morning, too. It all makes perfect sense now that you explained the pants thing to me.

That guy went to jail that night, too.

- Asst Chief Bill LePere

Managing Emergencies

One of the many things that public safety and really all government agencies in Polk County (and Florida for that matter) do fairly well is work together during emergencies. The collaboration and cooperation during hurricanes, wildfires, floods, or other disasters is a source of pride for us.

Having said that, I participated in today's 2009 Polk County Municipal Liaison meeting hosted by the Polk County Emergency Management Division. Pete McNally and his staff from PCEMD and Jim Bell from the County's Public Safety Department gave presentations on disaster mitigation and preparation efforts currently underway.

It is always good to renew business relationships with peers across the county at these meetings. These get togethers provide us with the opportunity to once again see folks we worked closely with during the storms of 2004 and more recent events.

Government today uses an approach of all-hazards planning and preparation rather than just hurricane planning because public safety and other departments need to be ready to respond to any type of emergency. This change in our approach is the result of lessons learned from past hurricanes and the extensive ICS and NIMS training that followed the attacks of 9-11. We now have an integrated system of federal, state, county, and municipal agencies that are ready to work together regardless of the emergency through a coordinated and well defined incident management system.

It is, of course, our hope that we are never called upon to use this training, but we stand ready nonetheless.

- Asst Chief Bill LePere

Updated RLC FAQs

With all the attention being given to the Red Light Camera (RLC) violation notices arriving in the mail now that our cameras are live, I thought it might be beneficial to reissue an updated document of Frequently Asked RLC Questions (FAQs).

Perhaps the most commonly asked question we are getting today is how can someone pay their fine. Directions are found on page two of the Notice of Violation that outlines the payment options, which include:

1. Pay online at www.ViolationInfo.com and logon with your Notice # and Pin # shown in the red box on the front of the notice. There is a $4.00 convenience fee.

2. Pay by phone by calling toll free 1-866-790-4111 between 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM EST. There is a $4.00 convenience fee.

3. Pay by mail by sending a check or money order (payable to the City of Lakeland) using the envelope enclosed with the Notice of Violation. DO NOT MAIL CASH.

Please note that payment is not accepted at the Police Department or City Hall.

Owners can view their violation images and video online at www.ViolationInfo.com using their Notice # and Pin # found on the front of the Notice.

The Notice also outlines two ways someone can contest a violation notice they received. Follow the steps carefully to ensure to you meet the timelines established for contesting a violation.

Of course the best course of action is to come to the complete stop at a stop light. The most common violation we are seeing are rolling right turns on red with the vehicle not even coming close to a complete stop on a red signal. 

- Asst Chief Bill LePere

Ensuring Accuracy of Red Light Camera Citations

A Letter to the Editor in The Ledger today told of an incident in which a car's owner received a citation for allegedly running a red light in another community even though the car that was ticketed reportedly had never left the garage. While I cannot speak for the facts of this referenced case, I do feel it is important for the public to understand the process used by LakelandPD to ensure accuracy in our red light camera violations.

Our officers are really the second layer of quality control as the RLC company focuses on accuracy up front. The company rejects violations at the front end of the process if the tag on the image does not match the vehicle make/model on the tag registration check. We never get to see those events. But assuming one slips through, our officers also validate the tag seen in the video and the registration check match. Here is the process they use.

Officers reviewing RLC cases first look at a before and after image of the event to validate the car's positioning at the time the traffic light turns red constitutes a violation. The officers then look at an image of the tag and compare it to the tag run by the RLC company. This is where we ensure accuracy of the citations. The tag on the video image must match the tag listed as being run for a registration check. Errors at this stage result in no violation citation being authorized.

Upon confirming the tag in the photo matches the tag being run, officers then verify the car's registration matches the vehicle caught running the red light. It is only after these steps are completed do our officers view the streaming video to watch the entire violation occur. Officers at that point then determine if a violation occurred or not.

It is important to remind folks that anyone receiving a violation citation in the mail is able to log into the Internet-based system and see their violation, including the tag on the vehicle caught running a red light.

These steps are designed to eliminate as much as possible the chance that an owner will mistakenly receive a red light camera citation. Now having said that, we certainly understand that a mistake may occur. We want to correct any errors caused by us not correctly matching the tag seen in the video image with the tag registration run by the company.

We expect the error rate, however, to be very, very small.

- Asst Chief Bill LePere

Buddy Bears

Residents at the Azalea Park retirement community recently donated approximately 100 teddy bears to the Lakeland Police Department under the Buddy Bears program. These bears are a wonderful aid whenever police officers or victim advocates are dealing with children who have experienced some sort of traumatic event. The bears have an amazing calming effect on children.

Pictured below are our PIO Mr. Jack Gillen and Lt. John Thomason receiving the bears at Azalea Park.

We are always grateful whenever a community organization takes the time to collect bears for us. A big Thank You to the residents at Azalea Park for your community spirit!

- Asst Chief Bill LePere

Budget Humor - Sign of the Times

As a general rule, accountants are sometimes viewed as having no sense of humor. Hours of figuring debits, credits, adding endless columns of numbers, creating spreadsheets, and balancing accounts can get the best of anyone. Add ever changing federal regulations to unanticipated emergency expenses and the job of a government accountant can be stressful.

So it came as a bit of surprise when our Chief Accountant Charlie Dormer finalized the cover of our budget book for the upcoming fiscal year. Charlie usually puts a graphic on the cover page - something like a police officer's badge, a shoulder patch, or a police car.

Not this year though.

In these times of budget cuts, belt tightening, and service reductions, it was a bit of comic relief to see what Charlie put on the cover of this year's budget book.

How appropriate...

- Asst Chief Bill LePere

Red Light Camera Citations

The headline of an article in The Ledger this morning reported red light cameras yet to yield any citations. To the casual reader, one might interpret this to mean the cameras have failed to catch anyone running red lights. That is certainly not the case.

We previously posted that citations would be delayed as we send our officers through training to learn how to work the software to review events and determine if a violation occurred. That training was conducted this past Wednesday.

A verbal report at our daily staff meeting this morning indicated almost 1,500 "events" were captured by the red light cameras and forwarded to LPD for review since the cameras went live June 1 at five different locations around the city. An "event" is any incident that might be a "violation" of the red light ordinance. There may be numerous reasons why an event is captured by a camera. It then becomes the responsibility for a police officer to review each event and determine if a "violation" occurred.

There is a specific process that occurs when a recorded event is processed by the company before being sent to LPD for review. That might take a week or so to complete. Once LPD processes the event and determines a violation occurred, the company still has additional work to do before a citation is mailed to the owner of the violation vehicle. It might take up to 30 days to get a citation in the mail from the date of the original event - all told, a reasonable period of time for the work involved in processing events and violations.

Not all events will end up being violations, but talking to some officers who began processing events this week suggests the vast majority of events are found to be a violation and warrant a citation.

To those who were caught running red lights by one of our cameras but think you got away with a violation because you have not yet received a citation, all I can say is stand by - your citation will be arriving at your mailbox soon.

Just be patient with us - these things take time to complete.

- Asst Chief Bill LePere