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Secret Service Agent who threatened to shoot hotel
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Agent Is Charged In Olympic Party
Friday, September 6, 2002
BY KEVIN CANTERA
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
More than seven months after a drunken Provo party on the eve of the 2002 Olympics involving U.S. Secret Service agents and several college women who were too young to drink legally, a single misdemeanor charge has been filed against only one of the agents.
The three men, part of a massive Olympic security detail, were sent home and given desk jobs immediately after the boisterous Feb. 1 revelry inside a Provo motel room, during which one of the off-duty agents allegedly threatened to shoot a motel manager.
Provo City Attorney Gary Gregerson on Thursday filed a class C misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct against D. Todd Cranor, of Hoover, Ala., who has resigned from the Secret Service.
Contacted late Thursday by The Salt Lake Tribune, Cranor said he was unaware that the charge had been filed and declined further comment. A summons was issued ordering Cranor to appear in 4th District Court on Nov. 18.
The two other agents -- who will not be charged -- were placed on paid administrative leave after police investigated possible sexual assault charges against them. A Secret Service spokesman refused to comment on their current status with the agency.
Provo police initially sought felony charges against the agents based on statements from the women who attended the party in Room 104 of the Western Inn, 40 W. 300 South.
But the women's accounts of the early morning party were inconsistent, and after months of investigation Utah County Attorney Kay Bryson declined to file charges, turning the case over to Gregerson.
Casey Clements, then manager of the hotel, which has since become the Affinity Motor Inn, said he was awakened by the agents' loud party and the smell of cigarette smoke around 2 a.m. He told the Tribune in an e-mail that after he asked the revelers to quiet down, one of the agents pushed him against a wall.
"I asked him not to push me, and he told me that he could because he was a federal agent," Clements said. Later the agent allegedly told Clements that if he complained again, "he would throw me to the ground, put his gun to my head, and I would be sorry."
Clements reported the agents to Provo police, who investigated. Clements added that the agents' supervisors, who had been staying in rooms above the party, themselves complained about the noise the next morning.
A few thousand Secret Service agents traveled to Utah for the Games in February, providing presidential, government, dignitary and venue protection as part of the $310 million Olympic security effort.
kcantera@sltrib.com
_________
Tribune reporter Michael Vigh contributed to this story.
http://www.sltrib.com/09062002/utah/768768.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Edited by - josey1 on 09/07/2002 05:46:59
Friday, September 6, 2002
BY KEVIN CANTERA
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
More than seven months after a drunken Provo party on the eve of the 2002 Olympics involving U.S. Secret Service agents and several college women who were too young to drink legally, a single misdemeanor charge has been filed against only one of the agents.
The three men, part of a massive Olympic security detail, were sent home and given desk jobs immediately after the boisterous Feb. 1 revelry inside a Provo motel room, during which one of the off-duty agents allegedly threatened to shoot a motel manager.
Provo City Attorney Gary Gregerson on Thursday filed a class C misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct against D. Todd Cranor, of Hoover, Ala., who has resigned from the Secret Service.
Contacted late Thursday by The Salt Lake Tribune, Cranor said he was unaware that the charge had been filed and declined further comment. A summons was issued ordering Cranor to appear in 4th District Court on Nov. 18.
The two other agents -- who will not be charged -- were placed on paid administrative leave after police investigated possible sexual assault charges against them. A Secret Service spokesman refused to comment on their current status with the agency.
Provo police initially sought felony charges against the agents based on statements from the women who attended the party in Room 104 of the Western Inn, 40 W. 300 South.
But the women's accounts of the early morning party were inconsistent, and after months of investigation Utah County Attorney Kay Bryson declined to file charges, turning the case over to Gregerson.
Casey Clements, then manager of the hotel, which has since become the Affinity Motor Inn, said he was awakened by the agents' loud party and the smell of cigarette smoke around 2 a.m. He told the Tribune in an e-mail that after he asked the revelers to quiet down, one of the agents pushed him against a wall.
"I asked him not to push me, and he told me that he could because he was a federal agent," Clements said. Later the agent allegedly told Clements that if he complained again, "he would throw me to the ground, put his gun to my head, and I would be sorry."
Clements reported the agents to Provo police, who investigated. Clements added that the agents' supervisors, who had been staying in rooms above the party, themselves complained about the noise the next morning.
A few thousand Secret Service agents traveled to Utah for the Games in February, providing presidential, government, dignitary and venue protection as part of the $310 million Olympic security effort.
kcantera@sltrib.com
_________
Tribune reporter Michael Vigh contributed to this story.
http://www.sltrib.com/09062002/utah/768768.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Edited by - josey1 on 09/07/2002 05:46:59
Comments
Friday, September 6
By Thomas L. Flannery
Intelligencer Journal Staff
State troopers working on traffic control for construction workers laboring on Route 30 at 1:45 a.m. on Aug. 18, 2001, had no idea a teenager in his grandmother's car was bearing down on them at 80 mph.
They did not know why five police cruisers were in pursuit of the 13-year-old boy, according to testimony Thursday in the trial of a state trooper charged with various offenses for firing three shots at the boy after he crashed the car and took off on foot.
Trooper Charles E. Cox Jr., 45, a 17-year state police veteran, heard about the chase coming his way when a construction supervisor for Dick Corp., the company rebuilding Route 30, got a call from a co-worker stationed at the New Holland Pike overpass.
The radio in Cox's car was not monitoring Lancaster County emergency radio. Cox was based in Embreeville and Avondale in Chester County,
Cox, who has been suspended pending the outcome of the trial, is charged with two counts of aggravated assault and reckless endangerment. An employee of R.R. Donnelley may have been in the line of fire when the incident happened.
In his opening statement Thursday, Assistant District Attorney Jeff Conrad told the jury Cox had no right to shoot at the fleeing teen because no one's life, including the trooper's, was in danger.
"There is no evidence to justify Trooper Cox's actions," Conrad said. "What he (Cox) did was an absolute criminal act."
Cox's attorney, Robert Donatoni of West Chester, painted a different picture for the jurors.
First, Donatoni said, Cox didn't know if the boy was "13 or 30." He also said the events leading up to Cox firing the shots happened in less than 15 seconds.
Cox, Donatoni said, feared for his life and the lives of about 20 people who were near where the teenager crashed the car.
"Trooper Cox did his job, and you can't punish him for that," Donatoni said.
State police Sgt. Kevin Christie, who was supervising the troopers working that night, testified that Cox admitted firing three shots from his 12-round, .40-caliber Beretta semi-automatic pistol.
"He (Cox) thought the suspect was a fleeing felon," Christie said, "and he (Cox) could not see if the suspect was holding a weapon."
Trooper Todd Hershey said he spoke with Cox immediately after the incident. He said Cox told him the same thing.
"He told me, "I assumed it was a felony pursuit,' " Hershey said.
The boy was not armed.
The teen, who lives in Mount Joy, testified that it all started when he failed to stop when Mount Joy Officer Joseph Goody switched on his red light and siren because he didn't want to be arrested.
Police officers from four nearby townships joined in the chase. The teen admitted he tried to force one of the officers' cruisers off the road during the chase.
The teen admitted speeding through the construction zone and said he had no plans to stop until he crashed into a huge sign used to direct traffic.
According to Conrad, Cox was about 150 feet away when the boy jumped out the driver's side window, slid over the hood and ran into the parking lot of R.R. Donnelley adjacent to the Greenfield Road overpass.
Conrad said Cox told the teen to stop. When he kept running, Cox fired three times, Conrad said.
Testimony continues today at 9 before President Judge Michael Georgelis.
http://www.lancasteronline.com/intell_news/troopers.shtm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
By DON PLUMMER
Atlanta Journal-Constitution Staff Writer
Longtime Kennesaw Police Chief Dwaine Wilson was fired Wednesday night, according to City Manager Mike McDowell.
Wilson was fired for using a city credit card to make a personal purchase and then lying about it, McDowell said today.
Wilson has been with the city Police Department for 25 years and chief since 1985. He was suspended without pay on Aug. 5, said McDowell.
Assistant Police Chief Tim Callahan had been put in charge of the city's 45-officer force during Wilson's suspension, McDowell said.
McDowell said he requested that the GBI investigate Wilson's handling of city money on July 27. He would not say what prompted the inquiry. Wilson could not be contacted for comment.
The GBI completed its investigation Aug. 7 and turned its findings over to Cobb County District Attorney Pat Head, said GBI spokeswoman Vicki Metz.
A spokeswoman for the district attorney said he would not comment on the case.
http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/metro/0902/05kennesaw.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878