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September 29, 2009

Charles Oliver: It couldn't happen here?

A few weeks ago, I told you about Jericho, Ark., a town that many residents and some law enforcement officers call a speed trap. The police force was disbanded after a member shot former assistant fire chief Don Payne in city court, where he was contesting a ticket, during an argument between Payne and some of the officers. Now, all 18 of the city’s firefighters have walked off the job in support of Payne.



A shooting near Bear Elementary School in Miamisburg, Ohio, prompted school officials to lock down the school. The lockdown lasted until school officials realized no classes were being held that day and there were no students in the school.



In Middleville, Mich., a school bus stop sits right in front of Lisa Snyder’s home. The bus arrives after some of her neighbors have to go to work, so she watches three of their children for about 15 to 40 minutes each school day until the bus comes. Snyder accepts no money for the job. She says she’s just being a good neighbor. For her neighborliness, the state Department of Human Services has accused her of running an unlicensed day care and ordered her to stop watching the children or face legal penalties. DHS officials say they are just following the law and trying to protect children.



In England, Matthew Washington, a detective with the Metropolitan Police’s anti-terrorism unit, was convicted of misconduct in public office for using a department credit card for personal purchases, including a family trip to Euro Disney as well as items from a sex shop. In his defense, he noted that other officers routinely did the same thing. In fact, the department canceled more than 1,400 cards after the investigation.



Shem Walker thought the man on his Brooklyn, N.Y., door step was a vagrant, or worse, a drug dealer, so he told him to get off his property. The man ignored him, so Walker tried to physically move him on. They got into a fight, which was joined by another man, and Walker was shot and killed. His family says they only found out the next day that the man was an undercover New York City police officer.



In Australia, an inmate work crew cut the transmission line of a radio station in Destin. Station officials didn't even know they were off the air until callers alerted them. Station manager John Ralls says he doesn’t know why the work crew was bush hogging the area since it is private property.



Tereza Tosbell says she wasn’t the only one appalled at how dirty Colchester General Hospital in Essex, England, was. She says family members who came to visit her when she was a patient there complained about how filthy it was. She say her ward room was full of dust and cob webs, and when patients left, she saw staff clean their beds by simply wiping them off with paper towels and tap water. Fed up, she finally climbed out of her bed and found a bottle of antibacterial soap and some paper towels and cleaned the four-bed room. She said staff simply watched as she got on her hands and knees and scrubbed the floor.



Charles Oliver is a staff writer for The Daily Citizen. Got a suggestion for It Couldn’t Happen Here? E-mail it to him at charlesoliver@daltoncitizen.com.









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