Norwalk had its 15 minutes of national news over doog poop, but Ansonia is upping the ante with the case of the dissapearing garden hose. Unless you live in mythical Mayberry, if you called your local police station to report the theft of a garden hose you would likely be told to come on down to the station and fill out a report. No police investigation would be instigated. And in Hartford, well, you can have an entire apartment burgled, or invaded as the media likes to sensationalize, and you could spend hours waiting for police to show, as Colin McEnroe reports:
One night last week I was in a neighborhood near downtown Hartford after one of its residents was burglarized. The man came home to his apartment and found the front door broken. The burglars had taken his valuables and had rummaged through a purse on the sofa, he said, had found some car keys, had exited the apartment and had stolen the relevant car from the street.
The man — let’s call him J. — called the city police at 9:30.
When I came upon J., it was after 10 p.m. He and one of his neighbors were waiting on the stoop for the cops. J. called again. And again. By about 10:30, one of his other neighbors tried phoning it in as a 911. There was an unsecured crime scene, she explained to the dispatcher. There were several single women living in the area. Nobody knew whether the criminals were still around.
The dispatcher seemed unimpressed.
In Ansonia though, a missing, sort of, garden hose, from the Police Department no less, has prompted the latest salvo in the race war. The comments section of the Connecticut Post offer up a nice view of why registering comments doesn’t stop personal attacks, bigotry and all the other banal stuff that people are compulsed to invect.
The facts are somewhat simple, Officer Salahuddin was videotaped holding a garden hose washing his police cruiser. The Police Department’s hose was missing for three days. Naturally Police Chief Kevin Hale felt obligated to call in the State Police to arrest Salahuddin for theft. Did I forget to mention that Salahuddin is Black? Enter the NAACP and a protest march. Which results in a call for the Department of Justice to investigate just why it takes State Police to arrest an Ansonia Police Officer for stealing the department garden hose.
Feds to investigate Ansonia police officer arrest
The U.S. Department of Justice has told Ansonia officials it will investigate the arrest of a decorated police officer on a charge of allegedly stealing a garden hose.
Officer Mustafa Salahuddin was arrested July 15 and is charged with sixth-degree larceny. He is on paid administrative leave.
Salahuddin’s attorney has said that the police officer was seen bringing a garden hose outside the Police Department’s parking lot to wash his police cruiser.
The hose was missing for three days before it was found at the department.
Mayor James Della Volpe says he and Police Chief Kevin Hale welcome the Justice Departments involvement.
Salahuddin has received the department’s Distinguished Service Award and last year he received a Lifesaving Award.
Ansonia Officer Lashes Out at Department
Hale has said he asked the State Police to investigate the theft after a Department of Public Works employee reported the hose was missing.
Mayor Jim Della Volpe said that a surveillance video linked Salahuddin to the theft. Salahuddin and Serafinowicz both declined to comment on details of the larceny case, but Serafinowicz has said that the hose never left the department.
“Chief Hale indicated that he was disheartened and saddened to see the Connecticut State Police arrest of one of our police officers, who he had personally recommended for meritorious commendation in the past and for whom he had personal regard,” the mayor said.
Salahuddin has been placed on administrative leave with pay until the case is resolved. He is scheduled to appear Tuesday in Derby Superior Court.He will plead not guilty in court, Serafinowicz said, and will choose a jury trial.
Hale has said it is routine procedure to call in an outside agency to investigate any issues concerning members of the department.But Salahuddin questioned why State Police were called in. “Usually they will do their own internal investigation before forwarding it to someone else,” he said.
He has been the subject of several earlier internal investigations that he terms “frivolous.”
Today Officer Salahuddin is in court
A lot of people in town can’t believe it came to this, and there was a march, organized by the NAACP, on City Hall yesterday afternoon. At the end of yesterday’s march we heard from the mayor and the marchers that the US Department of Justice will investigate the arrest.
Officer Salahuddin first clashed with the Ansonia Police brass a decade ago over its ban on facial hair. He took that complaint to state authorities and won, because his Muslim faith requires him to have a beard.
He says the department has been taking its revenge ever since with a series of petty complaints against him, the latest being that he stole a $25 garden hose from the police station.
The police chief says Salahuddin was caught on surveillance tape taking the hose. Salahuddin’s lawyer says the officer was taking it to wash his police cruiser.
The Mayor and the Police Chief both say the arrest over the hose has nothing to do with the past or the race of the officer accused.
Either way, the officer is charged with 6th degree larceny and was arraigned this morning in Derby Superior Court.
I presume that Police Departments all accross the state are inventorying their collection of garden hoses. Priorities people.
