Sunday, August 27, 2023

An audit that found that 26,000 of traffic tickets were falsified by 311 Connecticut State Police troopers

“It really taints everything they did,” said Jay Ruane, managing partner at Ruane Attorneys. “Because if they’re willing to lie about the little things, it really means they’re willing to lie about anything.”

The audit in late June found that 311 state troopers may have collectively entered at least 25,966 tickets into a State Police database, for traffic stops that never took place.

There are at least four ongoing investigations into the ticket writing scandal, including a criminal investigation that started in Chief State’s Attorney’s Office spokesperson Alaine Griffin's office and is now in the hands of the U.S. Department of Justice, which declined to comment for this story.

The Connecticut Division of Public Defender Services and the Connecticut State Police Union did not respond to requests for comment.

 A spokesperson for Gov. Ned Lamont said the governor has not been included in conversations about the issue and referred a request for comment to Griffin's office, who replied that the Chief State’s Attorney’s Office has not been alerted to the existence of any substantiated findings of misconduct that reflect upon the veracity or possible bias of any Connecticut state trooper at this time,” in an email.

It’s not clear if, or when, names of the troopers implicated in the scandal will become public.

Certainly the police union wants that evidence with held from the public, as police hate being found to be guilty of their criminal acts. 

The union that represents most troopers filed for an injunction this month to stop the State Police from releasing the names of troopers flagged by the audit to the press under the state’s public records law. 

The Superior Court in Middletown has scheduled a hearing on the injunction for Aug. 29.

If trooper names become public, defense attorneys expect a flurry of motions in state and federal courts — many of which are already backed up as they slowly work through the backlog of cases that built up during the pandemic.


I'm pretty sure that with a good investigator, they'll find the troopers can be hit with the conspiracy, collusion, etc etc and nail them for state and federal crimes

2 comments:

  1. If I had a pending case with them, Id accuse the trooper of it anyway , and attempt to make them prove he wasnt involved.
    all of this started with them having a ticket quota.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. damn right. And hell, the ticket quota issue is exactly the logical source, and I missed that completely! Didn't even occur to me, as I was looking at this as a police problem with honesty, and professionalism, instead of asking what they gain from logging 26,000 fake tickets

      Delete