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Friday, July 23, 2010

IS THE PEREZ LEASH OFF HPD?



I might be reading too much into this, but it seems to me that we have seen a much more active Hartford Police Department since the end of the Perez Administration. Just this week alone raids of small neighborhoods stores resulted in the closing of a couple stores as well as arrests of some operators.

The part that was even stranger is that the media was actually invited along to show the good work that HPD is doing. What a difference a few weeks makes.

It used to be like pulling teeth to get a press release or even photographs of weapons and drugs seized. Now today on the heels of yesterdays raids, a press release and photographs of drugs and weapons seized was sent out from HPD. The press release is below.

It may just be a coincidence, but hopefully Chief Roberts and the men and women of the Hartford Police Department will be allowed, and encouraged, to do what needs to be done.

HARTFORD POLICE NEWS
For Immediate Release: July 23, 2010



HARTFORD POLICE DETECTIVES EXECUTE 2 SEARCH WARRANTS -

SEIZE 8 FIREARMS AND ILLEGAL DRUGS

(Hartford) - On July 22, 2010, detectives from the Hartford Police Department’s Intelligence Division executed search and seizure warrants at 58 Annawan Street and 6 Regent Street. As a result of the execution of the warrants, detectives made one arrest and seized over 10 pounds of marijuana, PCP, $14,945 dollars in US currency, two (2) long guns, two (2) revolvers, four (4) pistols and numerous rounds of ammunition.

The arrested party , a previously convicted felon, was identified as Jorge Oquendo (03/20/58) of 58 Annawan Street. He was charged with eight counts of Criminal Possession of a Firearm, three counts of Theft of a Firearm, two counts of Possessing a Firearm with an Obliterated Serial Number, Possession of a Controlled Substance, Operating a Drug Factory, Possession of a Restricted Substance and Possession of a Controlled Substance within 1500 feet of a School. Some of the evidence seized is pictured below.











Jorge Oquendo

Friday, July 16, 2010

LEADERSHIP ISN'T ALWAYS EASY OR PLEASANT

This might easily be the most difficult post I have written on this blog. I know for sure it is the one that I have lost the most sleep over and spent the most time considering the ramifications, not for me but for the person involved.

Hector Robles is someone I consider a friend, someone I have respected for his actions, his work in the community, but more importantly his honesty and candor with me in many of our private conversations. But like us all, Hector is a human being and human beings make mistakes. How they deal with those mistakes is a measure of themselves and their integrity.

Leadership can be shown , even in the worst situations, by someone who puts the interests of his constituents first, rather than selfish personal reasons. That is exactly the situation facing Hector at this time.

As I said in the beginning, this posting raised several difficult issues. First off, I had no problem raising issues regarding Eddie Perez, John Rose and others. They were easy people to dislike. Hector on the other hand is a different story. He's a likable type guy, always accessible and responsive and overall a decent guy.

With that being said, I would say I expect more out of someone I consider a friend. I had originally heard about an ongoing IAD investigation into certain activities of Hector and his position with the Hartford Police Department. The allegations were troubling to me, and I tried to verify their accuracy. The journalistic standard a couple of my mentors have instilled in me is to double verify everything. Verify the facts through two independent sources who most likely aren't hearing the facts from each other.

The first source related most of the facts to me and advised me that Hector was well aware of the investigation, the facts uncovered and the direction the IAD was taking. The second source related pretty much identical facts and circumstances. But these were allegations that would definitely not only affect Hector's professional career but also his political career.

Not because he is a friend, but because I felt it was the right thing to do I went further. I verified the IAD information with a 3rd and 4th source, both of them also gave me information verifying the facts and all were about the same.

I don't intend to layout all of the information here, but eventually the entire report will have to be released as a public document and will be available here when that happens. In the meantime, it is not a good situation for Hector, HPD or the image of the City of Hartford.

One of the troubling parts of this is the information being fed to the media. Both the HPD spokesperson and Robles are saying that this is an "administrative investigation". This is a matter of more smoke and mirrors. Every IAD investigation could be classified as administrative in nature to begin with. In many cases as the investigation proceeds, information is developed that eventually leads to the uncovering of criminal activity. From what my sources are telling me, that is the case here.

We have had enough of the "smoke and mirrors" defense from Perez's case. We see how that has worked out for him, claiming it was merely a lapse of judgement, right up until the time that a jury convicted him of five felonies. Perez was a huge embarrassment and a media black eye for the city.

Hector has the opportunity to step up, be honest and truthful and do the right thing, unlike his political mentor Perez.It is a very difficult position, but doing the right thing isn't always easy. Admitting you are wrong and are willing to deal with the consequences may be difficult. Putting the city under another cloud of corruption after we are just beginning to come out of the cloud created by the Perez years is not only wrong, it is selfish and will damage everyone in the end as the truth will eventually come out.

Another issue with the investigation is the potential consequences. One high ranking source has said the "ball is in Hector's court". Apparently he has been given the opportunity to resign. That in and of itself is fine if the situation warrants a resignation. If that is being traded for a promise of no prosecution that would be wrong and further undermine the credibility of the Hartford Police Department. If criminal activity is found and documented, and probable cause is established, a decision needs to be made by the States Attorney as to whether an arrest is warranted, not Hartford PD.

Even in a bad situation someone doing the right thing for the City rather than himself will still come out ahead in the end. It might take a lot to regain the public's trust, but being honest up front is a good start.

ANOTHER INTERESTING ADVENTURE...AND THANK YOU FOR YOUR WELL WISHES

Where do I begin on this one? Many people have been concerned for me and my personal safety over the last couple years. I used to always laugh their concerns off by saying ”when your time is up, your time is up”.

Gladly, my time isn’t up.

It might be a long story, but if I can get anyone else to avoid a couple of stupid mistakes I made, it’s worth it.

Tuesday night I attended the Democratic debates at the Hartford Library. During the debates I noticed the peripheral vision in my right eye was just a blank white color. I could see straight ahead, but nothing to my right side, I thought I was just tired and kind of passed it off. The debate finished off and a few others were headed out to the Nutshell café and invited me along, but I decided to head home.

Outside the Library I spoke with Stan McCauley for a minute and he asked me several times if I was alright. I assured him I was and asked why? He must have seen something because he said I wasn’t myself and I was acting differently. He offered to drive me home and I said I was fine.

Warning signs , I now know, of an impending stroke. It gets better, or worse, depending how you look at it.

I decided I knew myself better and I could drive myself home. I started to head home and decided to call a friend of mine, Len Besthoff. He was out having ice cream with his wife and daughters and answered his new i-phone , I was all set to tell him the news of the debate and how things turned out. I knew what I wanted to say, but the words just wouldn’t come out. As I moved my mouth to talk, all that game out were unidentifiable sounds.

As hard as I tried to from words, nothing made sense. At that time, I don’t know why, I figured hanging up and calling him again would clear up the problem. He answered the second call and the jumbled words poured out again as I tried to speak. I heard his wife Lindsey say “Len, I think he’s having a stroke”. Not me, it couldn’t be , that happens to old people.

Len realized I couldn’t answer him, so he just told me “call 911, you need to get to the hospital”. He had to be wrong, I was actually driving fine, I just couldn’t speak. I’m tough, I’ll go home, take a couple Advil. Besides, people having strokes go limp and they go paralyzed I reasoned. A good nights sleep would correct it, I was just tired and the heat was killing me.

I was only a minute from my house, so I’d feel a lot better when I got home and had a nice cold ice tea. I grabbed the ice-tea and sat at my desk trying to talk to myself. Still, the words just wouldn’t form and the more I tried to enunciate the more frustrated I got. At this point a bulb finally went off in my head, “you are in trouble stupid, you need help quick”. But even though I was in trouble, how do you get help when you can’t speak? I knew I could call “911” and say nothing, but that didn’t guarantee an emergency response. The 911 Dispatch Center handles calls like that as what they call a “10-90”, eventually an officer would be dispatched to check on a 911 hangup, but it wouldn’t be immediately.

I came up with a brainstorm. I would text my sister Sheryl and ask her to call me. I texted her a message I thought was “CALL ME”. She later showed me the text at the ER and what I had typed wasn’t even close. The words were spelled correctly, but made no sense to her. It was just a few random words that made no sentence. Luckily she had her phone on and promptly replied “WHAT?”. Again I answered her back with what I thought was a coherent phrase, but it turned out to be more gibberish.

Luckily she realized something was wrong and called me on the phone. I tried to speak, only to flood the phone with more slurred unintelligible words. Luckily my sister is brighter than me and she promptly informed me she was calling 911 and hung up. As soon as she hung up, Lindsey Besthoff called to make sure I was on the way to the hospital or she was calling 911. I guess mothers may reason these things out better than us tough guys. So much for the Advil and my comfortable bed.

Since I could walk alright, in my stupor, I decided to go outside to meet Fire and EMS in my driveway. As Engine 5 arrived, they are actually my neighbors across the street, they asked if I had called and when I tried to answer yes, a muffled slur of words came out. Hopefully they noticed me shaking my head yes, They asked what the problem was and more muffled words. The obligatory question of “have you been drinking, do you do drugs?” would have been comical if the gravity of my situation hadn’t started sinking in now.

I was put into the back of an ambulance and the poking and prodding began, heart monitor hooked up and the short trip to Hartford Hospital began. Shortly into that trip and the words I didn’t want to hear, but I had a pretty good idea were inevitable were uttered, “sir, I don’t want to alarm you, but I think you might be having a stroke”.

I knew Advil would have cleared it up and now look what my sister and the Besthoff’s had gotten me into.

Into triage, the quick wristband put on me and the wide double doors to the inner sanctum of the bustling ER swing open electronically. Then just a few feet into the ER and the booming voice comes over the intercom system ”activated trauma in Red Pod, stroke victim coming in”. The same EMT who didn’t want to alarm me on the ride in looks at me and with a reassuring smile says “that’s you, you’re the stroke victim”

I knew he was wrong, I only needed Advil and some rest.

Then, like a scene from a TV show, I am wheeled into a large room with just about every stainless steel device you could think of. Then, like an automobile assembly line, every one of the 8 or 10 people in the room jumped into action. Someone , removing my shirt and tie, two others trying to get IV’s in, one in the right arm, one in the left, someone else taking vital signs, someone else hooking up leads for the heart monitor, a couple of doctors conducting the entire symphony. I was impressed.

Once that was all completed, it seemed like non-stop action, and immediately off to the CT scanner for a scan of my head and brain to see what was going and how severe it was. On the way to the CT scan a drug called “TPA” was explained to me. Apparently it is a super industrial strength “clot buster” that can be used in the first 3 hours of a stroke to help reduce the devastating effects of a stroke. It is not without its risk, including possible death, but they said it was very effective. Fortunately for me, they explained, it was available but most likely not necessary unless things intensified. I wanted to say thanks, but all I needed was an ADVIL and I’d be fine, this was all my sisters idea.

I think somewhere between the trauma room, the CT scan room and the TPA discussion, it started to sink in that I could potentially be in trouble. I’m really not sure what was going on inside my brain, but I realize now, not only could I not speak correctly, I wasn’t making the clearest decisions either. As soon as the CT scan was complete I was told that my mother and my sister had arrived.

My speech seemed to be getting back to normal, my vision was normal again and I expected to be released any time now. Obviously, there were people parked all over in the hallways on stretchers who seemed sicker than I was. Mt mother and sister seemed to be getting used to these late night reunions in the ER. It was about a month ago they sat with me until the wee hours of the morning on the e-coli episode,

They weren’t alone for long though and the word that “Kevin has had a stroke” spread quickly. The first to arrive was Stan McCauley who came in around midnight. A good blessing from a good friend could never hurt. The second to arrive was Alyssa Peterson, always out looking for votes. I felt sorry for her because she had heard I was in the hospital and she came immediately, only problem is she went to the wrong hospital. They pointed her to the correct hospital. Alyssa knew where I lived so she figured I would go the the hospital a mere few blocks from my house.

Did she really expect a guy who just wanted Advil for a stroke to make a lucid decision? I know I will aggravate the St’ Francis Medical Center people, but in my typical sarcastic manner I explained my decision to Alyssa. I told her “if you want to go to heaven you go to St. Francis, if you want to live you go to Hartford Hospital”. I apologize again to SFMC, I was in the middle of a stroke.

Eventually everything appeared to be stable, the neurologists were in and explained everything. It was time to send Mom and my guardian angel for the night, my sister, home while I was admitted to a regular room.

The scenarios and potential diagnosis were played out and hashed out as numerous tests were done. As I looked around at some of the other patients I passed on 9North, the “Stroke” floor, I began to realize my stupidity for treating this incident as lightly as I did.

Now that I had been stabilized, the testing was pretty much complete and now it was time for the HH people to show me the error of my ways. Fortunately, I had no visible remnants of a stroke. No paralysis, no speech difficulties, and anyone that would see me today would probably say “yeah, right, you just wanted a short vacation”.

If nothing else, it was a warning shot across my bow to catch my attention. A few changes such as diet and lifestyle and the addition of a baby aspirin a day should keep me off the stroke floor for a while.

I hope anyone else that experiences a similar situation will get to the closest hospital immediately, preferably by calling 911 and summoning EMS, but just get there. The drug TPA is very beneficial if needed , but only in the first 3 hours after the onset of a stroke.

I think the scariest thing to me though is that if I hadn’t been making a call or trying to talk to someone, I might never have known that a stroke was underway in my brain. I had no headache, no pain, no dizziness, nothing. If I had been alone and not talking on the phone I wouldn’t have noticed the slurred speech for the half hour or so it lasted . I shouldn’t have ignored the vision problem either, that should have been obvious to me as not normal.

And if you don’t recognize or want to acknowledge the warning signs, hopefully you will have someone like my sister Sheryl or Len and Lindsey Besthoff to force you to acknowledge the warning signs, it might save your life.

I guess why they call strokes the “silent killer”. Please look at the brochure below and remember the warning signs and act promptly if they occur to you or someone you are around. Stroke is the number 3 cause of death .
Stroke Facts

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

"HE'S NOT A CRIMINAL"




"HE'S NOT A CRIMINAL", those were the words uttered by a woman outside of Hartford Superior Court who identified herself as the "fiancee" of Clifton West, the 18 year old accused of shooting a Hartford Police Officer Friday night at Mather and Brook Streets.

"He's not a criminal". The fact that anyone could utter those words under these circumstances amazes me. What would the "fiancee" like us to use to describe her future husband. Maybe another misguided youth finding his way on Hartford's streets? Maybe as we so often hear after such incidents he was a good kid, just starting to turn his life around?

No, it seems pretty clear cut, anyone that would aim a gun at a police officer and pull the trigger is definitely a CRIMINAL, and a criminal of the worst kind. All moral character is gone when an individual, a CRIMINAL, can shoot at a police officer.

I'm not trying to trivialize any of the other shootings that happen in Hartford on a daily basis, but it just seems that someone who would shoot a police officer is capable of just about anything. Police Officers are the symbols of what keeps our society the somewhat civilized structure we expect.

If West could shoot a police officer under such circumstances, is there any doubt he would not hesitate to pump a few rounds into anyone else that got in his way. That is the mind set that seems to grasp a small group of young people roaming Hartford's streets and the senseless gun violence has ruined many lives, 18 year old Clifton West's included. I hope his "fiancee" doesn't have any hopes of a large wedding anytime soon

CITY OF HARTFORD MAY CHECK REGISTER

Here is the City of Hartford's May check register supplied by the City and Hartford's Chief Operating Officer David Panagore

Hartford May Check Register

IS IT "HARTFORDGATE"

Hartford Police were called to Hartford City Hall this morning to investigate an apparent burglary into the Corporation Counsel's Office on the 3rd floor.

No information is available at this time as to what area was entered or what might have been taken.

Could this be another scandal in the making? Only in Hartford.