Officers help elderly couple turn their lives around

I presented Certificates of Commendation today to two North Patrol Division officers who went way beyond their normal duties to care for a couple that really needed help. Here's their story:

Officers J.D. Pettey and Philip Sipple knew there was more to an elderly couple’s troubles than met the eye.

The officers were called to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Cole nine times between January and May 2010. Every time, Mr. Cole was drunk. The officers noticed some items in the home that led them to believe Mr. Cole had been in the military, and they soon found out he was a World War II veteran. Through their Crisis Intervention Team training, Officers Pettey and Sipple thought Mr. Cole might be suffering from post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. They asked him and his wife questions about it, and both said Mr. Cole had talked to someone at the VA Hospital about it a long time ago. Mrs. Cole said her husband couldn’t even watch TV shows with guns or bombings.

Mrs. Cole also had a problem with hoarding. Officers found 15 carjacks in the couple’s yard, 100 small flashlights and many more items packing the house. The couple agreed to get treatment for their mental health problems but said they couldn’t afford much. The officers got Mr. Cole enrolled in a PTSD support group at the VA Hospital for free. They also worked with the Division of Aging to get the couple discounted groceries and free professional help for their hoarding problem.

The officers did most of those things at work, but they used their off-duty time to help the Coles, too. They helped them clean up their home and removed a half-ton of recyclable material. They sold the recyclables and gave the money to the Coles. Officers Pettey and Sipple also arranged for NTB to donate their time and labor to remove many old wheels and tires from the Coles’ yard, and the officers helped them pull out a vehicle that had been stuck in the mud. The officers got the Coles back in touch with their old church, who agreed to help them with future needs. Officer Pettey even brought his wife, Officer Tina Pettey, on board to help Mrs. Cole organize her pictures, which helped the woman with her hoarding.

Police have not been called to the Coles’ home since the officers’ intervention.

Great work, Officers.
 
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What to do if your stuff gets stolen

Although we've told you repeatedly not to leave items in your car and to secure your home, there's still a chance your things could be stolen. This video explains what to do if they're taken and the steps you can take that will help you get your stuff back.



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Teen found dead in car identified

At about 11:40 a.m. Nov. 24, officers were dispatched to the 7200 block of Brooklyn on a reported shooting. When officers arrived, they found 18-year-old Lionel L. Pierson of Kansas City, Mo., dead inside a parked vehicle. Witnesses said they saw two black males walk up, fire shots into the car and leave on foot. Anyone with information is encouraged to call the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-TIPS (8477).

Police issue 100 seat belt tickets on Click It or Ticket Day

As you head out for the holidays, please buckle up!

PRESS RELEASE: 

The Kansas City Police Department issued 100 safety belt tickets and four child safety belt tickets during their Click It or Ticket mobilization Nov. 18.

KCPD joined law enforcement agencies from across the state to enforce seat belt laws in advance of the busy holiday travel season last week. Officers of the Special Operations Division stopped 282 vehicles and issued a total of 378 traffic tickets including: 100 safety belt tickets, 154 speeding tickets, 4 child safety belt tickets and one for driving under the influence.

“The Kansas City Missouri Police Department is committed to consistently enforcing all traffic laws but, especially those involving hazardous driving and seat belt violations,” said Sgt. Grant Ruark of the Traffic Enforcement Unit. “Slowing down and buckling up saves lives. It’s as simple as that and we’re going to continue to get this message across to motorists in our city.”

For information on Missouri seat belt usage, visit http://www.savemolives.com/.

Looking for suspect who tried to carjack couple's car with baby inside

At about 9:40 p.m. last night, Nov. 22, a couple who was moving from Colorado to southeast Missouri made a pit stop at a convenience store at 2911 Van Brunt. The couple stopped with their family - who were in moving vans - for gas. They had just put their 6-month-old baby in the car and were waiting just outside the vehicle for the moving vans to finish filling up when a man in a dark hoodie approached and got in the car and tried to drive it away. The man shows up in the video at around the 7:30 minute mark.

The mother broke the window out of the car with her elbow. Her husband jumped over her, through the broken window, and got into the backseat of the car and started kicking the suspect. The suspect crashed the car and took off on foot. We need your help to find him. The surveillance video below shows the incident. The suspect is very hard to see, and the victims could only describe him as a black male. If you know anything about this, please call the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-TIPS. The victims suffered some cuts and bruises but are OK, and their baby is safe.

KCPD officers recognized at Awards for Valor

The 39th Annual Awards for Valor banquet took place Friday at the Argosy in Riverside, Mo. This award ceremony is presented by the Metropolitan Chiefs and Sheriffs Association (MCSA) and honors some of the bravest officers in the Kansas City metro area. Nine KCPD officers received awards this year. You may have heard some of their stories before, like the officers who were shot at in south Kansas City last fall, Dean McGinness and Eric Turner. They got a Gold Award for Valor - the highest honor.

Others you may not have heard about, like Officer Chad Pickens, who also received a Gold Award for Valor. He's pictured here with MCSA President Chief John Meier of the Leawood Police Department and Chief Mike Hasty of the Gladstone Department of Public Safety. Here's what Officer Pickens did:

A call from work made Officer Chad Pickens leave the movie he was watching with his family at the Ameristar Casino on August 15, 2008. As he was leaving to go to his car, he encountered a fight in the parking lot. He saw one man get knocked unconscious, and then a woman pulled a gun out of her purse and fired it into the air. She then handed it to another man, who began to chase other men in the parking lot, firing it at them as he ran.


Officer Pickens was in plain clothes and had no bullet-resistant vest, but he realized the danger of the situation and how innocent people at the movies or casino could get hurt. He took cover behind a car, pulled his off-duty weapon and identified himself as a police officer. He engaged the man who was firing shots. That man then turned on him and fired. Officer Pickens returned fire from behind the car. The suspect then dropped his weapon, and Officer Pickens single-handedly took him into custody. No one was hurt during the incident.

There were many similar stories of amazing bravery from officers on both sides of the state line, and I thank them for their courage and congratulate them on their awards.

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Pop Warner team presents their trophy to Police Academy

Last Thursday, Nov. 18, the Pop Warner football team, the North Kansas City Wildcats, presented us with their Truman Bowl trophy. This was the "Super Bowl" for their league, and this group of sixth- and seventh-graders won it. So why did they give us their trophy? It was to thank the police department for letting them use the football field at our Regional Police Academy to practice on for free. The team has been practicing there since August and continue to do so now. We really appreciate this heartfelt gesture from the team and are proudly displaying their trophy inside the Academy. Captain Daniel Gates accepted the trophy on behalf of the department.

Our Police Academy facilities are available for community use. If you're interested, call 413-3500. If you'd like to host a special event there, you can rent rooms and even the auditorium. More information is available here.

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When obtaining services online, buyer beware

I saw a recent police report of a Northland man who stopped by one of our stations to report he'd been scammed by someone he hired from Craigslist. The man said he was looking for someone to do some work on his house and found someone on the online classified site. He met up with a man on October 4, who asked for $250 in payment up front for the work. The victim paid him, but the man never came back to do the work, and he won't return the victim's phone calls.

The internet has opened up a whole new world to scammers everywhere. To keep from getting scammed when hiring someone for a service, it's best to use some tried and true methods. Ask them for references of past jobs they've done. If they're reputable and really want your business, they'll gladly give them to you. Also, you can check with the Secretary of State to see if they're registered as a business and not some fly-by-night scam artist. Here's the link to the Missouri Secretary of State's business search web site.

Many legitimate contractors will ask for money up front to buy supplies and/or secure a deposit (although asking for the entire sum of the job up front is unusual, but not necessarily a sign of scamming). The rub with a lot of these cases is that they're considered a civil matter. To prosecute such a case criminally, we must prove the intent to deprive or deceive without any doubt. In a case like the aforementioned one, even if the two parties had agreed on a date in writing when the work was to be done, and it wasn't done by that date, a prosecutor could consider it a civil matter. So to save yourself time, money, and hassle, do your homework in advance before hiring anyone you find online or anywhere else.

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Get ready for inclement weather driving

A cold day like today reminds us that winter isn't far away in Kansas City. Some meteorologists even have predicted a few snow flakes today. We at KCPD want to help you be prepared for when winter strikes full blast. Check out this video for tips on how you can most safely drive on snowy or icy streets.





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Old Metro Patrol Station being torn down

The old Metro Patrol Division station at 1880 E. 63rd St. will soon be no more. Our goal is to have the building demolished by the end of the year. Built in 1977, it was in such poor condition that the cost to repair the building would have been well more than it is worth. Even if we were to use it as a storage facility, the leaks are so bad that the roof would need repair – which would be another large cost. I’ve heard from several people that the roof has leaked there since the grand opening of the building 33 years ago.

The old station has been vacant since June, when we opened the new station at 7601 Prospect Ave. But we didn’t forget about it. Inside every Kansas City Police facility is a bronze plaque stating when it was constructed, by whom, and who was on the Board of Police Commissioners and City Council at the time. We took that plaque out of the old Metro Station and installed it in the new building. I know the old station had a lot of sentimental value to many people, and we wanted to preserve it in some manner.

Demolition already is underway. The property is being abated right now as crews remove anything that requires special handling – like the fuel tanks that are there. Then, our goal is to have the building demolished and the site cleared by Dec. 31.

The future of the 1.5-acre site hasn’t been decided. It sits adjacent to the city’s Daniel Morgan Boone Park and is next to the burial site of the man for whom the park is named – the third son of legendary frontiersman Daniel Boone. So it has some historical and recreational value. We’ll try to keep you up to date on what will become of it.

The good news is that all the buildings constructed under this current public safety sales tax and the extension just approved by voters are designed to last at least 50 years. Maintenance funding has been built into the tax, so these buildings will serve the people of this city for many decades to come.


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