Yet another alcoholic–and enabled–cop
Amazing Antics: Stories of Alcoholism-Driven Behaviorsâ„¢
Story from “This is True”by Randy Cassingham, with his “tagline:â€
Story from “This is True”by Randy Cassingham, with his “tagline:”
“HOW THEY DO THINGS IN FLORIDA: Laurie Primeau, 47, a police academy instructor and 27-year veteran officer in Plantation, Fla., was pulled over for speeding after she allegedly swerved and nearly hit a sheriff’s cruiser. The deputy who stopped her noted two odd things. First, she had an open bottle of whiskey in her car (a training aid for police cadets, her lawyer said later). Second, “I asked her, ‘Where are your pants?’,” Deputy David Alvarado said” she wasn’t wearing anything below the waist; she replied that she didn’t know. She refused to take a breath test and was jailed, but couldn’t get bailed out for five days. She was fined $647 for speeding, lost her driver’s license for 180 days, and was put on probation. In an internal affairs investigation, Primeau swore she ‘does not know how to perform the finger to nose test’ for drunk driving even though she ‘extols her expertise as a DUI instructor,’ insisted she was wearing a swimsuit bottom, and said she did not have any alcohol in the whiskey bottle in her car. Police Chief Larry Massey concluded, ‘You simply may have been too drunk to remember exactly what happened’ and tacked on a six-week suspension without pay, after which she can return to full duty. (South Florida Sun-Sentinel) …On the other hand, sometimes a new career really is in order.”
As mentioned in the Top Story on Mel Gibson’s relapse, for every tragedy”or near tragedy”in the life of an alcoholic, there were plenty of incidents for which someone could have intervened but didn’t. What are the odds that this was a one-time event for Laurie Primeau at age 47? How many hundreds”no, in her case thousands of times might she have come into contact with other law enforcers who could have imposed necessary consequences for her misbehaviors as a result of drinking? Police Chief Massey should know that what he described, a blackout, is a virtual certain indication of alcoholism. Rather than a six-week suspension, he should give her a choice: regular and random blood and urine tested sobriety for several years, or as Randy suggests, a new career.
(Story and tagline from “This is True,”copyright 2006 by Randy Cassingham, used with permission. See http://www.thisistrue.com for free subscriptions.)