Prostitution
Inquiry Is Latest Scandal for State Police
Its revelation this week that it had suspended three
troopers amid a prostitution investigation produced the most recent suggestion
of tarnish.
“It’s very disheartening for the rank and file to go through
that, especially since the last couple years we have been splashed across the
news pages quite a bit,” Thomas H. Mungeer, president of the Police Benevolent
Association of the New York State Troopers, said.
In the most recent case, Trooper Titus Taggart, an 18-year
veteran assigned to Buffalo, is at the center of an internal investigation and
has been suspended without pay. He is “alleged to have organized parties that
may have involved the promotion of prostitution, while off-duty,” the agency
said in a statement. Two troopers from the Rochester area, Jeremy C. Smith, 34,
and Michael L. Petritz, 33, were also suspended without pay for alleged
misconduct, but were not accused of being involved in organizing the parties.
People with knowledge of the investigation, who insisted on
anonymity because the investigation was ongoing, said that Trooper Taggart, 41,
moonlighted as a party promoter and that the participants in his parties
included exotic dancers from Canada, some of whom may have engaged in
prostitution. The State Police, prompted by a tip, had been investigating
Trooper Taggart since December.
The Times Union of Albany, which first reported the
suspensions, posted a number of photos from Mr. Taggart’s Facebook page on its
Web site, including a picture of him posing out of uniform with a large bottle
of expensive liquor.
State Senator Patrick M. Gallivan, an Erie County Republican
who is a former county sheriff and State Police captain, said: “It’s certainly
disappointing that the negative actions of an individual adversely affect an
entire agency — one that is among the most professional in the nation. But to
the State Police’s credit, they’re not avoiding an investigation; they’re fully
engaged.”
Trooper Taggart could not be reached for comment. His
father, Art Taggart, was once a colonel in the State Police and a top aide to
former Superintendent Thomas A. Constantine.
“The father is a real decent, very religious guy, very
dignified man. He’s got to be crushed,” Mr. Constantine said, adding that he
did not know Trooper Taggart. He said the latest case was markedly different
from others that produced scandals at the agency.
“This isn’t systemic behavior at a very high level — it’s
troopers with very limited policy responsibility,” he said. “It’s individual
wrongdoing.”
Most of the other recent State Police scandals have revolved
around the leadership and its intersection with the governor’s office, which
has direct control of the agency.
During the administration of Gov. George E. Pataki, a top
commander, Daniel Wiese, had troopers performing unusual assignments, including
investigating a break-in at Mr. Pataki’s campaign headquarters and guarding the
baseball star Darryl Strawberry when he was hospitalized, according to a report
prepared by Andrew M. Cuomo, who was then attorney general and is now the
governor. Mr. Wiese left the State Police to join the state Power Authority,
but kept his shield and gun and maintained considerable sway over the agency.
During the administration of Gov. Eliot Spitzer, a scandal
erupted when the State Police prepared documents detailing the travels of the
governor’s political rival, Joseph L. Bruno, who was then the State Senate
majority leader. And, after news broke that Mr. Spitzer had patronized
prostitutes, questions were also raised about what his security detail had
known of his behavior.
Shortly after Gov. David A. Paterson took office in 2008, he
claimed there was a rogue political unit within the State Police, and asked Mr.
Cuomo to investigate. But Mr. Paterson’s administration became embroiled in its
own scandal after his State Police security detail contacted a woman who reported
that one of the governor’s senior advisers had assaulted her. The woman,
Sherr-una Booker, said at a court proceeding that she felt harassed.
After Mr. Cuomo became governor, he brought in a new
superintendent from outside the agency, Joseph A. D’Amico, who had been his
chief investigator in the attorney general’s office and a deputy chief in the
New York City Police Department.
Senator Eric Adams, a Brooklyn Democrat and a former New
York City police officer, gave Mr. D’Amico high marks.
“I think he has a zero tolerance level for something like
this,” Mr. Adams said. “Sometimes you hear someone say they’re conducting an
investigation and it goes nowhere, but you’re not going to hear that from him.”
But Assemblyman Micah Z. Kellner, a Democrat from Manhattan,
said he believed that the State Police needed more independent oversight. He
has introduced legislation that would set up a civilian complaint review board
to oversee all police and peace officers who work for the state, including
troopers. “Every time a police force is unaccountable to a third independent
party,” he said, “it’s a recipe for corruption.”