This Texas town has about 250 people. It has 50 sworn police officers.
This Texas town has about 250 people. It has 50 sworn police officers.
KHOU 11 Investigates discovered more than half of the cops in the Coffee City Police Department had been suspended, demoted or fired from their previous jobs.
KHOU 11 Investigates discovered more than half of the cops in the Coffee City Police Department had been suspended, demoted or fired from their previous jobs.
Quick excerpt,
Coffee City’s budget shows the town collected more than $1 million in court fines last year. That came from more than 5,100 citations officers wrote, the most in the state for a town its size according to the Texas Office of Court Administration.
But there is more to this story than a small town writing a bunch of speeding tickets. KHOU 11 Investigates discovered Coffee City is a magnet for troubled cops. More than half of the department’s 50 officers had been suspended, demoted, terminated or dishonorably discharged from their previous law enforcement jobs, according to personnel files obtained through open records requests to other law enforcement agencies.
Those prior disciplinary actions range from excessive force, public drunkenness, untruthfulness and association with known criminals. They include:
- An officer terminated for posting a Facebook message to a citizen: “You should kill yourself, do the world a favor.”
- An officer suspended for smashing a window and entering his girlfriend’s home without consent.
- A deputy constable suspended after a burglary victim’s laptop computer was found in his home.
- A deputy constable terminated for tackling a non-resisting citizen to the ground during a traffic stop.
- A deputy sheriff terminated for slapping a handcuffed inmate without provocation.
- Two officers terminated for lying on their job applications.
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As an outsider, local city based police forces sound like some medieval throwback to me.
That must be a scary town to be stuck living in. Think time FBI step in and disband that police department.
I lived across the inlet on the same lake, about 3 miles from the major bridge that they use to get most their speeding tickets - Between Frankston/Tyler, there's a long 4-lane bridge where they park on either end. There, the speed suddenly drops, directly on the outside of the city limits. There's always at least 2 waiting to get all the speeders coming off the bridge, and there's nothing at the end of that bridge but a Fat Dog Liquor and a closed/burnt down café.
Can confirm, Lindale over here. It brings to mind a little village next to Alvin TX (where the FBI picked up that lady for making threatening calls)- probably the same population...only 2 cops...it's a husband and wife combo...and he's also the judge! Ya learn quick --> not 1 mile above the posted speed limit, and sometimes one under just to play it safe
It's the classic rent seeking example. Like throwing a chain across a river to charge a fee for crossing it.