We don’t need any e-stinking badges…put blue in Martian, professionally spoken in the dialect of high glaze
Behold, it is written. When you ask the folks down at the cop shop for the basic, first page information on an offense or an arrest, they will respond “promptly.”
Our man paid a visit today a month after the arrest of Kristen Parker, assistant District Attorney and frequent flyer in prosecuting DWI offenses.
Brad Wigtil, the Chief of the Baylor University Police Department, displayed his oh-so-professional reluctance to cough up the information.
“We’ll have to agree to disagree,” he said. No prompting needed.
So far, so good.
That was until the infra-dig moment when – brother to brother – our man pointed out to him, “Say, now, fella, did you know you can go to jail for this here?”
The attorneys cannot be charged for the offense of withholding the information.
True story. It’s an offense of the magnitude of – let’s say – a DWI, a Class B misdemeanor – to refuse to let anyone – anyone at all, know that at a certain time, in a specific location, this person known by this legal name, did then and there commit a specific offense, was arrested and charged with the offense, their property disposed of in this manner, and so forth.
It’s all there. The young lady, whose date of birth is redacted, was apprehended at two minutes before closing time 1:58 am, in the 1500 block of James Ave in case 16-0720 on August 13 by Officer J.S. Swanson who cleared by case by arresting her for DWI. No drugs were detected, and she is further identified as the Kristen Kay Parker who stands five feet, 8 inch, weighs 140 pounds and gazes at the world through blues eyes from beneath a helmet of blonde hair. She was in the company of two other persons, driving her silver colored 2012 VW Passat 4-dr Sedan. A third person, whose name is similarly redacted, received her car and left the scene of the arrest driving it.
How do we know?
At the time, the Chief was professional and reasonable about it, saying that the office of the general counsel of Baylor University was in consultation with an attorney named Vanesa Gonzalez from the law firm of Bickerstaff, et. al., and that – well, no dice.
That was then.
Promptly at 5 p.m., he e-mailed the requested information because, well, just because. But it follows that when one learns the attorneys will not face a criminal offense of the magnitude of DWI because of their legal advice, and that he, as custodian of the public record, will – well, that’s when the shoe is placed on the other foot, as in certain medieval ceremonies of great drama teaching moral lessons veiled in allegory, etc.
No one changed their opinion, but, hey, we now have the information we sought.
You are an eyewitness to this news, complete with quotes from the black and white statutes of the Public Information Act:
INFORMATION IS POWER; INFORMATION WITHHELD IS POWER, TO THE THIRD POWER, CUBED AND USED AGAINST WE THE PEOPLE
A previous posting about this matter: