TAMPA
A former Tampa police officer has been offered an agreement on a criminal charge stemming from an incident where investigators say he rammed the fence of a romantic rival.
The Polk County State Attorney's Office last week submitted a proposed agreement to Lawrence Alspaugh II, allowing him to enter a pre-trial diversion program for first-time offenders.
Alspaugh and his attorney have not yet responded to the offer, Chip Thullbery, a spokesman for the state attorney's office, said today.
Alspaugh, 32, resigned from the Tampa Police Department in January during a departmental investigation that found he had violated several policies. One of those was using a law-enforcement database to pull the driver's license photo of a Lakeland man he considered a romantic rival and posting the picture on MySpace, Tampa police spokeswoman Laura McElroy said.
Alspaugh had been with the department since Nov. 2003. He will not receive a pension, police said.
Alspaugh, who lives in Lakeland, was off-duty in November when the Polk County Sheriff's Office said he rammed the cast-iron fence of Lakeland resident Donald Hardwick with a Nissan sport-utility vehicle.
McElroy said the situation arose because Hardwick had a relationship with Alspaugh's former girlfriend. His being off-duty at the time did not dampen the seriousness of the incident, she said. "Once you pin on the badge, you're always an officer."
In an interview today, Alspaugh said he and his girlfriend, who have a young son together, were still involved in a relationship when he learned she was seeing Hardwick. About two days before the fence incident, he was so upset about the situation he was prescribed sedatives, he said.
Alspaugh said that though he did strike the fence, it wasn't deliberate. "I was driving on sedatives when I shouldn't have been,'' he said.
Alspaugh said he has been unemployed since he resigned. "I'm trying to remain in law enforcement.''
Hardwick provided a description of the vehicle and the license tag to deputies, who stopped Alspaugh a short distance away from Hardwick's home.
In a sheriff's office report, Alspaugh told deputies he had gone to talk with Hardwick, but Hardwick would not open the fence.
Alspaugh also said in the report that his bumper had become jammed in the fence.
The sheriff's office charged Alspaugh on Nov. 20 with felony criminal mischief, saying he caused $1,600 in damage. Alspaugh in December entered a written plea of not guilty, online records show.
Before the department opened a lengthier investigation, Alspaugh had been reprimanded over the incident with the fence, but had no other serious discipline on his record.
He and two other officers received an award in 2004 after they pulled a motorist from a burning Jeep Cherokee in Ybor City, records show.
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http://www2.tbo.com/content/2009/mar/20/na-ex-officer-offered-a-deal/
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