Pubdate: Wed, 28 Feb 2007
Source: Sun-Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, FL)
Copyright: 2007 Sun-Sentinel Company
Contact:  http://www.sun-sentinel.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/159
Author: Ihosvani Rodriguez
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)

FOR CHIEF, HOLLYWOOD POLICE SCANDAL IS ANOTHER CRISIS TO DEAL WITH IN 
LONG CAREER

A double-cross busted the $600,000 marijuana sting. Undercover Miami 
Beach Detective Jim Scarberry, playing a scruffy drug runner, was 
hogtied and about to be executed when his backup stormed into the 
luxury hotel's Room 1101 and rescued him amid a wild shootout.

Four Miami Beach officers were wounded during the 1985 incident at 
the Doral Hotel, including Scarberry, whose shins were scraped by a bullet.

Now Scarberry, 55, is chief of the Hollywood Police Department, 
looking down the barrel of the latest crisis of his law enforcement 
career. This time, he said, it feels as bad as being shot at.

"I got into this to be a police officer and I never thought I would 
be a police chief," said the lifelong South Floridian. "I certainly 
never thought I'd be in this situation."

Last week, four veteran officers were charged in a federal 
investigation of organized crime and drugs. At the same time, the FBI 
is looking into leaks from the department that prematurely exposed 
the undercover investigation of the four officers, according to a 
federal law enforcement official familiar with the matter. The 
arrests were announced Friday morning at a news conference called by 
U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta. Scarberry said he knew about the 
investigation, but not all the details read aloud by the federal prosecutor.

"As he read on and on, it became more shocking and hurtful," 
Scarberry recalled.

After the announcement, Scarberry gathered most of the department's 
337 officers and staff for a 1:30 p.m. roll call, where he read the 
allegations to the solemn crowd. Scarberry listed the names one by 
one: Detective Kevin Companion, 41; Sgt. Jeffry Courtney, 51; Officer 
Stephen Harrison, 46; and Detective Thomas Simcox, 50. Each is 
accused of providing services to FBI agents posing as mobsters in 
exchange for cash.

Scarberry then urged everyone to get back to work.

"It felt like a funeral wake, and [Scarberry] was directing it," said 
Sgt. William Furguson, a longtime member of the force. "He was angry, 
but thoughtful of the officers' families. That move has won him a lot 
of accolades. He's a cop. He's not a suit."

When Scarberry joined the department in 1999, he was heralded as the 
person who was going to straighten up a department plagued by 
scandals and internal turmoil. Most of the damage to the department's 
reputationstems from a mid-1990s investigation that revealed officers 
had been hired despite criminal records. The department has also made 
headlines over the years with complaints of brutality and of ignoring 
some of the most crime-plagued areas of the city.

Scarberry joined the department after a 27-year career in Miami 
Beach, where he rose through the ranks and worked some of the city's 
more notable cases, including the shooting death of designer Gianni Versace.

Scarberry said he knew of Hollywood's dicey reputation while he 
worked in Miami Beach.

"My understanding of the department was that it had been going 
through some tough times. But after I spoke to a lot of people, I 
knew they had a lot of good people here who could make changes," 
Scarberry said.

Before he won the job, he had to recount a troubling allegation. 
Scarberry told a hiring committee that in the mid-1970s, he was tried 
on charges of grand larceny and conspiracy for allegedly taking money 
from robbery suspects during his rookie year. He was acquitted and 
the record was later expunged.

In Hollywood, Scarberry took over a police department with a long 
line of beleaguered chiefs.

The first police chief, in 1926, Virgil White, became so disenchanted 
with his job that he quit after five weeks. City commissioners fired 
his replacement, George Bausweine, after 21/2 months on the job. By 
the end of 1926, the city had seen five different chiefs.

More recently, Scarberry's two predecessors were driven out by 
scandals and internal turmoil.

Scarberry, a graduate of the FBI National Academy, replaced Rick 
Stone, whose two-year tenure ended with a resignation caused by a 
disastrous relationship with the police union. Stone was brought in 
to clean up the hiring scandal. Sam Finz, who was city manager at the 
time, said Stone did nothing wrong but could not carry on as chief 
given the officers' lack of support.

Before Stone, longtime Chief Richard Witt was fired.

Witt, who maintains he was exposing corruption at City Hall and in 
the department, is heading back to court next month for the third 
time to try to prove he was fired for whistle-blowing. He won twice, 
but the verdicts were overturned on appeal.

Even though many city officials and members of the department remain 
supportive of Scarberry, he has weathered some criticism, primarily 
for his views on discipline.

Scarberry has promoted a number of the officers who were implicated 
in the hiring scandal. He said his decisions were based on the 
officers' performance under his command.

Meanwhile, Scarberry's relationship with some union leaders has been testy.

In 2005, the Broward Police Benevolent Association filed a complaint 
claiming Scarberry unlawfully transferred Lt. Jeff Marano from his 
post at the police station on the sole ground he was a union 
representative and its treasurer.

But even his toughest critics have been praising the way he has 
handled the department's latest blow.

Marano said he thinks Scarberry will prevail.

"He's acted very professionally despite all his mixed emotions," he 
said. "He's the captain of our ship now and we're going to follow him."

Staff Researcher William Lucey and Staff Writer John Holland 
contributed to this report.
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