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JPZenger

(6,819 posts)
Fri Jun 28, 2013, 07:27 PM Jun 2013

6 Va. Alcohol Agents Surround Female Student, Pull Gun on Her, & Throw Her in Jail for Buying Water

Last edited Fri Jun 28, 2013, 08:11 PM - Edit history (3)

We had heard that the Va. Alcohol Beverage Commission agents had orders to get tough on college students. I guess this is their first big successful bust.

A 20 year female University of Virginia student went into the Harris Twetter supermarket in Charlottesville at 10 pm with 2 female friends to buy some bottled water and ice cream. Here's the account of the Charlottesville Daily Progress of what happened next. The paper says the local prosecutors confirmed the student's story.

http://www.dailyprogress.com/news/bottled-water-purchase-leads-to-night-in-jail-for-uva/article_b5ab5f62-df9b-11e2-81c4-0019bb30f31a.html

Excerpt:

"When a half-dozen men and a woman in street clothes closed in on University of Virginia student Elizabeth Daly, 20, she and two roommates panicked. That led to Daly spending a night and an afternoon in the Regional Jail. ... A group of state Alcoholic Beverage Control agents clad in plainclothes approached her, suspecting the blue carton of LaCroix sparkling water to be a 12-pack of beer. Police say one of the agents jumped on the hood of her car. She says one drew a gun. Unsure of who they were, Daly tried to flee the darkened parking lot. "They were showing unidentifiable badges after they approached us, but we became frightened, as they were not in anything close to a uniform," she recalled Thursday.

"I couldn't put my windows down unless I started my car, and when I started my car they began yelling to not move the car, not to start the car. They began trying to break the windows. My roommates and I were ... terrified," Daly stated.

...ABC agents who charged her with three felonies. Prosecutors withdrew those charges Thursday, but Daly still can't understand why she sat in jail. Agents charged Daly with two counts of assaulting a law enforcement officer and one count of eluding police, all Class 6 felonies carrying a maximum penalty of five years in prison and $2,500 in fines per offense.

Daly incurred the assault charges when she "grazed" two agents with her SUV, according to court records. She drove the SUV past the agents after her front-seat passenger, in a panic, yelled at Daly to "go, go, go" and climbed into the rear of the vehicle to gain space from the men on her side of the car, the records state. The women dialed 911 as they pulled out of the parking lot to report what was happening and ask whether the agents were police officers. Daly said she was planning to drive to a police station."


I have one question - who let Barney Fife carry a gun?

"But Andy, I had to pull out the gun, she had cookie dough ice cream!"









13 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
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JPZenger

(6,819 posts)
2. Meanwhile PA.'s alcohol cops sit in Delaware Liquor Store parking lots wailing to bust PA. residents
Fri Jun 28, 2013, 07:36 PM
Jun 2013

PA. has again starting busting PA. residents for crossing over the state line to buy their alcohol.

It reminds me of what happened when I was in high school - the cops would break up teenage parties and tell everyone they were letting them off this one time, while they put all the booze in the trunk of their cop cars and drove away. "Confiscatin' evidence"

d_r

(6,907 posts)
3. its a wonder somebody didn't get killed
Fri Jun 28, 2013, 07:49 PM
Jun 2013

plain clothes officers jump on the hood of the car, she starts moving the car, its a wonder somebody didn't start shooting her.

JPZenger

(6,819 posts)
5. there will always be good cops, and others who are completely out of control with their authority
Fri Jun 28, 2013, 08:05 PM
Jun 2013

I started listing the number of Phila. cops who were arrested in recent years for serious felonies. It was an exhaustingly long list.

 

AnotherMcIntosh

(11,064 posts)
7. Always?
Fri Jun 28, 2013, 09:47 PM
Jun 2013

I'll bet that even the milk-carrying cop is aware of the active criminal activities of other cops and has refrained from turning them in.

JPZenger

(6,819 posts)
9. If you were seeking "wholesome looking cute college girl" from central casting, she would get hired
Sat Jun 29, 2013, 09:32 AM
Jun 2013

There is a photo on the web of this college student holding an infant. She looks ridiculously wholesome.

JPZenger

(6,819 posts)
11. It took them 2 and half months to drop the charges!
Wed Jul 3, 2013, 03:26 PM
Jul 2013

I just read the fine print. I thought the charges were dropped the next morning. Instead, they were dropped 2 and half months after she was thrown in jail. She had said that she was really stressed out during exams while this was hanging over her head. She is studying for a joint bachelors-masters in teaching, and a criminal conviction can kill a teaching career.

Then again, this incident happened to an intelligent educated white woman whose family could afford to hire a qualified defense attorney. I wonder what happens to less fortunate people in situations when they are faced with authorities that are out of control.

-------------
I predict that ABC will keep delaying their investigation, in the hope that everyone forgets about it. I hope in 4 months, the local legislators demand to see the full results of that investigation.

JPZenger

(6,819 posts)
12. Update: ABC Getting Overwhelmed With Public Outrage
Wed Jul 3, 2013, 11:05 PM
Jul 2013

"if you aren't outraged, you aren't paying attention"

http://www.tricities.com/news/local/article_859e7cc4-e34b-11e2-8061-0019bb30f31a.html

Excerpts:

"The arrest of a University of Virginia student by state alcohol agents who mistook her bottled water for beer has sparked a public outcry.

The Virginia Alcohol Beverage Control's headquarters in Richmond was besieged on Monday with phone calls and emails from the public questioning the way the incident was handled, agency spokeswoman Maureen Haney told The Daily Progress.

"They're calling the governor's office, they're calling our public affairs office, they're calling every office," Haney said. "We're hearing about it on Twitter, they're using our website's email form, they're commenting on our Facebook."

The ABC is reviewing the incident. An earlier review by the agency found no wrongdoing.

--------------
Here's NPR's story on the debacle, which includes a statement from the student:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/07/02/198047492/felony-arrest-of-student-who-bought-water-riles-many-in-virginia
----
Google is showing 324,000 posts about this incident.

----
And here's a very powerful post by a local resident:

"As I read yet another account of the incident, I thought about Alicia Showalter Reynolds who was abducted and murdered 17 years ago on Rt. 29 north of Charlottesville, reportedly by a man who had a flashing police light on the roof of his truck and pulled her over. She went missing for two months until her body was found in Culpeper. The murder was never solved ... the case is still open.

At the time, police advised women who were apprehended by a "police" vehicle to find a safe area before stopping, and were assured real officers would know they were not fleeing.

With that in mind, perhaps ABC officers, especially those working in college towns, should be reminded of the Alicia Reynolds tragedy. "

http://swacgirl.blogspot.com/2013/07/charlottesville-abc-agents-should-be.html

JPZenger

(6,819 posts)
13. Update: 911 Call from Students and Bad Bad Details Released
Fri Jul 5, 2013, 11:52 AM
Jul 2013
http://bearingdrift.com/2013/07/04/exclusive-911-calls-virginia-abc-agent-says-assault-victim-tried-to-run-over-people-witness-says-gun-was-pulled/

http://www.newsadvance.com/news/local/article_598d0822-e57a-11e2-8d04-0019bb30f31a.html

Excerpt:

"In addition to the 911 call placed from Daly’s call, the regional emergency communications center released a recording of another call, this one from a man reporting that he saw “a gun being pulled” ...“They came up to the car swiftly and very aggressively,” he said, of the agents’ approach. “I was close enough to hear and they weren’t saying anything about who they were, just yelling at the people to get out of the car.”

... He said ..he was never asked to give a statement or contacted as part of an investigation.

...a passenger in Daly’s SUV said a man covered in tattoos and dressed in dark clothing appeared to trail the women as they walked to the vehicle. Then a man in a black Volcom T-shirt approached her side of the SUV and yelled for her to get out, eventually drawing his gun during the exchange, she said.

Daly’s front-seat passenger said she was on edge after returning from an event in which sexual assault survivors recounted their attacks."



The brains of the operation - Agent in Charge John Taylor of Lynchburg
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