IAPE Evidence Blog

The Jour­nal Gazette, journalgazette.net
BYLINE: Rebecca Green, courts, 260 – 461-8283, rgreen@jg.net

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Whit­ley County, IN

A for­mer Indi­ana state excise police offi­cer was sen­tenced to two years in prison after he admit­ted to steal­ing guns and money from the evi­dence room.

Aaron Bishop, 34, of Fort Wayne pleaded guilty last month to theft and offi­cial mis­con­duct in Whit­ley County Supe­rior Court.

In August, some­one broke into the excise police post in Colum­bia City, leav­ing a note behind to taunt police and mak­ing it appear that the theft was in retal­i­a­tion for police seiz­ing someone’s prop­erty, accord­ing to police.

But police were able to link Bishop to the crime, find­ing evi­dence at his Fort Wayne home. After a three-month inves­ti­ga­tion, he was arrested and sub­se­quently fired from the excise police. Police believe Bishop had an accom­plice but that man has never been named.

On Mon­day, Whit­ley Supe­rior Court Judge Doug Fahl sen­tenced Bishop to three years in prison on each count, order­ing the sen­tences to be served at the same time. He then sus­pended one year of each sen­tence, to be served on pro­ba­tion, court offi­cials said.

Bishop must also pay $13,562 in resti­tu­tion, per­form 50 hours of com­mu­nity ser­vice and pay a $200 fine.

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org

Chicago Tri­bune, Asso­ci­ated Press, chicagotribune.com
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Mer­ril­lville, IN

A for­mer FBI evi­dence tech­ni­cian in north­west Indi­ana has pleaded guilty to a fed­eral charge of mak­ing a false state­ment in con­nec­tion with a scheme in which about $80,000 was taken from a stor­age vault.

The Times of Mun­ster reports 36-year-old Melissa Sims of Low­ell made the plea Tues­day in return for pros­e­cu­tors drop­ping three counts of embez­zle­ment and one count of wit­ness tam­per­ing. She also com­mit­ted to pay­ing restitution.

She told U.S. Judge Philip Simon that she kept money that she had been directed to return to oth­ers. Sims worked for about a decade in the FBI’s Mer­ril­lville office, keep­ing inven­tory of evidence.

She faces a sen­tence of up to five years in prison and $250,000 in fines for the false state­ment count when she’s sen­tenced June 1. 

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org

INDYSTAR.COM, indystar.com
BYLINE: Robert Annis
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Zionsville, IN

Lat­est alle­ga­tions involve mis­use of evidence

Zionsville Police Chief Rick Dow­den is being inves­ti­gated on new alle­ga­tions of mis­ap­pro­pri­at­ing thou­sands of dol­lars of poten­tial evi­dence money and sell­ing a sports car that was evi­dence in a crim­i­nal case.

Sgt. Anthony Emery of the Indi­ana State Police said Fri­day that the inves­ti­ga­tion of Dow­den — which was expected to be com­pleted by the mid­dle of last month — is continuing.

Boone County Pros­e­cu­tor Todd Meyer also con­firmed that State Police inves­ti­ga­tors have asked him to con­vene a grand jury in the Dow­den case in the near future. After they com­plete their inves­ti­ga­tion, Meyer said, he’ll seek a spe­cial pros­e­cu­tor to take over the case.

Dow­den placed him­self on paid admin­is­tra­tive leave last month, after ear­lier alle­ga­tions sur­faced against him regard­ing mis­ap­pro­pri­ated evi­dence and misconduct.

In the lat­est alle­ga­tions, a Zionsville estate bro­ker, Brian McCall, said money he was sup­posed to have received in a vehi­cle deal gone bad is missing.

McCall said he bought a 2007 Nis­san 350 Z and a 2009 Ford Flex in May 2009, intend­ing to resell the vehi­cles locally.

How­ever, when McCall tried to sell both vehi­cles to Pear­son Ford, the deal­er­ship dis­cov­ered the vehi­cles had coun­ter­feit vehi­cle iden­ti­fi­ca­tion num­bers and had been stolen from out of state.

After McCall called Zionsville police, he arranged for a meet­ing with the alleged seller, a man who went by the alias Sean­nacy McNeil, arrived in a 2008 Ford Explorer that author­i­ties said was stolen.

McCall said Dow­den told him imme­di­ately after McNeil’s arrest that police had recov­ered $25,000 from McNeil, but then later told him they hadn’t recov­ered any­thing. Weeks later, when McCall pressed the issue with Dow­den, he was told they’d recov­ered only $4,500.

“I’m out a lot of money from this deal,” McCall said Fri­day, adding that when he tried to recover the money, Dow­den told him he couldn’t have it back because it involved stolen property.

“It’s my word ver­sus theirs. And with all the shenani­gans going on in that depart­ment, I don’t think I’ll ever get it back,” McCall said.

The Explorer and Flex were returned to their right­ful own­ers, but the Nis­san remained with the Police Depart­ment as evidence.

Zionsville Town Coun­cil­man Art Har­ris said peo­ple began see­ing Dow­den dri­ving the car around town.

“He didn’t make a secret of it,” Har­ris said.

Author­i­ties moved to claim the Nis­san as an asset for­fei­ture last year, but before a judge could act on the peti­tion, the car — which was still con­sid­ered evi­dence in a pend­ing crim­i­nal case — was sold for more than $9,000 at an auto auc­tion in November.

Glenn Green­berg, senior pub­lic rela­tions con­sul­tant for Lib­erty Mutual, con­firmed that the com­pany signed over the title of the sports car to the Police Depart­ment but didn’t have any addi­tional details.

Meyer, the county pros­e­cu­tor, said miss­ing a key piece of evi­dence, such as a vehi­cle, could present a prob­lem for the pros­e­cu­tion in such a case. McNeil is sched­uled to appear in court Feb. 17 to face three counts of auto theft.

McCall doesn’t face any charges.

Dow­den also does not face charges, but he is still under inves­ti­ga­tion by State Police and Zionsville officials.

James Voyles, Dowden’s attor­ney, declined to com­ment on the case.

State Police began inves­ti­gat­ing Dow­den late last year, after an unnamed depart­ment employee claimed to have seen Dow­den and a Zionsville police detec­tive take a 50-inch Toshiba plasma TV from police head­quar­ters and load it into Dowden’s city-owned SUV. A search was con­ducted at Dowden’s home in December.

In a probable-cause affi­davit, Dow­den is accused of hav­ing drawn and waved a cocked and loaded .45-caliber semi­au­to­matic pis­tol at a meet­ing with about 12 offi­cers at head­quar­ters last year.

Dow­den, who has served as police chief since 2007, went on leave shortly after State Police began their investigation.

Con­tact Star reporter Robert Annis at (317) 444‑6031. Fol­low him at twitter.com/RobertAnnis.

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org