By MELINDA J. OVERSTREET
for Glasgow News 1
The man who sent a complaint to the Barren County sheriff alleging that an officer disrespected a veteran during a traffic stop acknowledged after watching a video of the encounter that he was mistaken.
He told the group of fewer than 20 people, including members of the news media and law enforcement officers, who assembled for a viewing of the body-cam footage to which the public was invited that he would be making apologies.
As previously reported, Sheriff Kent Keen received the letter from Royce Bunch Aug. 24. He began looking into the scenario described, which was essentially that someone Bunch knows was involved in a traffic stop, asked the officer for a break because he was a veteran, and the officer told him he wasn’t one one so that didn’t matter to him. The man in the stopped vehicle said he was on his way to the landfill and was trying to get there before it closed.
Keen discerned that the law enforcement officer involved wasn’t a member of his department, reached out to Glasgow Police Department Chief Guy Howie, and requested and viewed the video. Keen posted a response to the complaint on social media Tuesday, and Howie posted his own response later the same day, stating that neither men in the encounter mentioned anything about whether they were veterans. The GPD officer in question, Sgt. John DuBarry, is a veteran himself. Each of the law enforcement department heads said in his own way that the scenario did not happen as described by Bunch.
In Howie’s response, he said that before either Keen or he could respond to the complaint, it was posted on a social media page. He invited the public to view the body-cam footage at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday at the GPD training room “in the interest of transparency and public trust.”
Portions of the image were blacked out at times to protect the privacy of the person in the Ford 4-door pickup truck that had a flatbed, mesh-metal trailer behind it. One segment of the audio, when the truck driver’s license information was being said over the radio, was also redacted, said Carol Wilson, administrative records supervisor for the GPD before the video was shown.
Those in attendance were allowed to make audio recordings and still photos of the video while it was shown, but not to reproduce the video, per se.
According to the video, the traffic stop happened just before 3:15 p.m. June 5, and Howie said later it was along Industrial Drive at the Y intersection. In the video, when he returned to the pickup truck with the citation, DuBarry told the person who was stopped, identified only as Tim in the police chief’s response to the complaint, that he was going 55 miles per hour in a 35 mph zone. He added that the time was then 3:20 p.m. and the landfill didn’t close until 4. “Tim,” before abruptly driving off, said that he had seen online that it closed at 3:30 p.m.
Howie and Keen each opened the floor to questions and answered a few about the details of where and when, and whether the officer did anything incorrectly. They both said the officer had not.
A news reporter asked whether there were any laws that could lead to charges against the person who sent the letter.
“I’m not going to carry it any further,” Howie said.
County Attorney Mike Richardson said nothing had been brought to him in that regard, “and I don’t look at anything unless it’s brought to me, so, if the chief thinks this is the end of it, then it’s the end of it.”
Howie said he does believe there’s an apology owed to the sheriff’s office, the police department, and the public, “and I believe it needs to be a public apology, but that’s not up to me.”
Bunch said, “It will be taken care of, I assure you.”
He acknowledged that he was the person who lodged the complaint, and when Glasgow News 1 asked in what manner he expects to take care of that apology, he said he would personally make it to the sheriff, the police chief and the mayor, “because that’s not exactly the information I got, and that’s why, Kent, I sent it to you, and, if you remember, I said, ‘because I know you will handle it properly.’”
“And it was; it was investigated, because I investigate all complaints in that manner,” Keen said, “and this is what was revealed.”
“Yes, sir,” Bunch said as Keen paused in the midst of that statement.
Glasgow Councilwoman Marna Kirkpatrick told Bunch that because the complaint was made publicly and discussed during a council meeting, he may want to request a place on the agenda of the next council meeting.
Following a discussion about the fact the load on the wagon wasn’t covered, which could have added a charge to the citation, Howie said, “Just to follow up with that, folks, we injure, kill and do more property damage in traffic-related incidents in Barren County than through criminal acts.”
He said the department gets federal funding to perform extra patrols for traffic-related issues, e.g. seatbelt violations and speeding, focusing on places where accidents have happened.
“And we take that very serious. When we take an oath, it’s to enforce all the laws,” he said, and he said they would continue to do that.
As the gathering wrapped up and Bunch made his way over to Howie, GN1 asked him to confirm that he was saying he was mistaken, which he did.
Bunch walked over to Howie and apologized and asked him to arrange for him to apologize in person to the officer, and the chief told him he would try to make that happen.
Bunch later agreed that he was satisfied things were handled properly during the traffic stop.
“Yes, ma’am, 100 percent,” Bunch told GN1 before speaking privately with Keen.
Kirkpatrick, who has been married to a law enforcement officer for 16 years, said before she left that she hoped Bunch would apologize publicly during a council meeting, because she felt the community deserved it, and it was an example of how people should be careful what they put on social media.
She said law enforcement officers have a hard job as it is.
