To Protect and Swerve
A New Orleans police officer has been suspended from duty after being booked with DWI following a May 1 collision with a Causeway Police car on the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway.
Officer Roy Caballero, 28, was driving his personal vehicle north on the bridge about five miles from the Metairie shoreline around 3 a.m. when his pickup swerved from the right lane into the left lane and into the Causeway cruiser’s path, said State Trooper Joseph Piglia. State Police Troop B is handling the accident investigation.
Do I really need to say anything?
Loki, HumidCity Founder
May 8th, 2008 at 7:54 am
While drunk driving is probably not the norm (please say it’s true…) for New Olreans Police Officers, off duty or on, it’s indicitive of a certain Holier Than Thou attitude that seems more pervasive in their ranks of late.
I live next to the 5th District Station, which has entrances on two different one way streets. At first, one would notice offical police cruisers, though rarely military cruisers, going the wrong way on the block up to St. Claude avenue.
Now they roll the wrong way up the street in personal cars, leaving the station after shifts, or even after short visits, as though anyone entering from the right direction were a mere nuisance.
Entering the street myself, I often have to swerve quickly out of the way of an unexpected vehicle, barreling at me from the wrong (and illegal) direction.
If basic traffic laws do not apply to NOPD members while OFF DUTY, how far a leap is it to assume that a few extra drinks is no big deal?
However small & petty this one way street problem may seem, please remember that it’s lawless behavior all the same, and such minor traffic infractions took the life of one of talented neighbors less than a week ago.
Lord David