The Florida Dept. of Law Enforcement (FDLE) this week gave Key West Police Chief Buz Dillon 45 days to respond to allegations that a KWPD Internal Affairs investigator declared a citizen complaint against Lt. Al Flowers "unfounded" without conducting an investigation. The complaint alleged that Flowers lied in court in January 1997.
The FDLE got involved at the request of Key West The Newspaper after KWPD officials refused to respond to questions about either the perjury allegation or Internal Affairs' apparent failure to investigate that charge.
"It's unlikely that Chief Dillon will tell the FDLE `no comment,'" said a source inside the Police Dept.
This story started back on Oct. 29, 1996, when Lt. Al Flowers stopped Rod Macdonald and ticketed him for riding a bicycle at night without a light. He also gave Macdonald a ticket for allegedly failing to notify the Dept. of Motor Vehicles (DMV) of a change of address.
At the hearing on Jan. 28, 1997, Judge Wayne Miller found Macdonald guilty on the bicycle light charge, but threw out the DMV notification charge.
Subsequently, Macdonald (who later legally changed his name to Shahdaroba Rodd) filed a formal complaint with police Internal Affairs, alleging that Flowers, in an effort to make the DMV charge stick, had lied in court about the address he said he saw on Macdonald's license.
In August 1997, Inspector Bob Christensen declared Macdonald's complaint "unfounded." When Macdonald complained to the FDLE, Christensen assured that agency that the allegation had been fully investigated and that it was "unfounded."
But, three weeks ago, when KWTN looked at the investigation file, there was no indication that Macdonald's complaint had been investigated. For example, the primary allegation was that Flowers had lied about an address he had seen when he ticketed Macdonald— but the file showed no contact with the DMV to check out the allegation.
When KWTN asked Inspector Christensen about that, he responded, "No comment."
According to a hearing transcript provided by the State Attorney's Office, Flowers testified in court on Jan. 28, 1997, that he had seen the following address on Macdonald's license on Oct. 29, 1996: 5415 Little Acre Road, Ebro FL.
But this week, KWTN checked with the DMV. According to DMV Public Information Specialist Debra Baxley, the address that was listed for Macdonald in the DMV's records on Oct. 29, 1996, was Star Route Box 7, Ebro. Baxley also said that Macdonald changed his address to the Little Acre Road address in January 1997. That change became effective on Jan. 22, 1997.
Macdonald says that he didn't have his drivers license with him on the night that Flowers stopped him. He says he showed Flowers a state-issued ID card. But, he says, even if Flowers had seen his license that night, it would have had the Star Route address on it.
"When Flowers testified under oath that he saw the Little Acre Road address on my license that night, he just flat out lied," Macdonald said. "What I think happened is that Flowers, preparing for the Jan. 28, 1997, hearing a day or do in advance, checked the DMV records and found my new address and— having no clue that this was a new address— wrote it down, went into court and testified under oath that he had seen that address on my license three months earlier, when he had seen no such thing!
A source inside the KWPD told KWTN this week: "Chief Dillon now has a choice. He can tell the truth about whether or not Christensen fully investigated allegations that Flowers committed perjury— or he can continue to participate in the coverup."