You've seen all the published hype about the "success" of a seven-month undercover investigation into alleged tourist rip-offs at some Duval Street t-shirt shops. That hype was based solely on a warm and fuzzy four-page press release sent out by the Key West Police Department's full-time public relations representative on September 5. The purpose of that press release was to laud the work of Officer Tara Koenig, 22, who was the undercover operative in this case. Koenig, who graduated from the police academy here just last December, is the daughter of one of Key West Police Chief Buz Dillon's former captains in Alpharetta, Georgia— where Dillon was chief before he got the top cop job here three years ago.
But the truth is— and somebody has to say this out loud— this half-a-year-long investigation into alleged consumer sales fraud on Duval Street yielded no arrests for consumer sales fraud! None. Zero. Zip. Yes, there were eight arrests on various immigration and drug charges— but, frankly, that doesn't seem like much of a return on the taxpayers' considerable investment.
Although Koenig's much-publicized term-paper-type report to "top City officials" did go into great detail about how t-shirt scams work, she was, apparently, unable to document enough wrongdoing to warrant any arrests for consumer sales fraud! None. Yet, the Key West Police Department trumpeted the "results" of this investigative fiasco as though it was some kind of major breakthrough in solving the long-running problem of consumer sales fraud on Duval Street. Horse feathers!
We have lots of questions about what Koenig did on the job. Did she scam touristsas part of her undercover work? If not, how did she keep her job? Did she keep and spend the money she was paid for working in the t-shirt shops— along with her salary as a police officer? What was her relationship with the men she worked with and for? How much did this undercover investigation cost the taxpayers? The answers to these questions are likely to come out if and when any of the current cases go to trial. We'll keep you posted.
The Key West Citizen also had questions. But when ex-cop Tom Walker, now a Citizen reporter, asked for a one-on-one interview with Koenig, his request was denied. He was told to submit his questions in writing and the department would respond in writing. In othr words, Buz and his staff would answer the questions, not Tara. To the credit of the Citizen editors, they rejected that restriction.
While we do commend the various law enforcement agencies that were involved in trying to infiltrate what some have called the "Southernmost Mafia", this recent effort was not one of law enforcement's finest hours— regardless what the KWPD's spin machine would have you believe.