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SCDPS faces ire of council, residents followi
Published November 22, 2009
SOCIAL CIRCLE — A complaint to the City Council has sparked a controversy on the behavior of officers of the Social Circle Department of Public Safety.
Following the Nov. 10 arrest of Heather Elizabeth Foster, 36, of Social Circle, the department is under attack by both the Fosters and members of the Council for the arrest.
“I am trembling, I am so furious,” said Councilwoman Angela Porter at the Nov. 24 Council meeting, after Foster’s husband, Greg, registered a complaint of what he alleged was an abuse of power by an officer. “I am furious about this whole incident.”
Foster was initially pulled over and issued a citation by officer Michael Taylor for running a stop sign at the corner of Annie P. Henderson Drive and Oak Drive. As Foster drove away from the traffic stop, video surveillance from the patrol car clearly picked up Foster yelling a profane insult about Taylor.
The officer immediately followed Foster to the intersection of Dogwood Avenue and Holly Street, where he initiated a second traffic stop and arrested Foster for disorderly conduct.
“I was so embarrassed,” Foster said to the council Tuesday. “He made me get out of the car and arrested me.”
Speaking primarily for his wife due to her strep throat, Greg Foster said this was only the latest in a series of abuses of power by the Social Circle police.
“She was handcuffed in front of our child,” Foster said. “She had dropped one of our boys off at Social Circle Primary School and was taking our 9-year-old son to Social Circle Elementary when they arrested her right in front of him.
“I know people who drive around Social Circle because they’re afraid to drive in this town. People are intimidated by the police here.”
While the Fosters suggested the arrest was a power play by an “egomaniac” cop, video of the arrest shows Taylor remains calm throughout the event and, while waiting for Foster’s husband to arrive for their son, reassured the child his mother was OK and was only going to the police station to answer questions.
Foster, who maintains she stopped at the stop sign in question, admits to the use of profanity but claims she was not yelling at Taylor but rather speaking to witnesses about Taylor after they said she did stop at the traffic sign. Foster grows increasingly agitated on the video, protesting the ticket and accusing Taylor of harassment and wasting resources on a stop sign. After Taylor arrested Foster, she screamed she had a child in the car and protested Taylor’s justification of a single curse word for an arrest.
“She used profanity in front of numerous bystanders, some children, including her own,” said Lt. Scott Ford, head of the uniform division for the Social Circle department. “We’ve had complaints from the school of people running the stop sign, speeding, noise violations in the area, and that’s why we stationed an officer there. The officer handled himself professionally and did the job to the best of his judgment.”
Taylor has no prior complaints on his record. The Fosters had not registered a formal complaint with the department prior to their appearance at the council meeting but City Manager Doug White said the paperwork was pending.
“We want to handle this in a professional manner,” White said. “Hopefully, the process will work for everybody involved.”
At the council meeting, however, Mayor Jim Burgess was visibly upset by the Fosters’ story.
“I regret this happened,” Burgess said. “I think obviously the behavior was pretty gross. This is not the way we want our police department to operate. I don’t understand it.”
Although Burgess has since seen the tape of the incident following Tuesday’s meeting, he declined to comment while the case was under internal investigation by the department.
“It bothers me very much,” Burgess said at the council meeting. “We truly regret it and we will look into this. This is not the end of this.”
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