[Altamont is a quiet little town in the hills of Tennessee. If this little
town has a problem with the seized loot disappearing from police custody,
then we can probably conclude it is happening everywhere. Altamont did a
courageous thing -- they disbanded the police force! Too bad we can't do
that on a national scale! 

Online at
<http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/article/0,1406,KNS_347_2426709,00.ht
ml>

 Leon]

 Ex-officer charged in illegal gun sale

By Associated Press
November 14, 2003

ALTAMONT, Tenn. - A Grundy County grand jury investigating Gruetli-Laager's
disbanded police force charged one of the former officers with selling a
confiscated gun for $250.

District Attorney Mike Taylor said Thursday that Kevin Wayne Keele, 37, of
Tullahoma surrendered on a felony charge of official misconduct and was
released after posting a $5,000 bond.

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The indictment handed up Monday accuses Keele of selling the gun in August
2002, the same month the police force was disbanded, for $250 to a private
individual. Police in Newman, Calif., registered the weapon as stolen with
the National Crime Information Center in 1998.

Taylor said a Nov. 21 hearing was set for Keele.

Neither Keele nor his attorney, Robert Carter of Tullahoma, immediately
returned telephone messages seeking comment.

A state audit after the 1,800-resident town's police force was disbanded
showed guns, cash and vehicles missing from the inventory of seized
evidence.

Taylor said the investigation was continuing.

"The auditors have finished their portion of the investigation. Now TBI
agents are trying to tie up loose ends," he said.

Taylor said the stolen gun was "confiscated in a raid or seizure in Grundy
County." He said it would eventually be returned to its owner.

An audit by the Tennessee Comptroller's Office showed the four-officer
police force did not document what happened to seized money and property
and could not provide proof of training for which they were paid.

The report also said officers could not prove the city had received fines
collected from drug and drunken driving cases referred to county courts.
There were no arrest reports or follow-up records on those cases.

In 1994, city leaders voted to give police a pay raise through a drug fund,
the audit stated. That money was provided by the sale of seized vehicles
and other evidence confiscated in drug-related crimes, according to the
Tennessee Department of Safety.

Gruetli-Laager's city board fired the 21-year chief and his officers just
weeks after Donna Rollins was elected mayor on a campaign promise to
disband the police force. The vote also followed the arrest of an alderman
on a charge of buying a controlled substance without a prescription, a
charge later dismissed.

Rollins said the police force was shut down in response to complaints of
harassment and to eliminate its $106,000 annual operating cost.

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