Steve Mensing, Editor with Kenny Lane, former Salisbury Police Officer
♦ Steve Mensing: Today I’m interviewing Kenny Lane a former and highly respected Salisbury Police officer who entered into a wrongful termination suit against the City of Salisbury, N.C. Over a week ago the RFP posted the very revealing deposition of Ex-Police Chief Rory Collins. Readers can read that deposition here on the RFP or download the FREE PDF. document. We believed Kenny was wronged and the Chief’s own words in the deposition bares this out.
Kenny Lane: Thanks Steve.
Steve Mensing: We read the city’s termination process with you and noticed the reasoning for your termination deviated from one day to the next. In Collins’s deposition it appears he agreed that almost everything you’d been accused of being untruthful about was either false or unfounded. His one “reason” was your socalled “untruthfulness” in your memo regarding TASER training which your polygraph indicated you were honest about. Do you believe the incident with the training session was the reason you were terminated? Or was it really something else?
Kenny Lane: Steve, I think it was an excuse to terminate me and not the actual reason.
Steve Mensing: Okay–What’s the actual reason?
Kenny Lane: I believe it was because I attempted to get resolution to problems in the evidence room, on crime scenes, and within the department addressed. No effort was ever made to address any problem I attempted to get addressed and I was frequently told by Collins that I “needed to understand who the chief was” when he elected not to act.
Steve Mensing: Makes sense. What evidence would you share with the public?
Kenny Lane: I took photos of the evidence room which I believe will demonstrate the challenges I encountered. One of the difficulties I encountered was the evidence room’s chaotic condition. It was in extreme disorganization and often the evidence sheet, used to track storage, couldn’t be found. An example appears in incident 2011000063 when the victim came forward to claim property ordered returned by the court and the evidence sheet couldn’t be located. (attachment 2011000063 and 2011000063b)
Another difficulty was that evidence was actually present in the department for which the evidence log showed gone in some manor (ordered destroyed, returned to owner, etc.) One incident involved computers stolen in a burglary, case 2009000081, which were later collected by the SBI to investigate an unrelated case. A computer was located in the PD which indicated it had been returned to the owner. Obviously, if it was present in the PD, it was not returned. I notified Deputy Chief Whitley that the evidence sheet indicated the item had previously been returned, but we actually still possessed it. (attachment 2009000081 and 2009000081b)
Another difficulty I discovered was evidence provided to officers without officially checking it out from the evidence room. This destroys the chain of custody. In this incident an officer took an item from evidence and returned it at a later date. I don’t know what the entire time span was, but likely several weeks elapsed as it was given to him prior to my being ordered to assume responsibility for evidence coming into the evidence room. I attempted repeatedly to get the administration to send out an order to return any such undocumented releases to be immediately returned. The email reads from bottom to top, oldest message to the bottom, and shows the difficulty getting any cooperation locating missing items. (attachment unchecked items)
Steve Mensing: Sounds sloppy. Evidence rooms are supposed to demonstrate pristine order so that evidence can be quickly accessed for investigations and court. No wonder Salisbury has an abysmal record for unsolved murders over the last few years.
Kenny Lane: That’s right. I initially was told I was responsible for the evidence log in. On June 20th I got an email indicating another officer was granted access to evidence, but I could not receive any confirmation on this. (attachment Lingle) I later learned Collins opened the room up to a total of seven people, including himself.
Steve Mensing: That’s an unheard of number of persons having access to an evidence room. Usually its no more than 3 isn’t it? Even in large metro departments?
Kenny Lane: That’s correct Steve. On June 20th I spoke with Officer Brown who indicated he turned in a found wallet and was told not to do a report. During the inventory the wallet was located and Brown was told to take the item and attempt to locate the owner (The owner was known and was at that time homeless.) Brown was concerned about taking the item this way and I advised him strongly not to do so, but to enter it into evidence. I also advised him I would do a department memo as many patrol officers would know the owner and may see him during their patrol. (attachment 2011002304, 2011002304b, 2011002304c)
Steve Mensing: This is concerning. Basically there is a complete break-down in the chain of custody for evidence. You mentioned multiple people in the room. That’s a bad idea. And would the chief normally be in the chain of custody?
Kenny Lane: It’s a bad idea for accountability Steve. Obviously, the less people with access to the evidence the more accountability. Initially there were two employees with one supervisor who had access. It’s unimaginable for the chief to have access. Normal response to suspected theft from a secured unit is to suspend everyone with access while an investigation is conducted. In the event of a problem, it’s imperative the chief not be in the chain of custody so he would not be classified as a suspect. Collins’s entire command staff was included in the chain of custody. Every case had the potential for a defense attorney to close the administration down by demanding all people in the chain of custody be available for court. Any investigation of improper evidence handling would necessarily shut the entire command structure down if conducted properly since each had access. I was told “I’m the chief, I don’t answer to you” when I tried to address this.
Steve Mensing: This was done by the same chief who admitted to twice daily use of the powerful narcotic pain killer Oxycotin in his deposition?
Kenny Lane: Right. It certainly looks bad doesn’t it? And the evidence room itself was a shambles. Policy wasn’t being followed on storage, items were placed randomly and paperwork lost or found outside it’s assigned area. Complete chaos. And a man consuming an major opiate in the same league with uncut heroin.
Steve Mensing: Would it be possible for narcotics to be removed from the evidence room? Especially with 7 “officers” possessing keys to the same area? Sounds like major mismanagement. It also sounds like a lot of attorneys might be chomping at the bit to have their clients cases overturned on appeal. There is a very strong possibility of altered and missing evidence in such a mismanaged evidence room. Let’s hope the city hasn’t opened itself to a tidal wave of suits they are powerless to defend against. Such legal events have occurred before in other badly mismanaged police departments in the United States. Hate to see the streets of “historic” Salisbury teaming with newly released killers and felons…especially when the SPD is so grossly understaffed. Do I hear the advancing trumpets of the “Innocence Project” as they descend on the Bury?
Kenny Lane: I guess anything’s possible if you’re playing Russian Roulette with your evidence room. I located narcotics outside their assigned area, including carelessly tossed on the floor. I can’t state how that got there, or why, but I documented it and it was ignored.
Steve Mensing: When you say you documented it, you mean you sent a memo or told someone in the command staff?
Kenny Lane: Right and because of the hostile reaction I got, I also photographed the problems. I turned this in and kept a copy for myself as I strongly felt the copies I turned in would “vanish”.
Steve Mensing: Did you retain those photos? Our readers might curious to see evidence room disorganization.
Kenny Lane: I’ve got 96 photos. If you’d like to take a look at them you’re welcome to do so.
Steve Mensing: Increasing the number of persons with access to the evidence room certainly does seem to be an extremely poor decision. It diminishes accountability in a large way and increases the opportunity for either misconduct or errors. Did you have any other concerns about the people former chief Collins allowed access to the evidence room?
Kenny Lane: Yes, I did and attempted to address this with Collins, but was ignored. Sheila Lingle was given access to the evidence room. Several years back we had a shooting at Catawba college where shots were exchanged between students from Catawba and students visiting the campus from another school. This scene was processed by LaVell Lovette. She was a lieutenant with Salisbury at the time and left shortly after to accept the Chief’s position with Elon, NC. The SBI also assisted with the investigation. When the trial came up Lingle presented a crime scene sketch of the incident which was not the original Lt. Lovette had submitted. The second sketch had been changed from the original sketch and was presented as the original. The DA, Bill Kenerly at that time, elected not to pursue charges against Lingle for this which I totally disagreed with. I explained this to Collins and stated both Chief Lovette and the SBI agents, who assisted with the scene, could verify this, but he stated “it happened years ago, it’s not important” and made no effort to contact anyone. As far as I am aware Lingle still possesses access to the evidence room despite the fact she substituted evidence in a case.
Steve Mensing: Not a good idea. Recently it was established Collins was taking oxycotin at that time. What problems might that cause?
Kenny Lane: When the narcotic use is considered along with the reluctance to have a complete inventory whenever an employee was given access or access was surrendered it looks strange. These were deliberate steps taken to decrease accountability. Why, when I insisted Lt. Armour and myself be treated as a suspect and removed from the evidence room until an investigation and inventory was complete, did he refuse to remove us? Was it just muddled, incompetent leadership? Or did he not want an accurate forensic audit? If not, why? Obviously, considering what was discovered about his narcotic use, questions may arise about the security of narcotics in the evidence room. Questions likely will arise as to whether anyone may have stolen narcotic evidence, or even substituted placebos (sheet rock powder for cocaine, aspirin for oxycotin tablets, etc.) for evidence scheduled for destruction. No checks are made to determine what a substance is after that’s already been tested and ordered destroyed. There’s no way to answer those questions now because of his decisions. Were they merely incompetent choices? Or did he want those questions to remain unanswerable? Either way, it’s a nightmare for accountability.
Firearms outside the assigned firearms cage. Policy directs firearms, drugs/suspected drugs, and money and jewelry all be stored in separate secured sections of the evidence room. Photo 28 displays an evidence log sheet in the upstairs security room which should be in the downstairs lockers.
Evidence room. Picture 4 and 6 show evidence related to case 2004000147, including a fresh printed evidence label. Picture 87 shows these belong to a closed homicide case. I can not explain why these items were separate from the rest of the case or why a fresh label would have be on the printer.
Photos 78 and 79 show green vegetable material (suspected marijuana) stored outside the assigned drug storage area.
Photos 11, 12, 13. A bag of suspected drugs located in the floor near the “burn barrel”. This barrel is used for the destruction of property court-ordered to be destroyed. Drugs/weapons should be secured separately and not put in the barrel for destruction until the day they are taken to the incinerator. I can’t explain why suspected narcotics would be on the floor outside the secured narcotics area.
Photos 82 – 84 show empty rifle cases for firearm transportation to/from court and long term storage items from homicide. There was a box containing two pistols lying on this case which should have been inside the weapons storage section. No explanation of why these items were here.
Photo 21 is a crowbar with evidence labelling missing. No idea what incident this is associated with as the tag was gone.
Photo 23 is two safes used for storage of narcotics that were not secured.
Photo 40 is the firearms storage area (secured and locked apart from other items) And to the left is the safe for storage of jewelry and money. Firearms should have all been inside this secured area.
