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When Rich People Complain About Cops, Ray Kelly Listens!
By
Garth Johnston
Published Mar 28, 2011
Modified Mar 28, 2011
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By
Garth Johnston
Published Mar 28, 2011
Modified Mar 28, 2011
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You know a good trick for getting the police to jump to attention when your jewels have gone missing? Mention to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly at a party that the cops don't seem to be doing much to find 'em. That, according to the Post, seems to have worked for Upper East Side socialite Toni Goodale—though it still hasn't gotten her those jewels back.
The Goodales reported five-or-six pieces of jewelry (who's counting?!) worth about $200,000 missing from their safe in January 2010 and little to nothing appeared to happen in the NYPD's hunt for them. So when Toni saw Ray at a party at the end of last year she mentioned it to him, leading the Commish to launch "a wide- ranging internal probe into how [19th Precinct] detectives handled" the case.
And now some police officers the paper spoke to, and Goodale, are saying that maybe Kelly went too far? "It was, 'We want to punish you because the jewelry wasn't found,' rather than, 'We know you did this or that wrong and want to ask about that,'" one detective familiar with the grilling told the paper. And one poster on NYPD Rant said:
Yikes...I worked for a time in the 19th Squad...Great group of detectives and a great bunch on patrol as well (late 90's).....I couldn't stand the politics of the east side socialites, especially as a guy who spent the first 15 years of my career in sh1tholes throughout the city...I actually asked for and received a transfer back uptown...I was already conditioned to dealing with hard core criminals and bitter, untrusting citizens and was happier with them than many of these blue blooded snobby condescending crybabies.
In an e-mail to the Post, Goodale wrote that she "of course, feel remorse that some detectives are now under review. My intent has never been to get anyone into trouble. Just to be clear, I never complained to Ray Kelly." Instead, she wrote, "Commissioner Kelly and I saw each other over the holidays at a party, and I briefly mentioned that I had been robbed. I expressed frustration, but it was not, in any way, a complaint." Her husband, on the other hand, said, "We hired a private investigations firm because we were disappointed in the Police Department's actions. [The cops] have done nothing, it seems to me. If they haven't solved the crime, they ought to solve the crime."
The NYPD, for its part, is defending its actions in the whole thing as just the way things go. According to a spokesman "Commissioner Kelly responds to citizen complaints from the poorest precincts to the richest, and the 19th is not exempt from the bureau's monthly review of 10 to 15 cases in all other squads, some randomly and some based on complaints." Hmm, the way Heidi Jones allegedly complained about the investigation into an "attempted sexual assault" and then got a police escort...and then it turned out she was apparently lying?
Even so, the next time our jewels go missing we know who we'll be calling. But we won't bother to wait almost a year before we give Ray a ring.
Tagged
19th precinct
missing jewels
nypd
Ray Kelly
rich people
socialites
toni goodale
Garth Johnston
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