Brinkley Mayor Billy Hankins said he won't pursue an investigation of the city's police chief for excessive speeding because the mayor didn't witness the Oct. 21 traffic stop in Clarendon and those at the scene could have been joking when they said Chief Ed Randle was clocked on radar going 107 miles per hour in his Ford F-150 pickup.
Randle wasn't issued a citation.
"Everybody was laughing and carrying on," Hankins said, referring to Arkansas State Police dash-camera video and audio of the traffic stop. "Was that a joking matter or a true fact? I don't know that it was a true fact. ... I can't go by the video and say all the comments on there were factual because I don't know. Everybody was laughing on there, so I can't say that the comments were not made in a joking manner."
Randle was stopped by state Trooper Charles Williams, who was assisting a Brinkley police officer named Spencer.
When a reporter called Brinkley police and asked for Spencer's first name, the person who answered the phone said, "Sir, we can't give out that kind of information."
Randle was unavailable for comment Monday and Tuesday and didn't return messages on those days. But Randle did return a message on Nov. 28, and in a brief telephone interview, he refused to give the name of the officer who initiated the traffic stop.
On Nov. 2, Hankins sent a letter to Deputy Prosecuting Attorney J. Baxter Sharp III asking for an investigation.
Sharp responded with a letter Nov. 28 saying he can only do investigations for criminal matters.
"Any concerns you may have related to the city's policies or ethical issues will have to be addressed by someone else," Sharp wrote. "The actions of the chief on Oct. 21, 2016, fall largely in the area of officer discretion for those officers who came into contact with him on that date."
Sharp also mentioned "Officer Spencer" in his letter to the mayor.
There were three potential areas of "recourse," Sharp wrote:
• The state trooper could write Randle a speeding ticket.
• Officer Spencer could file an affidavit saying he saw the chief speeding in Clarendon, which is 16 miles south of the officer's jurisdiction in Brinkley.
• Or Randle could "self-report" for charges to be filed.
Bill Sadler, a spokesman for the Arkansas State Police, said Williams didn't have Randle on radar so he wouldn't be the one to issue a citation.
"It was the Brinkley officer who had the radar lock on the truck, not the state trooper," Sadler said in an email, noting that the Brinkley officer arrived about five seconds after the trooper stopped Randle's pickup.
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The traffic stop occurred on Arkansas 302 near Baptist Grove Church in north Clarendon.
In the video, Williams makes a U-turn when he meets a red pickup and pulls the vehicle over. Signs indicate the speed limit along that stretch of the highway is 45 mph.
Williams can be heard laughing as he approaches Randle's pickup on foot.
"Where are you going so fast?" Williams asks.
"To call a game in Clarendon," Randle replies.
Williams points at a vehicle that pulled up behind his.
"Look, this guy right here has been following you for miles going 100 miles an hour," Williams tells Randle. "He called the state police."
Officer Spencer approaches Randle's vehicle, and the laughing police chief says to him, "I know you didn't call the d*** state police!"
"No! I didn't have your plates so I didn't go over [the radio with the tag number]," the Brinkley officer says to his chief. "I was like, 'This guy's rolling!' I was, 'He's doing 112 right now!'"
"My truck won't go 112," Randle tells the officer.
"I had you locked in at 107," the officer responds, apparently referring to radar.
"It won't do 107," the chief says. "It'll go 95."
"I had you locked," says Spencer. "Seriously, I got you locked in at 107."
One of the two men talking to Randle says, "I was running 90 and you were pulling away."
"I'll have to have my speedometer checked," the chief says. "It won't go but 95."
The officer and the trooper walk away from Randle with all three men laughing. One says, "See you later."
The entire traffic stop took about one minute. The men laughed periodically during their brief encounter.
Metro on 12/07/2016