http://beta.news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout...54649.html

I swear they want us to be robots sometimes.

Seems like a hero to me. To the officers down he must have been an answer to prayer.

Total Horse Sh!t. I can see RU giving this guy the business about not staying in touch with dispatch...but...firing him? You must be kidding me.

Where's the union now?

For some background.. Rice is located at 6400 Main Street. This incident occurred about 1700 Main Street.

That's a bit far "off the reservation" a bit over 3 miles. There are two Houston Police Department stations (including the SWAT HQ) within a half a mile of the incident.

Plus Downtown Houston has its separate HPD Command. Plenty of HPD Officers lots closer to the scene.

There is a Federal Office Building 4 blocks from the incident and the Federal Protective Service were there as well.

Oh wow... :/

(06-07-2011 07:42 PM)WMD Owl Wrote:  For some background.. Rice is located at 6400 Main Street. This incident occurred about 1700 Main Street.

That's a bit far "off the reservation" a bit over 3 miles. There are two Houston Police Department stations (including the SWAT HQ) within a half a mile of the incident.

Plus Downtown Houston has its separate HPD Command. Plenty of HPD Officers lots closer to the scene.

There is a Federal Office Building 4 blocks from the incident and the Federal Protective Service were there as well.

Understood. But how does one know if other officers are responding or not? Sounds like a communication issue.

(06-07-2011 07:55 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  

(06-07-2011 07:42 PM)WMD Owl Wrote:  For some background.. Rice is located at 6400 Main Street. This incident occurred about 1700 Main Street.

That's a bit far "off the reservation" a bit over 3 miles. There are two Houston Police Department stations (including the SWAT HQ) within a half a mile of the incident.

Plus Downtown Houston has its separate HPD Command. Plenty of HPD Officers lots closer to the scene.

There is a Federal Office Building 4 blocks from the incident and the Federal Protective Service were there as well.

Understood. But how does one know if other officers are responding or not? Sounds like a communication issue.

You hear "Officer down at Greyhound Bus Station" over the HPD radio frequency, and you have a response.

Actually the first response was from the Metro Transit Authority Police (who are armed) that work at the Downtown Transit Center that is one block from the incident.

Maybe someone up the chain of command was looking to ditch the guy, and saw this as his/her chance.

We've all been places where valued employees get some latitude when rules aren't followed. Un-valued employees don't.

I think Rice had every right/reason to do what they did ... their statement makes a good case. If Rice officers responded to every call for help (not specifically reaching out to the RUPD) I suspect that Rice would be completely unprotected.

However, this is almost certainly a no-win situation for Rice, in the same way that blowing up a wedding to take out a couple of high value Taliban is not a good PR move for the United States. Ultimately, the message comes down to "our kids are worth more than your kids". RobertN's presence on the forum to validate that notion notwithstanding, it's simply not a good PR move.

Rice statement about RUPD officer

http://www.rice.edu/statement.html Wrote:As a matter of policy, Rice University does not comment on personnel matters. However, out of respect for the Houston Police Department, we want to clarify that David Sedmak was terminated from the Rice University Police Department for dereliction of duty. Sedmak left his post when only two other officers were on duty and failed to notify his supervisor of his whereabouts for nearly an hour, which could have endangered the safety of him, our students and campus.

The Rice University Police Department (RUPD) frequently assists police and other emergency response agencies in neighborhoods near the campus. They include police departments from Houston, West University Place, Southampton, Bellaire and the Texas Medical Center, and the Houston Fire Department. RUPD also conducts cross-training with some of these adjacent agencies.

In the first five months of 2011, RUPD responded 37 times to calls for help from these external agencies. In all instances, Rice officers are required to promptly notify the RUPD dispatcher of their location and the situation, and they have portable radios and mobile radios in their police vehicles for that purpose. All radio transmissions are recorded, logged and monitored by the Rice police sergeant on duty. This enables the sergeant to monitor the situation to ensure that the officer is safe when responding to calls off campus, and also to ensure that enough officers are on duty on campus to protect the safety of our students and employees.

In this case, the Houston Police Department did not call RUPD for assistance. The university is about three miles away from this incident and two HPD stations are within a shorter distance.

We are grateful that the two HPD officers were not seriously wounded and are able to return to duty, and will continue to collaborate with HPD and other area departments in the future to protect the safety of our campus and community.

(06-07-2011 09:46 PM)I45owl Wrote:  I think Rice had every right/reason to do what they did ... their statement makes a good case. If Rice officers responded to every call for help (not specifically reaching out to the RUPD) I suspect that Rice would be completely unprotected.

However, this is almost certainly a no-win situation for Rice, in the same way that blowing up a wedding to take out a couple of high value Taliban is not a good PR move for the United States. Ultimately, the message comes down to "our kids are worth more than your kids". RobertN's presence on the forum to validate that notion notwithstanding, it's simply not a good PR move.

Rice statement about RUPD officer

http://www.rice.edu/statement.html Wrote:As a matter of policy, Rice University does not comment on personnel matters. However, out of respect for the Houston Police Department, we want to clarify that David Sedmak was terminated from the Rice University Police Department for dereliction of duty. Sedmak left his post when only two other officers were on duty and failed to notify his supervisor of his whereabouts for nearly an hour, which could have endangered the safety of him, our students and campus.

The Rice University Police Department (RUPD) frequently assists police and other emergency response agencies in neighborhoods near the campus. They include police departments from Houston, West University Place, Southampton, Bellaire and the Texas Medical Center, and the Houston Fire Department. RUPD also conducts cross-training with some of these adjacent agencies.

In the first five months of 2011, RUPD responded 37 times to calls for help from these external agencies. In all instances, Rice officers are required to promptly notify the RUPD dispatcher of their location and the situation, and they have portable radios and mobile radios in their police vehicles for that purpose. All radio transmissions are recorded, logged and monitored by the Rice police sergeant on duty. This enables the sergeant to monitor the situation to ensure that the officer is safe when responding to calls off campus, and also to ensure that enough officers are on duty on campus to protect the safety of our students and employees.

In this case, the Houston Police Department did not call RUPD for assistance. The university is about three miles away from this incident and two HPD stations are within a shorter distance.

We are grateful that the two HPD officers were not seriously wounded and are able to return to duty, and will continue to collaborate with HPD and other area departments in the future to protect the safety of our campus and community.

Based upon the new information I can see the problem RU had with this situation. IMO though... Unless this guy had prior personnel problems..it still seems to be excessive punishment. I good solid dressing down would suffice. I have a feeling that other things may be at play here with this officer and RU.

Not sure what any of you may or may not have seen on this, but there are a couple of inaccuracies in the first article I saw. The biggest discrepancy is the the article made it sound like he was only a couple of minutes away from campus. The bus station is probably about 2-1/2 miles away from campus, on city streets that share the roadway with a trolley line, and that stretches out the time between the two.

It does seem like an overreaction. But I don't know what else is in the file to set the stage.

Elsewhere (I think on one of the TV sites), I saw a comment that he had been in the RUPD for three years and that part of the reason he joined was to give his kids a chance to attend Rice. He had been an officer for 17 years, I gather most of it in Galveston.

The MORE important issue is that I believe RUPD is a private police force... and not a public one. The idea of officers assisting each other across jurisdictions is not the same.

Not only was it not his responsibility, I suspect it was specifically prohibited for him to leave campus without authorization. While we can look at it and say, well, it was a shooting... "officer down"... and only 3 miles away... exactly where do you draw the line? 1 mile?? Six?

(06-07-2011 11:41 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  Not sure what any of you may or may not have seen on this, but there are a couple of inaccuracies in the first article I saw. The biggest discrepancy is the the article made it sound like he was only a couple of minutes away from campus. The bus station is probably about 2-1/2 miles away from campus, on city streets that share the roadway with a trolley line, and that stretches out the time between the two.

It does seem like an overreaction. But I don't know what else is in the file to set the stage.

I looked at the map, but completely forgot about the trolly line. I used to drive up Main street in the right hand lane, turn my left blinker on, change two lanes, then turn my right blinker on and changes two lanes again without turning the steering wheel. http://goo.gl/maps/tOD8

On the Rice forum, it was posted that the actual drive time was about 13 minutes, per google maps. It makes me wonder if he was on-campus at the time of the distress call or if he had wandered off for some reason.