10/11/07
Fake Cop
Impersonator is still on the loose
By Eric Goold

Local law enforcement officials are looking for a man who posed as a police officer during a traffic incident on I-95 last Thursday, Oct. 4.

Driving in a dark blue or black Ford that had no tags, the male suspect pulled over and then threatened the driver of a vehicle that had passed him on the highway.

Sheriff Keith Josey said on Tuesday evening that the suspect is still at large.

“There have been no new developments since the incident,” said Josey. “In fact I spent most of Saturday driving up and down the Interstate, checking the exits, but we haven’t seen the car or anything that looks like it.

“Since the car had no tags, we have no way of knowing where he’s from,” added Josey. “But we have to assume he’s from the area and keep constantly checking.”

The incident occurred on I-95 North between mile markers 108 and 110 in Summerton after 1 p.m. According to the police report the victim was a female, not a resident of Clarendon County, whose name was not released.

The woman was traveling near the 108 exit when she had to pull over in the left lane to pass a slower car in the right lane. She looked at the driver of the slower car as she passed and he looked at her.

Seconds after passing the car and pulling back into the right lane, the woman looked in her mirror and saw a small blue light flashing on the roof of the car behind her and the headlights were flashing as well. She pulled over and stopped.

A man got out of the car and approached her driver’s side window, which he tapped on the glass with a black flashlight. The woman rolled down the window approximately four inches.

She thought the man was a police officer until he asked her to get out of her vehicle without asking her for her driver’s license and vehicle information.

She asked him what had she done. When she said that, the suspect said he could shoot her through the door. The woman responded that she would shoot him, and then she leaned over the front seat to retrieve her cell phone from her purse.

The suspect then stepped back from her vehicle, told her to stay in the car and that he would call for backup to arrest her. He ran back to his own car and drove away, narrowly avoiding getting hit by an oncoming truck.

The woman followed the suspect to the 115 exit, where he got off I-95.

Sergeant Ralph Roberson from the Clarendon County Sheriff’s Department met with the woman at the Shell Station on the Paxville Highway exit 119 and took her statement.

She told the officer that the suspect was a black male wearing blue jeans, a tan green shirt and a plain dark baseball cap. The shirt had no patches with two stripes and no badge. The car was a mid-1990’s Ford, dark blue or black with a short antenna in the middle of the trunk and no vehicle tags.

Anyone with information about the suspect or the traffic incident is urged to call the Sheriff’s Department at 435-4414, or preferably, 911 for 24-hour service.

If a citizen gets pulled over and suspects that someone might be trying to impersonate a police officer, Josey said to make sure you check the vehicle following you and get to a well-lit area.

“What they can do to protect themselves anytime they are pulled over by a patrol car is look at the vehicle,” said Josey. “The Highway Patrol of course has the grey-silver cars with the blue stripe. We have white cars with blue stripes. We only have one car that’s unmarked that fits the description, and it’s unlikely that you’ll get pulled over by an unmarked car with a small blue light.

“With few exceptions, our marked cars have lights mounted on the roof and in the dash,” said Josey. “If you’re not sure it’s a police officer you’re stopping for, cut on your interior light and motion him to follow you to the next exit or interchange. Go to a well-lighted area, especially if it’s at night. In the meantime, if you can, call 911 on your cell phone and check to make sure a peace officer is looking for someone in your area. Then you’ll know for sure.”