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2 Pinellas Deputies Suspended Over Traffic Stop

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TBO.com

Published: February 26, 2009

Updated: 02/26/2009 05:34 pm

Two Pinellas County sheriff's deputies were given hefty suspensions after a video camera in a squad car showed they misrepresented their actions in separate reports on the same traffic stop, according to sheriff's memoranda released this morning.

Cpl. Frank Felicetta was suspended for 16 days; Deputy Joseph Miner was suspended for four, the memoranda say.

On Feb. 22, 2008, Felicetta stopped a white pickup truck on Sunset Point Road because he thought the window tint was so dark it obscured the inside of the truck, according to a Pinellas Sheriff's report.

Inside were five people – Milton Bazo, the driver; a woman; and three other men, the report states. Because of the large number of occupants, other deputies were called.

Bazo was arrested on charges of drunken driving and possession of cocaine; he was also cited for illegal window tint, the report says. One of the passengers, Richard Yaskolka, was charged with possession of drug paraphernalia after he was found to be carrying in his pockets a spoon with a cakey substance, plus two syringes, the report states.

Assistant Public Defender Jessica Manuele, who defended Bazo in the drunken driving case, asked County Judge Donald Horrox to suppress all the evidence in the case in part because she believed Felicetta perjured himself in light of what a DVD of the video illustrated in court.

After some deliberating, Horrox agreed there were problems with Felicetta's testimony.

"I do not find Corporal Felicetta's testimony credible in this case," Horrox is quoted as saying in a transcript of one of the court hearings. Prosecutors then dropped the drunken driving charge and the illegal tint charge. In a separate proceeding, Bazo pleaded no contest to the cocaine charge.

Felicetta said in a report that he spotted a small cellophane bag with a trace of white powder inside the vehicle, but the video shows he located it after talking with a passenger in the car. In addition, Felicetta's testimony at the suppression hearing requested by Manuele didn't match his error-ridden report, the memoranda say.

The video was played at the September hearing and also showed Felicetta had made inappropriate remarks, the memoranda say.

There were other problems with the traffic stop.

Felicetta believed the driver appeared to have been drinking, but he did not conduct standardized field sobriety tests or document basic observations of impairment, the memoranda say.

Miner was suspended because he misrepresented his dealings with the other truck occupant arrested, Yaskolka, the memoranda say.

Miner said in a report that he had asked Yaskolka to keep his hands out of his pockets, but the video showed no such remark was made, the memoranda say.

Miner also wrote that he read Yaskolka his Miranda rights from a special card but later acknowledged he had not. He also said in his report that he removed a spoon from the passenger's pocket, but the video shows a sergeant located the spoon and removed it from Yaskolka's pocket, the memoranda say.

Yaskolka eventually pleaded no contest to the charge and was sentenced to a day in jail, computerized court records show.

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