New Traffic Stop Mounts Tension Between FHP & Miami Police
MIAMI (CBSMiami) - The rumored rivalry between the City of Miami Police Department and the Florida Highway Patrol may be heating up.
CBS4 News has learned that Miami Police officer Tom Vokaty has been put on administrative desk duty while his superiors try to piece together exactly what happened and why on the Florida turnpike extension Tuesday night some time before midnight.
According to two high ranking sources within the department, Vokaty who lives in Broward County and was apparently heading home, pulled over a marked Florida Highway Patrol trooper.
Sources say a conversation ensued and then supervisors were called in.
No charges were filed and no citations or tickets given.
Then both sources say as the incident came to a close Vokaty said to the trooper something to the effect of, "how does it feel to be pulled over"?
That was a direct reference to this incident back on October 11th caught on dashboard video camera when FHP officer Donna Watts pulled a gun on Miami Police officer Fausto Lopez after pulling him over on the turnpike in Broward County charging officer Lopez with reckless driving. She cuffed him and put him in the back of her patrol car until being ordered to release him.
The video went viral and set off a firestorm of controversy.
Miami Police spokesman Delrish Moss confirmed this latest incident.
"We are conducting an investigation into the circumstances to find out exactly what occurred and why," said Moss. "We believe this is an isolated incident and it does not reflect the relationship between the City of Miami's police department and Florida's Highway Patrol as a whole."
These latest incidents come on the heels of this weekend's trashing of a Highway Patrol trooper's car outside his Miami home when someone dumped 5 gallons of human waste on. The investigating into that incident is ongoing.