Orange County sergeant accused of abuse of power terminated
A 30-year veteran law enforcement officer of Orange County is accused of targeting a man, with a past sex offense, for the previous two years. The registrant has a history of arrests for impersonating a police officer.
The LE was informed in late 2020 that the investigation into the registrant for any wrongdoing was going to be closed.
In March of 2021, the LE arrested the registrant for carrying a pepper ball weapon that was in plain view and not concealed in his car. An internal investigation found that the registrant should NOT have been arrested, and the officer has been fired.
I live on Orange County and on have good things to say (so far) about the sex offender registration process and monitoring unit of the Sheriff’s Office. Maybe it’s because the Sheriff’s own brother is a convicted sex offender. Not sure about the reason but I’ve always found the deputies and civilian registry personnel to be professional. That said, I’ve seen the registrant discussed in this article on the news several times. He runs/owns a company that provides motorcycle escorts for funerals. He has been caught on video pulling people over wearing his police-like uniform with badge and pepperball gun. So he’s been acting like a cop even though he isn’t. Two wrongs don’t make a right and it does appear the deputy involved should’ve lost his job for harassment. It does seem the Internal Affiairs Division is on task and I personally would feel comfortable talking to them IF I ever had a complaint, which at this time I dont.
This story’s so confusing that we’ll likely all draw different conclusions from it.
He was pulled over, but he’s in jail, and the officer who pulled him over is fired.
Which tells you that cops are liars, or sex offenders re-offend, or something about weapons.
Sure OK great reporting
Jacob
This guy (The ex offender) has been re-arrested a ton of times but does very little time or somehow gets out of the charges. As far as I know, none of the charges in the past few years have been for another sex offense. He owned his own Funeral escort service but he walks a thin line. He carries what from a quick glance a gun, pepper spray, handcuffs and his motor cycles have real sirens and lights, although the lights are purple.
Although the cop deserved to be fired for having a hard on for the guy, Dewitt himself and put himself in the scope of the law enforcement for aggressively verbally attacking innocent drivers and even pulling some of them over with his fake lights that to some people look very official when combined with his police sirens.
I do not particularly like either of them. The cop makes other cops look worse than they should, and the ex offender has been getting himself in trouble so much that the news also has made him a celebrity in a bad way.
The sex offender part of the story is from his past and the news stirs that up no matter if you got arrested for throwing chewing gum on the sidewalk. The story would read “Dangerous sex offender lose in public terrorizing and vandalizing public property”.
Looks like a gun I meant to type (it is NOT a gun)
It was a BB gun.
I’ve seen plenty of videos of him. He’s a loose Cannon. There’s no need for someone to dress like a cop, carry handcuffs, a BB gun, pepper spray, and ride around on a motorcycle that looks like a police bike if you’re running a funeral escort business. He wanted people to think he was a cop and he had the “tough guy” attitude towards other drivers. He didn’t portray himself to be a dangerous sex offender, but he was a danger to the public nonetheless.
Yay! Some justice! One down and God only knows how many more to go.
May all corrupt politicians, LEOs, and media outlets be exposed for their wrongdoings and be disgraced before the public eye.
I’ve followed this case carefully and though Jeremy Dewitt has makes a spectacle of himself regularly, it’s obvious he’s been systematically targeted for harassment. Not sure if this is bc of his registry status or the relationship he’s created with local law enforcement due to his funeral escort business. Unfortunately, he’s just been sentenced to 5 years in prison for the dozens of arrests he was pending charges on. At east he will get some vindication knowing this LEO lost his job for abuse of authority.
Anonymous
I can just see the deputy now. Removing the word Funeral and just tell the other deputies “Yeah I got a guy out her running an escort service”. He would be telling the truth, just not ALL of the truth.
I ran into cops like that all the time when I was a cop. We use to do search warrants and you were supposed to yell “Police, search warrant”. Instead this guy would tell us all to hide behind the building and he would knock while wearing plain clothes. Someone would say “Who is it” and he would say “STEVE”. Most would open the door and he pulled his gun and said “Police, search warrant” and we all came running.
Back then I thought that was clever even though I never did it. But now I see that is acting as bad as the people you are trying to arrest.
A few months ago, I think I actually seen this on A&E’s T.V. Show (Court Cam). Glad to see that the officer was fired for his unprofessional behavior and Harrassment. No matter if DeWitt brought attention to himself due to his funeral escort business and impersonating an officer, pulling people over etc. Doesn’t give the officer right to overstep his authority. My personal opinion is that the officer harrased DeWitt over his impersonating an officer by pulling people over and being a prick to motorists. DeWitt’s past criminal history might have played a part in the Harrassment. Either way it still doesn’t give the officer authority to harrass and over step his boundaries of law enforcement.
I found the best way to deal with LE is to keep the cell phone camera running. It’s amazing how polite they become when they know they’re being recorded.
I sent this story in because not of his on going arrests, but the fact that a deputy took it upon himself to make this guys life a living Hell. He does seem to get out of a lot of the charges against him or probation but Deputies are not empowered to sentence anyone, regardless of what they think of an individual.
A law enforcement officer can form an opinion about someone all they want, but when they choose to place a vendetta against someone, they have crossed the legal limits of their authority.
I in fact have an opinion about both of them.
The ex offender is very disrespectful to the public and gives the rest of us a bad mark. ( My opinion based on the 100s of videos I have seen over the years about him and his antics)
The deputy was justifiably fired based on acting outside of his authority to purposely try and make someone life more miserable that it already was.
And of course, my 2 cents opinion won’t even buy a gum ball from the machine anymore.
‘Terminated’ should be redefined when it comes to Law enforcement. It should be called ‘Terminally laid off until the Fraternal Order of Police or some other Law enforcement advocacy organization sees that he is re-hired.’ This disgusts me too!!
Rarely is any Law enforcement officer actually terminated.
Some people are just not able to handle authority. I saw it right here in the Brevard County Probation Office. It is important to live an up-standing life and when ‘authority gets out of control’ take a stand.
I never cared about this before. I have done some research the last few days. The best video I have seen about this is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjL3evW5mHk
This article should NOT be of concern for us.