Monroe County Sheriff Rick Ramsay joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM yesterday morning to talk about what’s been going on in the county.
Seat belts most definitely save lives.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “We’re always on the push to try to educate people. We want people to get voluntary compliance, but seat belts save lives and reduce injuries. A lot of people say they don’t like wearing them. They’re uncomfortable. But once you start wearing a seat belt, and you get used to it, if you’re not wearing it, it’s uncomfortable. So I think it’s really, really important. I’ve been a police officer 38 years, I’ve been on so many car accidents, and I’ve seen them when they did and when they did not wear seat belts. I can assure our listeners, that seat belts are the number one contributing factor to saving lives, reducing serious bodily injury and making it so you can walk away from the crash, versus being taken away in the back of an ambulance.”
Resource violations continue to be an issue and there was also a lobster and drug case combimation recently.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “You don’t generally see this type of mixture of marijuana, cocaine-laced fentanyl and lobster. But one of my officers stopped the car for a traffic violation in the Upper Keys. When the window rolled down, the officer could smell a strong motor of marijuana coming out of the car. Driver did not have a medical marijuana card, which gave us permission under law to search the car. We did find marijuana, drug paraphernalia, THC vape pens. We did find cocaine which was tested positive for fentanyl. It was laced with fentanyl, which we talk about. A lot of people don’t know the drugs that they may buy, marijuana, cocaine, those stuff, a lot of times, is laced with fentanyl. So you don’t even know that you’re smoking or inhaling fentanyl. But also we found six out of season lobster, five of which were short. So it’s unusual to see a seafood environmental case, along with heavy narcotics. But this person ultimately did go to jail for various charges of drugs, drug paraphernalia, fishery violations. Also the person had identification from five different people on their information. So it appears to be this person potentially was doing, or does identity theft, again, five forms of identification from various people’s information. So we think this was a combination of environmental, fishery resources, drugs and identity theft, that this person got his hand in a little bit of everything. So we’re happy to identify him. Get the drugs off the streets, hold him accountable, get him on our radar, and try to send a message to him that he’s not welcome here in Monroe.”
A Key Largo man was arrested Saturday for stealing $2,000 binoculars from an Islamorada residence.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “We don’t see too many thefts from homes. If they do, they’re generally unlocked homes. But yes, binoculars, high value binoculars can be pretty expensive. This was the theft of binoculars. We went out looking for the suspect. In this case, identified him pretty quickly, on a bicycle. You generally don’t see somebody on a $10 bicycle with a $2,000 pair of binoculars around his neck, but we did identify him pretty quickly, arrested him, held him accountable, recovered the property for the owner. Owner was very happy to get those high value binoculars back, obviously.”
Resource violations don’t always make sense.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “Every week you see these pictures of these small, little fish that these people are picking up. It is so disheartening. It’s hard to believe the size of these fish are so small that they keep either spearing, catching and just destroy our environment. So we’re trying to loop everything the sheriff’s office, whether it be on the land, on the sea, on the air, we just have to have our hands in every part of society, try to protect our resources, safety of our citizens, visitors, and hold people accountable. That’s our common goal each and every day.”
Lawrence Wagner with Marvin Key Consulting in Summerland Key, Florida, is a platinum donor to the Florida Sheriffs Association.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “Mr. Wagner has been a good friend to myself and the sheriff’s office and the Sheriff’s Association for years. I’ve given him several plaques in the past on behalf of FSA and the sheriff’s office. It’s always a pleasure to go out and spend time with him, talk with him. Such a good community supporter. He’s one of these guys that if we ever need any help with, anything, I know if I called Mr. Wagner, he’d be there in two seconds. Just a great guy, great friend. I was happy to spend time with him the other day at the Cudjoe Key patrol station and give him his award and talk with him, but we have to highlight citizens who are so integral and just a twin part of public safety. We keep saying together we’re the biggest gang and that our citizens are part of the team, and Mr. Wagner is right there at the top of one of our team leaders from the community, and does so much for us each and every day. We appreciate him, for sure, and we’re happy to highlight him.”
Two boaters were arrested recently for reckless operation and battery, where they apparently tried to capsize two kayakers.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “This is unfortunate. This happened in the Middle Keys. The suspect in this case was a commercial fishing captain. I don’t understand what took place here. This is a very unusual for sure. I actually know the guy, and he’s a good guy, never been in trouble. He’s been around a long time, local young man. He started here in the Keys as a fisherman, but some altercation with a couple of kayakers, a father and a son fishing on kayaks and close to some dock area and the 21 foot boat, for some reason, mad at the kayakers had started circling aggressively at the kayakers. They said they were in fear for their life and safety. At some point in time, the captain put the bow of the boat against the dock to keep it from going forward, trimmed up the engine, and then blasted water from the engine towards the kayakers. So what started this, I don’t know, a very unusual case, definitely not the norm for the captain, who generally, a really quiet, hard working, just goes to work every day. I was surprised to hear his name for sure. The other guy I did not know. But we can’t take anger out and do these type of activities and what was believed by the kayakers was an attempt to flip over, overturn the kayaks, and then, obviously, using the boat propeller to blast high amounts of water is pretty reckless and dangerous, and anywhere near a prop out of the water for people that are in kayaks or close by, is a true hazard. So unusual case, but we’ll see what happens in that one. But again, the things we come across in law enforcement are so wide so vast, that every day is a different day with something we haven’t seen before.”
A man was charged recently after taking a rental boat to Cuba.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “That was a rental boat. It was rented from a location down in Key West. It was only supposed to be used in the area, not used at nighttime, a two day rental. Actually it was filmed by a commercial fisherman who was way offshore, in about 2500 feet of water. When he saw this boat, a small, 23 foot center console, heading towards Cuba in 2500 feet of water. He actually took his phone out and started videotaping it, and his videotaping is saying, oh, there’s a beach weekend Boat Rentals. What are these idiots doing out here? And he panned on the boat with a male, female as it drove past them, and then he panned back on his GPS coordinates to show the depth GPS coordinates of where he was at. Later on, that boat did go to Cuba, it was intercepted by the Cuban border guards who took it into shore, took the two into investigative custody, contacted the US. Authorities, determined the boat was stolen. It wasn’t supposed to be in Cuba, and the male was ultimately sent back to United States by the Cuban government, was not allowed to be there, so they put him on a plane back to United States. I’m understanding the female, same last name is maybe from Thailand, and may not be a US citizen, I understand that she may still be in Cuba, but we had our friends at HSI meet the plane when it landed, we had a warrant for his arrest. The government took him into custody when he exited the plane in Miami, and then he’ll be extradited back down to the keys for the Grand Theft of the vessel. US may have charges for him for going to a foreign communist country without authorization. You have to have authorization for US government to go to Cuba. In 2019 he again stole a vessel and went to Cuba. So this is the second time around that this has occurred. So he’s back in our custody. Nothing good coming from this guy.”