Monroe County Sheriff Rick Ramsay joined Good Morning Keys on Keys Talk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about what’s going on in the county.
A Key Largo man was arrested last week for recklessly driving an ATV.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “All Terrain Vehicles are designed for one thing, that’s to be off road, and dirt and whatnot, and have fun, but they’re not designed to be on the road for a lot of reasons. They’re unsafe. We can’t have these things on the highway, so when we see these things, we try to deal with them, but let alone riding wheelies. They have different tires, which are not designed for pavement, so they don’t operate well. They tend to float and kind of move around. So this individual is wanting to show his ass and riding a wheelie and operating this illegal vehicle, non-registered vehicle on the highway, and it’s kind of stupid, you’re not supposed to be there in the first place, but then you’re out there drawing attention to yourself, looking for attention. So, I always tell people, if you want attention, we’ll give you all the attention you want. So, we did come across this individual, we did stop him, he was non-compliant with trying to identify himself. Ultimately, we did arrest him for multiple charges, and keep sending the message: just follow the rules, just do what you’re supposed to do. We’ve got better things to do. We don’t want to ruin people’s days, but these are unsafe, and again, they’re not designed for the highway, and it’s a danger to the general public as well as operating these ATVs, so we don’t have too many ATV issues going on in the Keys. Thank God. Some other jurisdictions have them all the time, but occasionally, like this, they do pop up.”
A man from the mainland was spear fishing in the National Marine Sanctuary Preserve area off Plantation Key recently and was given a mandatory mandatory notice to appear.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “This is in the sanctuary, the protected no take zone, and again, this was a 46 year old male from Hialeah with some other people on the boat. As my patrol officer pulled up, the boat was tied off to the mooring buoy, which clearly said on the mooring buoy, no fishing or lobstering, and we had individuals on the boat with fishing rods fishing from the boat, as well as the owner in the water with a spear gun, spear fishing, so when we got them all together, the owner identified that it was his boat, but said he didn’t know that it was a no fishing area, which again is hard to believe, because you’ve got to come up and tie off to the mooring buoy and right on the mooring buoy is no fishing, plus all your navigational charts, your GPSs, you can’t be ignorant of the law, but here clearly it wasn’t ignorance and a law, it was someone who was just lying.”
A man threatened deputies with a hammer in Key Largo recently.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “It just goes to show some of the crap we’ve got to deal with. It was the wee hours of morning, 7:30, this guy’s acting strange, going down the street with a hammer, flipping people off, bizarre. We get calls. We respond, the person’s non-compliant, combative, aggressive, has the hammer, racial slurs, threats to officers, threats to crack their head open with the hammer, refusing to identify himself, giving false information. So, eventually, we did arrest him, but those are dangerous situations. Someone with a hammer who’s not stable, things can go really south really quickly. My officers used good discretion to try to deescalate the situation and try to do what they can to make sure no one gets hurt, but we did get him medically cleared and took him to jail on a slew of charges. Again, it’s a difficult, challenging job to be a police officer anywhere, because these unexpected people show up that sometimes are high on alcohol, drugs, mental illness, other related stuff, which makes it that much more scary. So, good job by my teams. We always appreciate the general public calling us when they see unusual circumstances, suspicious activities such as this, so we can get out there right away and assess and deal with it, de-escalate, or take the appropriate action to stop the threat to the general public.”
A man in the Publix in Marathon had a knife and followed customers around the store or out to their vehicles for unknown reasons recently.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “He was clearly making an unsafe environment for everyone at Publix, making people scared or concerned. He wasn’t there clearly to go shopping. He was clearly acting bizarre, had a knife strapped to a sheath on his belt and was just following people around the store, acting strange, and sometimes if people would leave the store, he’d follow them out, and again they were freaked out. One person ran from this individual as he continued to follow him. We did get called, we did come out with this individual who continued to act bizarre and strange and not identify himself, and was a clear present threat, so he was ultimately arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, and a few other related charges. So again, we see people that just are not, for whatever variety of reasons, acting normal, whether it be mental illness, alcohol, drugs, or combinations therein, is just not uncommon, but those type of scenarios make it really dangerous, because people are so unpredictable. Sometimes it’s dangerous to be a law enforcement officer, even in a community like ours, which is one of the best, safest places to live, work, and play. It is such a safe community, but even safe communities, we have people that do stupid stuff or act in bizarre manners.”
Last week, a man exposed himself to passing traffic on US 1 around 9:28 in the morning in the Upper Keys.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “This past week, there was a lot of strange, bizarre people acting in a strange manner. This is a 49 year old male from Mount Dora, who was around the 106 mile marker on side of the road during daytime, and we were getting calls about this person as motorists are going by, kept dropping his pants and exposing himself to the general public, so we responded real quickly, as our response time is so fast, and we did come across this male who was less than cooperative with law enforcement, and ultimately we did have to arrest him for disorderly conduct and other related charges, and try to get him off the streets, and take him from exposing himself to the public and acting in this bizarre manner. So, generally, it has been an unusual week for bizarre behavior between the guy with the hammer, the guy in the PUblix, the exposing himself. We’ve been on a roll with some idiots.”
A private plane crashed at Key West International Airport last week. Luckily there were no life-threatening injuries.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “We do have a law enforcement detachment at the airport full time. We had a small private aircraft, I think a small little piper, single engine, two passengers on board were trying to take off. The aircraft took off, and just as it started ascending, lost power, and they were about 200 feet up. They lost power and came down obviously quickly, and wound up crashing into the mangrove area at the end of the airport. So it did a lot of damage to the aircraft. The aircraft was probably destroyed, but better off is that two people on board did get out relatively uninjured, a few cuts and bruises, more shaken up than anything. So obviously we’re glad that if you lost power, you lost it just as you just took off and you have ability to land somewhere relatively safe. Fire rescue, police, sheriff’s office were there right away to assess the situation, render aid, and then it was turned over to FHP and NTSB, National Traffic Safety Board, does the investigation. Initial investigation on airport plane crashes are generally done by Florida Highway patrol. We continue to strive to do the best we can to keep this community one of the best places ever to live, work, and play. We hope that we are meeting the expectations.”