Monroe County Sheriff Rick Ramsay joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about what’s been going on in the county.
Officer Julian Garcia was the recipient of the South Florida PBA Officer of the Year award.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “It’s a big honor for him and for the agency. I was up in Doral on Saturday night and Sunday, with a lot of my team members. We had a big showing of support from our command to support Julian Garcia as he was one of three finalists for the South Florida PBA Officer of the Year for his heroism and his injuries sustained in line of duty. So we had a good event, a beautiful Gala. Really a good showing from law enforcement in South Florida. And Julian got the award for officer of the year. His family was there, his friends. Really an emotional night. I was just so glad to be a part of it, be there with him. He was so happy. I’m just proud of that young man.”
The Citizen’s Police Academy graduated members recently.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “Great event, great program. We graduated 50 something people on Wednesday night at the Marathon High School Auditorium. We want to thank our partners there as well for letting us use that facility. We had a great graduation followed by a great dinner, food, desserts, cake, and then a display from the sheriff’s office. It met its benchmark of what I wanted, trying to have these relationships with our citizens, build these everlasting relationships, create new friends, new partners. It was really an emotional time on stage as we are graduating the recipients, many came up that had built such strong relationship with the sheriff’s office and key individual members were bringing up cards and gifts and trophies and talking about their experience and talking about individual officers that made an impact on them. It was really heartwarming. It really continues to beat the drum of true community policing, true community partnerships and why myself and my team members do this. These are a lot of time, money, effort, but the results pay dividends over and over again, and it’s our part of trying to be entrenched in this community as much as we can to better understand the needs, wants, desires and expectations of the citizens, as it results and relates to MCSO. So again, a really, really, really proud night for me and my team members.”
On Friday, two Key Largo Florida residents were arrested for possession of more than two ounces of fentanyl as well as cocaine and other drugs.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “That was a big case, and fentanyl is one of the most deadliest drugs out there. Just mere incidental contact with your fingers, it can be absorbed in and kill you. We see overdoses these days, we hear about more and more people overdosing, and if you hear about an overdose, it’s almost always going to be a fentanyl related overdose, probably nine times out of 10, some level of fentanyl is what’s killing the people. It is so deadly. We think close to 100,000 people a year are dying in overdoses from fentanyl in the United States. We worked a very interesting case in the Upper Keys. We had a drug dealer and his girlfriend, also a drug dealer, who were working out of a little hotel/motel in Key Largo. They were staying and dealing drugs. We received information. We got our special operations team in there. We watched and saw drug transactions occurring. We were able to arrest the male, female. Initially, hold the room till we got a search warrant inside this room with these drug dealers, with a six year old young lady, a little girl. It was a 38 year old male and his girlfriend was a 33 year old female with a six year old daughter who’s right in the room with all these drugs, where all these drug sales and deals are going on, where criminals are coming in to buy fentanyl. They had 2.3 ounces of fentanyl. That’s enough to kill literally tens of thousands of people. They had 105 fentanyl pills, they had cocaine, crack, drug paraphernalia, digital scales, cash from the drug sales. So we arrested the male and female, both for trafficking and fentanyl and other related charges. We contacted our friends at department Children Family Services to come out for the young lady. They ultimately opened the case. Ultimately turned the young child over to a grandmother. So sad, sad case. This mother should never have contact with this little girl again. That’s not likely the case, though, but just terrible this little girl put in harm’s way of the drugs, to see this going on, be potentially involved in what could be drug rip off, guns, these bad things occurring. When drug deals are going on, you don’t have the best people showing up to buy drugs, a lot of times they’re potentially rip off or people bring guns, so it just enhanced the safety aspect of this. But we’re so glad to get these two crap head drug dealers off the streets, get those drugs off the streets before they can impact our citizens and potentially kill somebody, hold them accountable, get the court intervention in this young lady’s life. Hope that the court can do better to protect this young child than her mother’s been doing.”
A motorcyclist from Lake Wales, Florida was trying to outrun the police in Islamorada last week.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “This started in Islamorada as we attempted to stop a reckless motorcycle with a 27 year old male operating it going southbound. It turned into a high speed pursuit going in excess of 100 miles an hour through the Islamorada area. At some point in time we broke off the pursuit for safety reasons. We continued to monitor and look for the motorcycle. We re-engaged the motorcycle in the Marathon area. It was called in by citizen, it was off the road now driving through a yard around 69th Street. We responded, re engaged. Found the motorcycle and operator who had just struck a fence, and when we pulled up, was going to try to flee again, damaged the patrol car when they went by, a patrol car side, swiping it, an officer with a Taser was able to tase the operator, while he was a slow speed, trying to get between the cars. The Taser work that was supposed to, causing him to come to a halt, fall off the bike. We’re able to secure him, arrest him, tow the bike and stop this threat. He apparently was almost out of gas and pulled off to try to go through people’s yards looking for gas and gas cans to try to refuel his motorcycle, is why he was off on the side streets. But again, the citizens seeing something unusual, suspicious, calling us, helps us to do our job. We don’t get that call about this person who’s on the side street or going through people’s yards or looking suspicious, this person could’ve got away. That’s why we keep talking so much about the relationship between the sheriff’s office and the general public, working hand in hand to combat crime, prevent, deter bad things from occurring.”
A boat struck the Seven Mile Bridge in Marathon recently and four people were helicoptered out.
Sheriff Ramsay said, “It was a tough situation. It looks to be a center console vessel, maybe about 23 feet. I saw a picture of it, just destroyed. Had seven people on board, young adults and minors. Several were high school students in the Marathon area. So range in ages like 15, 16, 17, and then the other ones, like 18, 19, so we’re talking some very young people on the boat, single engine center console, seven people on plane. Operator struck the Seven Mile Bridge. Obviously the boat came to an immediate halt. Everyone got ejected into the boat or out into the water. It was called in immediately by a Good Samaritan who responded to start trying to help, aid and assist, trying to pick people out of the water. The boat then drifted off the bridge, drifted into the bay, until the point that it was almost sitting half on the bottom. Coast Guard responded. Obviously, our friends at the United States Coast Guard does a great job. Our friends in Fish and Wildlife Commission responded. The sheriff’s office responded. So we had state, local, federal on water response, determined very quickly that these were trauma level of requirements for flight to higher level of care in Miami. We determined there was multiple patients. We had to bring in trauma star south and trauma star north. Both helicopters picked up multiple patients. Our aircraft can fly more than one medical patient, so we picked up four trauma alerts on our two helicopters and flew these people to, mostly Jackson Rider Trauma Center to be evaluated and receive treatment and care. The investigation is being handled by our friends at FWC, but again, this is Saturday, during daytime, good conditions, clear skies. At the end of the day, it’s going to come down to operator error is what’s going to be the conclusion of this crash.”