Numerous incidents’ on cop’s record
By John Zaremba
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Lawyers for President Obama’s illegal alien half-uncle are going after the beat cop who busted him on a drunken-driving rap, chasing internal affairs records they hope will paint him as a serial squad-car speeder.
Onyango Obama never would have been stopped and subjected to a breath test, which lawyers also are contesting, if it weren’t for the cop’s bad driving, his lawyers insist.
“It will be our contention that the officer nearly caused the accident by nearly hitting Obama,” defense attorney William L. Harvey III told the Herald, saying he believes patrolman Val Krishtal was going “well above the speed limit” at the time of the near-crash.
Obama’s attorneys said they want Framingham cops to cough up a paper trail on Krishtal, who, according to his own police report, nearly rear-ended the commander-in-chief’s long-lost relative before making the Aug. 24 stop heard ’round the world.
“What’s at issue is obviously the police officer’s course of conduct with regard to his speed, especially on that day he pulled Obama over,” Harvey said. “We’ve learned that there have been numerous incidents in Framingham with regard to his driving pattern as a police officer.”
The records request is part of the defense’s attempt to show Krishtal lacked probable cause to stop Obama — a contention that, if the court were to agree, could lead to the charges being dropped.
In an e-mail to the defense team last week, Middlesex prosecutors disclosed a Nov. 22 crash in which Krishtal, en route to a report of shots being fired, smashed his cruiser into a stone wall. That same email alludes to “numerous incidents investigated by the Framingham PD over the past several years involving Officer Val Krystal (sic) and the operation of a motor vehicle while on duty.”
Framingham Deputy Police Chief Craig Davis confirmed that police are reviewing Krishtal’s on-duty driving history, but said he lacked specific information on those incidents and referred further questions to Police Chief Steven B. Carl. Carl could not be reached yesterday.
“Chief Carl is looking into the matter and, I guess, has discovered a bunch of them,” Davis said.
Krishtal, 44, has a valid license and, according to Registry of Motor Vehicle records, has not been cited for a traffic offense since 1989. He declined to comment yesterday.
Obama’s August drunken-driving arrest brought to light his history as a 20-year immigration fugitive who had been living quietly and holding down a job at a local liquor store.
Obama had a blood-alcohol level of 0.14, police said at the time. Harvey said the defense plans to argue that the testing device was calibrated incorrectly, and that the results should be stricken from evidence.
“We’ll be attacking that, as well as the procedures the police officer utilized while he was operating the Breathalyzer,” Harvey said.
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