FHP CITES MIAMI LIEUTENANT

Ticket a second torment for officerThe Florida Highway Patrol is reviewing an incident in which a Miami police lieutenant was ticketed while rushing to a hospital where his son lay mortally injured.
BY JOAN FLEISCHMAN

Miami police Lt. Armando Bello was in the Florida Keys when he got word that his son, a 27-year-old Miami-Dade police officer, was critically injured in an off-duty, one-car crash at 5:45 a.m. Saturday. Bello jumped into his car and was racing north on U.S. 1, headed to Jackson Memorial Hospital, when he got stopped for speeding by the Florida Highway Patrol.

Bello, 49, told Trooper Jose Burgos the circumstances. Burgos didn't believe him. So he wrote Bello a ticket -- for doing 91 mph in a 55-mph zone. That was at 7:11 a.m.

What Bello didn't know was that doctors at JMH's Ryder Trauma Center had just pronounced his son dead at 7:08 a.m. Officer Armando Bello Jr. was on his way home from a party for a fellow police officer when his silver Lexus hit a tree at Northwest 27th Avenue and 110th Street.

FHP Lt. Col. Rick Gregory said the brass are reviewing the traffic ticket situation. ''Our concern is the sensitivity and discretion issue,'' Gregory said.

Burgos, 26, a trooper for three years, lives in Homestead and patrols upper Monroe County on the day shift. He was driving to work in his marked black-and-yellow cruiser when a motorist flagged him down to report a ''reckless driver,'' Capt. Jaime Picanol said Tuesday.

Burgos saw Bello ''passing, changing lanes, at a very high rate of speed,'' Picanol said. The trooper clocked Bello's Mercedes with radar and pulled him over at mile marker 118. Bello said he was a policeman and that he had a gun in the car. ''`My son has been involved in a serious crash,'' he told Burgos, according to Picanol. ``He's been airlifted.''

Burgos, who had watched the TV morning news, ''didn't hear anything about it,'' Picanol said. ``He didn't give it much credibility, so he wrote him a ticket.''

Burgos felt terrible when he later learned that Bello was telling the truth and that his son had died.

Bello, a 26-year Miami Police Department veteran now assigned to the communications section, once worked motorcycle patrol, doing traffic and DUI enforcement.

Burgos is a solid, ''high activity'' trooper, Picanol said. And troopers ''get so many excuses, you have to determine which is real,'' Picanol added.

Said Lt. Col Gregory: ``It is hard to put a policy in place to describe common sense, but we want to make sure every trooper understands that they have discretion and there is a need for sensitivity.''

Burgos will likely void the ticket, Picanol said. ``He's going to take care of the citation to make sure Lt. Bello won't have to go to court.''

The junior Bello was a finalist for the Dade County Police Benevolent Association's Officer of the Year award in 2005 for rescuing a driver and four children from a burning car.

Services are at 10 a.m. today at St. Brendan Catholic Church in Westchester. Burial is at Woodlawn Park South, 11655 SW 117th Ave. In lieu of flowers, the Bello family requests donations to the Police Officer Assistance Trust, 1030 NW 111th Ave., Suite 232, Miami, FL 33172.

Here we go again!

Problems:

1- Citing a L.E.O

2- Not believing a fellow L.E.O.

Solutions:

1- Could have just said "Buddy, you need to slow down! We are getting calls on your car." , and send him on his way.

2- If he did not believe the guy, write down all of the officers info and details of the incident, and if he was so eager to jam up an officer, call in later on and look into the matter. If the officer was not being truthful, go to his superiors.

3- And of course, if you run into the guy again and he is doing the same shit, then he is a danger to himself and the public. Then and only then, does the officer deserve a ticket.

And for those of you that say, you do not cite a L.E.O. no matter what, I say, you have to draw the line somewhere. We are not above the law. There is speeding, and there is reckless driving, road rage, etc. We took an oath to uphold the law, so we shouldn't be breaking it, especially criminally!

It was wrong of the trooper to write a citation, and not just let the Lt., go after he identifed himself and told him the situation. Other posts i read have said that the Lt. was extremely reckless even to the point of running other vehicles off of the road. I dont blame him for that at all, but if he was driving the way he was, maybe he had to be slowed down, not necessarily a citation but driving like a maniac even though the situation justified it, driving that way may have put him in a worst situation or hurt someone else. I dont blame the trooper for stopping him and having him slow down for his safety and others, but he did not need a citation and could have just had him get his act togeather and calm down some. My prayers are with the officers family.