the Town of Greenwich by Frank Trotta

Not much could shock me – or so I thought. I certainly was shocked as a student at the FBI Citizens Academy when in one of the optional exercises some of us watched over the shoulder of FBI agents in a computer center working on an Internet sting. I saw with my own eyes, a father in a chat room offer up his pre-teen son for sex with an adult male (who was actually an FBI agent in a chat room).

Repulsion is an understatement. I have as much disdain and disgust for that father as I do for the men of the cloth who preyed on children instead of praying for them. I was so angry that if I could have crawled through the wires to reach that father I would have probably been charged with a violent felony.        (more…)

I’ve been invited to five Presidential Inaugurations, but have never been to one – too much glitz for my tastes.

Generally, I have tried to ignore this quadrennial ritual, but this year that was impossible. One would have to be comatose to have avoided the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44^th President of the United States. One reason the inauguration seemed omnipresent was the $150 million or so spent on the event – three times the second most expensive inaugural. (Perhaps these festivities – along with the Obamas hiring Santa Monica designer Michael S. Smith to decorate the White House living area — were a preamble to the Obama Stimulus package.) (more…)

The new year saw the retirement of Michael Pacewicz, Greenwich Police Department’s only remaining Captain. GPD Chief David Ridberg commented that Captain Pacewicz served in almost every division in the department, and did so well.

As a member of the GPD Community and Police Partnership (CAPP) I got to know Captain Pacewicz who headed the East Sector CAPP at its formation. In some ways he was a quintessential cop – part Kojak, part Jack Webb, part Sam Spade. I knew whenever I asked Captain Pacewicz a question that I would get a straight answer. I might not like his answer, but it would be frank. He was direct, unvarnished, and at times blunt. (more…)

Tomorrow begins “ordinary time.”

For those of us who “bleed blue” football season painfully ended today as the Giants were eliminated from the playoffs. We don’t care about the NFC and AFC championships next week, or even the Super Bowl. Tomorrow marks the beginning of the countdown until Giants summer camp in Albany. Sure, there may be a slight distraction when the Yankees start playing again, but otherwise tomorrow starts “ordinary time” for Giants fans. (more…)