Police Chief Speaks Out Against Allegations
By: Import User
Updated: January 7, 2009
An area police chief speaks out on allegations made against his department. Local published reports have accused Joplin Police Chief Ed Dennis of withholding information. Those accusations stem from an incident last week when an officer was injured while trying to arrest a suspect. In the Joplin.com article, Dennis says he did not immediately release the name of the suspect, later identified as Antonio Birueta, because it was difficult to get a positive i.d. on him. Dennis also says his department did not know for a while whether he was a juvenile whether his family had been informed of his injury and formal charges had not be filed against Birueta at the time. Dennis says the Missouri Sunshine Law gives public agencies three days to reply to requests for information, if they are not able to comment the same day of the request. Dennis says the information was provided to the media well within that time frame.
