THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, March 16, 1996 TAG: 9603160362
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: By MAC DANIEL, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE LENGTH: Medium: 66 lines
William Sheridan Swoope, the man who turned a stolen boat motor over to Chesapeake police Capt. William L. Spruill, pleaded guilty Friday to a charge of receiving stolen property.
The boat motor incident resulted in Spruill being reprimanded after an internal investigation by the police department into its handling of the arrest of the sons of three Chesapeake officials - a longtime councilman, a sheriff's captain and Spruill, who is Chief Ian M. Shipley Jr.'s administrative aide.
Spruill was charged with ``purposefully misleading'' and ``failure to disclose'' to investigators the identity of the person who gave him the motor, Spruill's reprimand from Chief Shipley said.
Detective Ira T. Galbreath, also reprimanded after the internal investigation, told Shipley he remembered Spruill telling him an ``elderly gentleman'' had brought the boat motor to his house.
For his guilty plea, Swoope, 32, of the 2000 block of Old Greenbrier Circle in Chesapeake, agreed that the felony charge of receiving stolen property will be reduced to a misdemeanor in one year if he agrees to tell all to Chesapeake police investigators, take a polygraph and testify against his co-defendants.
The boat motor was stolen from Givens Honda in Chesapeake in a burglary that netted about $160,000 in merchandise in October 1994. Special prosecutor Kenneth A. Phillips said Swoope picked up the motor in North Carolina and, after holding on to it for about three weeks, turned it over to Capt. Spruill, a friend of Swoope's, after finding out it had been stolen.
Moody E. Stallings Jr., Swoope's attorney, said Swoope suspected the boat motor was stolen when he first picked it up. Swoope confirmed it was stolen three weeks later, Stallings said, and turned it over to Capt. Spruill.
Phillips said the case unfolded after an employee at Givens Honda overheard an Oct. 23 conversation about the theft between William L. Spruill Jr., the police captain's 23-year-old son, and another man. The theft took place between Oct. 21 and Oct. 22.
The Givens employee, Brian Wade, told Givens officials about the theft. After an inventory, Phillips said, they discovered the items missing.
Swoope's plea grew out of two separate theft cases that had resulted in the arrest of the sons of Chesapeake officials.
During the past month, the Chesapeake City Council has been seeking help in reviewing how police investigated the crimes and whether an internal investigation and reprimands of five officers were adequate.
In one of those cases, Alan Keith Butt, 27, the son of Councilman John W. Butt, and William Jeremy Brickhouse, 20, the son of sheriff's Capt. William Brickhouse, are charged with receiving stolen property allegedly taken from Givens.
In a separate case, the younger Spruill Jr. is charged with grand larceny and breaking and entering in the theft of an all-terrain vehicle from the home of Vice Mayor Robert T. Nance Jr.
The council has asked for help from the state police and Chesapeake's chief judge after city officials said Shipley failed to address the council's concerns. The state police said the matter appeared more administrative than criminal. The chief judge said he did not think the matter warranted impaneling a special grand jury.
KEYWORDS: THEFT BOAT CHESAPEAKE POLICE GUILTY PLEA STOLEN
PROPERTY by CNB