Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, April 13, 1993 TAG: 9304130248
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
GRAY CONVICTED OF IMPEDING POLICE
William Gray was convicted Monday of impeding police officers who responded to a late-night disorder at his former child psychiatry office in Roanoke.Gray, who earlier this year surrendered his psychiatry license in order to avoid trial on charges of molesting young men, was fined $100 by substitute Judge E. Wayne Sawyers.
The hearing pitted the testimony of a police officer against that of Gray and two young men who were with him at the office about 1 a.m. on Jan. 21.
Gray had accused police of using excessive force to arrest him; Sgt. R.L. Arrington of the Roanoke Police Department said Gray interfered with police as they questioned a DUI suspect on his property.
The suspect was one of about 10 young men who had been drinking and playing cards at Gray's office before police arrived.
Gray had called 911 earlier in the night when his friend, Paul Holt, a transvestite who recently challenged the city's anti-solicitation law, "was trying to bust the door down" after being locked out of the kitchen, Gray testified.
But when police arrived a few minutes later, Gray and the other men playing cards in the kitchen did not respond to their knocks on the door.
A few minutes later, police were back at the Washington Street office to question a young man who had used Gray's car to drive Holt home.
As police performed sobriety field tests on the man, Gray - who appeared to be intoxicated - came out into the yard, shook his finger in Arrington's face and told him he was "going to put a stop to this," Arrington testified.
Gray, however, testified that he was only asking police to leave his property when they slammed him against a wall and threw him to the ground. A complaint that he filed with the Police Department's internal affairs office is still being investigated, he said.
Gray's attorney, Sam Garrison, argued that prosecutors had not rebutted testimony from Gray and two corroborating witnesses indicating that he was "severly mistreated" by police.
But Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Alice Ekirch said the case rested on the credibility of witnesses, noting that the men who supported Gray's account were convicted felons whom he allowed to live in his office.