ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, September 9, 1996 TAG: 9609090080
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DIANE STRUZZI STAFF WRITER
A TEAM OF DETECTIVES based in the Roanoke Valley has helped overburdened police in localities throughout central and Western Virginia track down criminals.
A wave of burglaries hit Pittsylvania County at the same time as three homicides and a series of drug raids. Investigators were swamped.
"We didn't have enough manpower," said Pittsylvania County Sheriff Harold Plaster.
So he turned for help to the Virginia State Police, who brought in the Roanoke Valley Criminal Investigations Team, a unit formed two years ago at the request of the state police to enhance cooperation between police departments. Despite its name, it solves crimes throughout a 16-county area in Southwestern Virginia.
The break-ins at houses, businesses and churches in Pittsylvania County seemed like a natural case for the team.
The unit includes detectives from Roanoke, Roanoke County, state police and, on a part-time basis, Salem. It had the expertise to handle the Pittsylvania County cases - reviewing how the break-ins were done and any evidence left at the scenes. And, most importantly, the detectives had the time.
Within two months, the unit had made three arrests and solved 41 burglaries, Plaster said. The leads they ran down are also expected to solve other break-ins.
"We know we can't do it alone," Plaster said. "We're such a transient society. A crime may occur in Pittsylvania in the morning," and by that afternoon the criminal may be in Henry County or Roanoke.
"We're not an island by ourselves."
The Pittsylvania case is one of the few in which the unit accepts the limelight for making arrests. The four-man team is quick to admit that their main purpose is to assist police departments, freeing detectives up to work on their own locality's higher profile cases.
What a good offensive lineman is to a running back, the valley investigation team is to area police departments. They are more likely to run background checks on a suspect, do surveillance or run down leads than step in to make an arrest.
The team has been involved in about 140 cases so far - from Amherst County to Southside Virginia, from murder investigations to tracking down suspects on outstanding warrants.
Based at the Roanoke County Police Department on Peters Creek Road, the team does not cost area departments any additional money. They received a $5,000 federal grant to cover the cost of communication radios and a computer.
The team was only a month old when a Vinton couple and their two daughters were killed in their house in August 1994. Along with about 20 other investigators, the team followed up leads and interviewed witnesses. Police arrested a suspect in that case this summer.
"I take satisfaction" in knowing a case may have been solved, said Roanoke County Sgt. Paul McElvein, who supervises the unit. "It's not because I get 15 seconds of glory on stage but because I had some part of it."
Take the case of James Casey, who accumulated 39 warrants for burglary and grand larceny charges. Police had been looking for him since May 1993. They didn't find him until the investigation team - specifically Roanoke Detective Roger Harris - got involved. Harris put the word out that police were searching for Casey. A detective in Rocky Mount picked up the request, found out Casey was staying at his parents' home, got a search warrant and made an arrest in November 1994.
And then there was Luther Robert Brown III, whose downfall was trying to get money legitimately. He was wanted in Roanoke, Roanoke County, Richlands, Danville and West Virginia on 32 bad check and fraud charges. The team alerted a Danville credit card bureau. When Brown applied for a loan in Norfolk, he was nabbed.
"It's very different than the typical detective work," Harris said. "Sometimes it's slower, other times it's a lot more hectic. We have to be more flexible. We get involved with a little bit of everything."
Right now, the investigators are assisting state police in compiling a list of the region's homicides over the past five years. The detailed information about the cases and suspects will be entered in a state-and nationwide police database. Investigators can punch in the particulars of their homicide to find out if it matches any others.
The team also is investigating several unsolved homicides in the Roanoke area.
Police departments are gradually moving beyond the mindset that their detectives and the crimes they investigate stop at the city limits or county line. Robbers don't care if it's Roanoke or Roanoke County, McElvein said. All they know is that there is a store with money.
"Everybody is just trying to push the cart to the top of the hill," he added. "Now it's just easier with [this team] working together."
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