Drunk trooper wasn't charged

RALEIGH -- A captain with the N.C. Highway Patrol caught driving while "extremely drunk" was taken to a hotel instead of jail.

No charges were filed against the off-duty captain, James Williams Jr., 46, after a traffic stop at 1:50 a.m. April 3 by a Butner Public Safety officer.

An official probe of the incident is under way. Williams was placed on desk duty last week, pending an internal affairs investigation at the Highway Patrol.

Ernie Seneca, spokesman for the N.C. Department of Crime Control and Public Safety, said the patrol's investigation, as well as one at the Butner agency, should be concluded within a couple of weeks.

"These investigations will be thorough," Seneca said. "We are looking at all aspects involved."

Recordings of radio traffic and telephone calls released Friday include Butner Lt. D.C. Parrott's initial report of seeing a motorist in a Ford Mustang convertible traveling south on Interstate 85 and swerving from lane to lane.

Butner Capt. W.B. Williams, the supervisor on duty, came to the scene and called headquarters to ask that a message be relayed to his own boss, Maj. A.W. Moss.

"Advise him I have a trooper stopped," W.B. Williams says on a recording. "He is a captain with the Highway Patrol and he is extremely 10-55."

The police code 10-55 means "intoxicated driver."

Moss was asleep at home. The dispatcher, caught on tape, tells Moss that James Williams was stopped.

"You say he was extremely drunk?" Moss asks.

The Butner officers called a tow truck for James Williams' Mustang and gave the trooper a ride to a Best Western. A few moments later, a hotel clerk called Butner Public Safety to report that the driver with "car trouble" changed his mind about getting a room and needed a ride to the station.

The only written document filed about the traffic stop provided by Butner Public Safety does not list the trooper's name and says the traffic stop was resolved "without report."

Parrott and W.B. Williams have been placed on leave.

No cameras on dash

Seneca said that the officers' vehicles were not equipped with dash-mounted video cameras and that no additional tapes of the traffic stop exist. The spokesman said he could not comment on whether a breathalyzer test or roadside sobriety test were conducted on the patrol captain, citing state personnel privacy restrictions and the internal affairs investigation.

As commander of Troop C, James Williams is responsible for overseeing operations in a 12-county area that includes Wake, Durham and Granville counties. He is a 21-year veteran of the patrol with an annual salary of $84,691.

James Williams was required to surrender his badge, state vehicle and uniform until the investigation is complete. He could not be reached for comment Friday.

In an interview April 8, Butner Public Safety Chief Wayne Hobgood said he didn't know anything about the traffic stop, adding that he knew James Williams and that he is "not a drinking man."

'No one is above law'

A department spokesman said Hobgood had not been informed by his subordinates of the decision to let the trooper go without an arrest.

State Sen. Ed Jones, a retired trooper, said that if the evidence showed Capt. James Williams was driving drunk, then the local law officers were duty-bound to arrest him.

"No one is above the law," said Jones, a Halifax County Democrat. "He should have been cited and tried just like everybody else. It doesn't matter who you are, rich or poor, black or white. You can't just go out and pick and choose who you're going to arrest and who you're not."

Chrissy Pearson, the spokeswoman for Gov. Bev Perdue, said the governor has confidence that Reuben Young, the state secretary for crime control, will take the appropriate personnel action against those involved.

"She has zero tolerance for any unethical or illegal behavior by a state employee," Pearson said of the governor. "If what we think has happened has actually happened in this case, she thinks those involved should be fired."