By Becky Polaski

Staff Writer

St. Marys resident Joe Penfield continued his claims of misconduct by city police when he addressed members of city council at their meeting earlier this week. Penfield has been attending council meetings for close to two months making claims that police acted improperly while conducting a seat belt safety check point over Memorial Day weekend. 

“I came in here about two months ago and made serious allegations about the management skills of Mr. Caltagarone, specifically him being unable to monitor and control the activities of his police department, and nobody seems to take that seriously,” Penfield said to council. “I really don’t understand that, but I think you will before it is all over.”

Penfield noted that at the previous city council meeting that he attended it was stated that a representative from the Pennsylvania Inspector General’s Office had visited the city and determined no wrongdoing by the City of St. Marys police officers.

“I’m just wondering if I could get a copy of that report from the city and the name of the investigator who did the investigation,” Penfield said. “I don’t know a whole lot about forensic science, but I know that you really can’t do an investigation without interviewing the person who had the complaint, and that was me. Nobody ever contacted me, so I don’t know what is going on there.”

During that same meeting, Penfield had also requested that he be given a polygraph test in an effort to prove the validity of his accusations. He informed council on Monday night that he had continued to looking into where a polygraph test could be taken locally.

“The local state police have a polygraph expert, but they won’t give a polygraph test when there are acquisitions against city officials or local police. They don’t want to taint the investigation with the possibility of corruption or scandal at the local levels,” Penfield said. “So if I want a polygraph test I’ve got to go to Harrisburg, which is out of the question at this time, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be able to do it next month. I can get a private polygraph. There is one in Bradford. It is only $700 and I’m working real hard to try to get up that kind of money and take a test in which case I  will come in and present it to council.”

Penfield also requested a favor from Councilman Steve Skok.

“I know you like to golf,” Penfield said to Skok. “Rumor has it that there is someone on the golf course from city government that is bad mouthing me real bad and scandalizing me. If you are out there and you run across anybody doing that could you please let me know? I have ordered ‘spy ears’ where you can focus them and you can hear people’s conversations from a long way away. If I can get up on the hill behind the golf course and get this person there will definitely be a lawsuit against that city official.”

Penfield also addressed Councilman Dick Dornisch’s comments from the previous meeting where Dornisch told Penfield to go home and plant tulips because the city had no plans to give him a polygraph test.

“I didn’t quite understand that at first, but I did a little research and I found out that tulips don’t get planted until the end of October,” Penfield said. “So I’m assuming that was code for me to wait until the end of October to act against the city on these charges.”

Penfield concluded by stating that he simply wanted to keep members of council informed as to what was going on and he added that he will be back at their next meeting on Monday, Oct. 5.