JUST DESSERTS

Tampa Police Chief Pulls Out Badge to Get Out of Trouble—and Gets Suspended

Mary O’Connor said her actions were “poor judgment.”

The Tampa police chief was put on leave after she flashed her police badge to get out of a traffic stop last month while on a golf cart. Chief Mary O’Connor was on a golf cart in the neighboring city of Oldsmar on Nov. 12 when she was pulled over by a Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office deputy for not having a tag. According to body camera footage, O’Connor pulled out her police chief card—that is, her literal badge—in the hopes the officer would let them off. “I’m hoping that you’ll just let us go tonight,” she told the deputy. The deputy allowed her to leave, and O’Connor and her golf cart driver drove off. “It was poor judgment on our part to be driving a golf cart on a public roadway without the appropriate tags,” O’Connor said in a statement Friday. “This was the first time we had exited the golf-cart friendly community in which we own property with this vehicle, prompting the need for a license plate. In hindsight, I realize how my handling of this matter could be viewed as inappropriate, but that was certainly not my intent.”