A Cuyahoga County sheriff’s deputy, Paul Lawrence, was arrested on Tuesday and charged with menacing and public indecency.
The arrest stemmed after two episodes that occurred this summer at the Rocky River Reservation in Cleveland, Ohio.
The first incident was reported back on June 12 when a woman jogger complained that a man was masturbating in a Jeep parked in the Big Met Golf Course parking lot. That man, allegedly, was Deputy Lawrence.
According to the police report, the female jogger was passing the vehicle when all of a sudden it sped off. Later the same jogger saw the Jeep parked next to her automobile and saw the man driving stick, but going nowhere.
The woman said she had noticed the Jeep twice before she caught the man in the act.
The next mishap happened on August 29, the same day Lawrence called in sick to the station. Coincidentally, Lawrence had called off of work for a hot date with no other than Rosie Palmer and her five sisters. Lawrence was at it again.
According to that police report, two 19-year-old women waved down a park ranger and reported that a man in a Chevy Malibu had been following them. Later they witnessed the suspect wander off the beaten path so that he could what appeared to only be urinating behind a tree. Upon closer inspection, it looked as though the man was more likely buffing the mahogany.
As the two women were giving the ranger the suspicious vehicle’s license plate number, the group spotted the Malibu again. The ranger had enough time to stop the automobile and confront Lawrence about the alleged incident.
According to the police report, the deputy claimed he was almost out of gas and was waiting for his spouse to get out of work. When Lawrence started his vehicle, however, the fuel gauge showed he had more than a quarter tank of fuel.
Either the responding ranger misread the gauge or else Lawrence was pumping his own gas, poorly, at a Cleveland service station.
Afterwards Lawrence informed the ranger he was a sheriff’s deputy and showed his Cuyahoga County ID. Later he was brought in. The woman who allegedly saw Lawrence in a Jeep twice before picked Lawrence out of a photo lineup and now the deputy, three years after acquiring that rank, faces four misdemeanor charges.
According to records, Lawrence had been disciplined for not showing up to work earlier this year.
Lawrence was off-duty during both incidents (that is, to say, that he was not, ahem, walking the beat) and has posted bond. He has been placed on paid leave.