I slandered the Sheriff, but I did not accuse the deputy ..

Feeling overwhelmed tonight ... too many stories .. too many calls and emails to return .. too many things to check on ... but that's the news biz sometimes.

A few thoughts to share:

Drew Alexander called me today with quite a laugh in voice. He just returned from a trip to Colorado and heard about Friday's SNAFU on TV3. (see post below) Drew told me not to give it a second thought .. that he understands mistakes happen and he found it very funny that -- at least for a moment -- he was suddenly a steroid dealer in Summit County. He told me that so many folks have been teasing him at the Sheriff's Office, that he's sticking his chest like a body builder just to spite them. For what it's worth, I'm so glad that if a mistake like this was going to happen, that it happened to a local leader who understands what it means to be human.

I had a chance to visit the Akron Police training bureau today. One of the classes officers are taking for "in service" training focuses on new guidelines for booking juveniles. Under the old rules, a deputy clerk had to administer an official "oath" to the officer booking the delinquent .. now a fellow officer can do it instead .. and that should speed up the process of getting juveniles booked and into the system. Sounds like a faster way to get kids either secured at Dan Street or picked up by their parents. Still, what does is say about Akron's problem with youth violence that we have so many teen offenders that we need a faster way to book em?

I also had a chance to stop by the Akron Beacon Journal newsroom today. For such a large newsroom with so many people working there (relative to a TV newsroom anyway), it was a very quiet place. I spent about 30 minutes at the ABJ interviewing veteran reporter Jim Carney for an upcoming documentary I'm working on for 45/49.

Among the police calls we chased tonight: a police officer whose cruiser was T-boned by a driver on Main Street. The officer is fortunate to have escaped unharmed. Initially, the call went out as an officer trapped in his cruiser which brought medical and police units from all over town.