Talk about a meltdown! Ty Cogan could give the Wicked Witch of the West a run for her money.
At about 8:25 p.m. Friday, Dec. 19, Liverpool Police Officer Todd Creller, one of Onondaga County’s top traffic cops, stopped a grey 2014 Chevrolet Silverado pickup at Second and Hickory streets. The vehicle was being driven without its headlights shining.
Its driver, 38-year-old Ty Cogan, an off-duty Syracuse policeman who lives in Liverpool, was drunk, according to Creller — “slobbering” drunk, the resultant police paperwork would say. Cogan was slurring, swearing and shouting, Creller wrote. His eyes were bloodshot and his attitude was belligerent.
Good thing Onondaga Sheriff’s Det. Jeff Passino arrived on the scene. Passino, a former part-time LPD officer, noted that a citizen had called in a warning about a Chevy truck being driven erratically “all over the road” and running a red light.
Turns out the detective remembered the suspect as an old high-school chum. He thought maybe he could talk some sense into his former classmate, in spite of the trouble in which he’d landed.
No such luck.
Ignoring the officers’ instructions to remain in his vehicle, Cogan swung open his door, jumped out of the truck and headed in Creller’s direction. At one point, Cogan fell down and needed assistance to stand up. He was literally falling-down drunk, according to the officers, but continued to threaten them and grabbed Creller’s uniform.
“Shoot me, shoot me,” he yelled, according to Creller’s ride-along passenger, Daniel Pirong, who also heard the officers repeatedly tell Cogan to “Stop resisting!”
The only good thing we might observe about this sorry situation is that no one was seriously hurt.
It’s not as though he didn’t try to cause some havoc and harm, but Cogan was apparently too sauced to deploy the martial arts he’d learned in all his years of police training. But he knocked Creller’s eyeglasses from his face, busting them, wrestled with both Creller and Passino causing a laceration to one of the detective’s fingers and tried to push Creller into moving traffic. Cogan kicked, bit and finally rolled around on the ground like a sick dog.
Once prone in the middle of Second Street, he continued to swear at the officers and refused to place his hands behind his back to be handcuffed. When finally shackled, Cogan balked at being placed in the backseat of Passino’s patrol car. After being transported to the North Community Police Station at 7120 Henry Clay Blvd., Cogan then refused to exit the patrol car in order to be booked.
Just before 10 p.m. Sheriff’s Sgt. Brian Zinsmeyer administered a breathalyzer test, and it showed Cogan’s blood-alcohol content to be .21 percent, nearly three times the state’s legal limit of .08 percent and well over the .18 percent needed for a charge of “aggravated” driving while intoxicated.
Between them, the sheriff’s office and the LPD threw the book at the city policeman.
Based on Creller’s complaints, Cogan was charged with fourth-degree criminal mischief for breaking the eyeglasses, second-degree harassment for grabbing the officer and disorderly conduct for exhibiting a “threatening/fighting manner.” Creller, who has worked here in Liverpool for a dozen years, also wrote him a ticket for driving without functioning headlights.
The sheriff’s officials added the most serious charge for aggravated DWI.
While Cogan is answering the charges in Liverpool Village Court, his bosses at the Syracuse Police Department are trying to figure out what to do about his employment. In years past, he had served with distinction. In 2013, Cogan earned a medal of gallantry bestowed by the district attorney’s office in recognition of his valiant work on a 2011 rape investigation and in 2010 the SPD honored him for subduing a man with a loaded .380-caliber handgun.
Bossa nova show Sunday
The Syracuse-based bossa nova combo called LuBossa kicks off the eighth annual Liverpool Public Library Folk Music Series with a free concert at 2 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 18, at the library, 310 Tulip St.
Featuring soprano Luba Lesser and guitarist Jason Kessler, the group performs both familiar and exotic bossa nova melodies. Together they render many of the Brazilian tunes in their original Portuguese. On Sunday, they’ll be accompanied by bassist Darryl Pugh and drummer Josh Dekaney.
A graduate of Colgate University, Jason Kessler studied classical guitar with William Viola of Philadelphia and composition at Syracuse University with Brian Israel. He has performed with members of the Syracuse Symphony and Society for New Music.
Luba Lesser grew up in Moscow, where she sang professionally with the Children’s Chorus of the State Radio and Television in Moscow. After moving to Syracuse in 1991, she has performed with Syracuse Chorale, Syracuse University Oratorio Society, Syracuse Vocal Ensemble and Syracuse Opera.
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