Newell was 275 miles away, in Los Angeles, for a meeting with an acquaintance - lawyer Johnnie Cochran. The MPD drug-forfeiture fund also paid for the car Newell rented to get to California. When you go to a conference, the main focus is the conference. It's not like I was off partying in Los Angeles. But rental car records show that other MPD employees have logged nearly as many miles during training sessions.
Anytime someone attends a conference, it is for the benefit of the agency.
They are for training, and we certainly would want them to be there,'' said interim Police Director William Oldham, who is in Sun Valley, Idaho, this week for a national conference. Last week the agency requested copies of OCU travel records spanning several years. Agents will have to look elsewhere for some of those records, however. And because of missing records, for example, the department cannot identify which employees bought gas with an OCU credit card at two fuel stops far from approved destinations. The FBI was already examining the department's use of federal grant money as well as purchases made with credit cards backed by OCU drug funds.