Va. trooper shot during water contamination investigation

The Daily Press ^ | 4 Feb 2003 | AP

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Va. trooper shot during water contamination investigation


By the Associated Press

Published February 4, 2003

ACCOMACK, Va. --

A Virginia state trooper was shot Tuesday night in Accomack County while investigating a possible plot to contaminate water supplies.

Col. Gerald Massengill, state police superintendent, said the trooper had been taken to a hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
Massengill said the trooper was executing a search warrant on Virginia's Eastern Shore between 10 and 10:30 p.m. in connection with an investigation into a possible plot to contaminate water supplies.

The investigation was being conducted by the state police, the FBI and the Accomack Sheriff's Office. The FBI could not immediately be reached and a dispatcher at the Sheriff's Department could not provide any information.

Massengill did not release the trooper's name or any information about possible suspects or other injuries.

Copyright © 2003, Daily Press

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The local TV news said that the suspect had "been to an Arab country".

[Mulder]

Massengill did not release the trooper's name or any information about possible suspects

I think that tells us all we need to know about the "suspects".

[Petronski]

The dude's name is 'Massengill?' Must have been a tough time in junior high.

[Ciexyz]

Yikes! Sounds frightening.

Hope the trooper is OK.

[bluefish]

I wonder if a "specific threat" like this will get out. Specific versus the vague, non-specific threats that get trumpeted daily which seem to be more of a CYA move. Are any of the bottled water companies publicly traded? Of course, one has to wonder about the security in those bottling plants as much as at the water treatment plants. Hopefully, corporate "greed" (desire to protect reputation) results in tight controls there.

[Howlin]

LOL!

[goodnesswins]

Everyone got a bit of water set aside?

[Chad Fairbanks]

But I bet he always smelled like a spring rain...

[blam]

"Everyone got a bit of water set aside?"

Yup. I have my own artesian well.

[The Old Hoosier]

Did they arrest the guy?

[John H K]

The Eastern Shore of Virginia (It's the small section of Virginia at the south end of the Delmarva Peninsula) is about the poorest, least-populated area of the entire coast from Florida to Maine.

Only exception is Wallops Island and associated NASA and military facilites, but there's something like that most everywhere.

I suspect it would be about 10,000 spots down the Al Queda target list.

[John H K]

I'll make an official Wild-Assed Guess that it actually was somebody with a Meth Lab.

[hellinahandcart]

Still collecting water supply articles?

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I believe they have. Lol, I was half asleep when they said they had "breaking news".

[Lion's Cub]

Someday our police may take this seriously. Let's hope they start now.

It was absolutely rediculous to send a lone trooper to serve a warrant on a terrorist suspect. Someday the LEOs are going to realize that the bad guys don't register their guns, and there is a reason we call them terrorist cells. The flamin' idiot was lucky this time.

John H K -

You could well be right about the meth lab, but maybe "poisoning the water supply" had something to do with destroying the commercial fishing industry by puting something biological in the water that would flow into the bay and kill off the industry.

[TheErnFormerlyKnownAsBig]

Everyone got a bit of water set aside?

It's called the hotwater tank. Plus the two 6 gallon jugs we keep on hand.

[Lion's Cub]

Virginia ping

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An update of sorts.It doesn't say who shot the trooper though. Strange.

A Virginia state trooper was shot Tuesday night in Accomack County during an investigation into a possible plot to contaminate water supplies, according to police and court records.

Col. Gerald Massengill, state police superintendent, said the trooper had been taken to a hospital with non-life threatening injuries.

Massengill told The Associated Press the trooper was executing a search warrant on Virginia's Eastern Shore between 10 and 10:30 p.m. in connection with an investigation into a possible plot to contaminate water supplies.

FBI agents and other law enforcement officials were attempting to arrest Ipolito "Polo" Campos at his home in Accomac, The Virginian-Pilot of Norfolk reported. A suspect who was in the house was in custody, but police would not identify the person.

Charges were filed against Campos earlier Tuesday in federal court. They included accusations of using phony immigration documents and a false Social Security number.

An unidentified person reported to the Accomack County Sheriff's Department two weeks ago that Campos said he was sent to poison Virginia's waters and "if he did not poison the water someone would kill him," according to federal court records.

An FBI spokesman said the reported threat to the water supplies remains under investigation by the region's Joint Terrorism Task Force, but no credible evidence exists that any plan was in place to carry out such an attack, The Pilot reported. The task force was set up after the Sept. 11 attacks to investigate such reports.

Massengill did not release the trooper's name or any information about possible suspects or other injuries.

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Update to the update, now two people killed in raid.

Officer shot, 2 people killed in Accomack raid
By TIM MCGLONE, The Virginian-Pilot
© February 5, 2003

NORFOLK -- A state trooper was shot and two people killed during a raid Tuesday night on an Eastern Shore home where a man was sought for threatening to poison Virginia's water supplies, according to police, paramedics and court records.

The trooper, who was wounded in the arm, was not identified. A Maryland state trooper said a helicopter was called to the scene to transport the wounded officer to a hospital.

The two people killed were not identified. The deaths were confirmed by Capt. Eric Schleis of the Parksley rescue squad. The FBI and Virginia and Maryland state police agencies would not confirm the deaths.

FBI agents and other law enforcement officials were attempting to arrest Ipolito ``Polo'' Campos at his home on Kellam Drive in Accomac. A suspect who was in the house was in custody, but police would not identify the person.

Charges were filed against Campos earlier that day in federal court.

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An unidentified person reported to the Accomack County Sheriff's Department two weeks ago that Campos said he was sent here to poison Virginia's waters and ``if he did not poison the water someone would kill him,'' according to federal court records.

While he is not now charged with making the threat, he is charged with having phony immigration documents and using a false Social Security number. That case will likely go to a federal grand jury.

The Immigration and Naturalization Service informed the FBI that it had no record on Ipolito Campos. Immigration documents on file with a seafood company where Campos worked do not exist in INS files, and the Social Security number Campos provided to the business belongs to someone else, the records say.

An FBI spokesman said the reported threat to the water supplies remains under investigation by the region's Joint Terrorism Task Force, but no credible evidence exists that any plan to carry out such an attack was in place. The task force was set up after the Sept. 11 attacks to investigate such reports.

Campos began working for Eastern Shore Seafood Products Inc. in Mappsville and Norfolk on Dec. 28, 2001. He was fired nearly a year later after testing positive in a random drug test, the court records say.

An employee who answered the phone Tuesday in the Mappsville office said no one was available to discuss the matter.

13 News contributed to this report.

Reach Tim McGlone at tmcglone@pilotonline.com or 446-2343.