Montgomery Police Officer Christopher Eugene Sanspree Jr. made fake calls to Prattville 911 while on duty, officers said. (Mug shot: Prattville Police Department)
An Alabama police officer is now on desk duty after allegedly making at least six calls to police department in a different jurisdiction while on duty, falsely claiming to have witnessed an array of violent crime.
If true, why did Christopher Eugene Sanspree Jr., 23, of the Montgomery Police Department do it? Prattville Police Chief Mark Thompson said the motive remained unclear, but claimed that the defendant said “he thought it was funny,” according to Montgomery NBC affiliate WSFA.
“Prattville Police Department Investigators determined that Sanspree made several phone calls to Autauga County E911 to falsely report incidents, also known as ‘swatting,”” Prattville officers wrote in an online statement on Thursday. “These falsely reported incidents were serious in nature and required a substantial amount of resources to respond to each call as well as a considerable amount of investigative resources to be expended.”
He is reportedly out on bond after being arrested Feb. 7 on six warrants for false reporting an incident. Sanspree is on “administrative assignment,” Capt. Raymond Carson of the MPD’s Office of Professional Standards reportedly said.
The alleged false reports reportedly included seeing a male suspect running about with a machete, people breaking into vehicles, and a person lying apparently shot in a front yard. Prattville police said that the calls happened Oct. 30 through late December, though they are working with law enforcement counterparts in Georgia, Massachusetts, and Wyoming to see if there is any connection to swatting incidents there.
“Point blank, honest with you, it pissed me off,” Thompson said when asked his thoughts about what Sanspree allegedly did. He referenced unrelated false calls that turned out to be ambushes, and he voiced frustration with the defendant making these false calls with full knowledge of what police officers have to go through.
“We have enough to deal with, with the image of police officers, already, and then we have somebody do something like this, and he was on duty when he was doing this,” Thompson said. “And so, yeah, it highly irritates me and other law enforcement chiefs that are trying to keep the image of law enforcement being a honorable career, and then we have people like this doing stunts like this.”
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