By Jenny Huggins
News Reporter

(Note: All information is obtained from public court records filed in the LeFlore County Court Clerk’s Office.)  At 12:25 a.m. on June 4 Poteau Police Officers were dispatched to Noble and Grand in reference to individuals drinking alcohol and causing a disturbance.

Officer Victoria James stated in the affidavit that she was familiar with the residence  and had been dispatched there several times in the past for similar calls, usually involving juveniles. According to James when she arrived at the residence several other officers were already on the scene including Jim Noggle.

 

Noggle had instructed the numerous individuals present to provide him with identification so he could issue citations. James reported that while Noggle was speaking with individuals providing him with identification, she observed that one male was sitting in a plastic chair pushing buttons on a cell phone.  

 

According to the affidavit while Noggle was speaking with several individuals near his patrol unit, James approached the male subject and asked him if he had identification. The male said that he did not, so James asked for his name and he proceeded to tell her that it was Gage Meeder. James asked the individual to accompany her to her patrol unit so she could collect his information.

 

James reported that she asked the male if he had recently been released from jail and he admitted that he had been recently jailed for public intoxication. James stated she asked the individual about his level of intoxication at that time and he stated that he had not been drinking. She then pointed out his badly slurred speech and the individual told her that he had a speech impediment.

 

According to the affidavit, when James and the male reached her patrol unit she again asked the individual what his name was and he again said Gage Meeder. James then asked for a full name and the male said Christopher Gage Meeder. James then informed the male that she had recently jailed Meeder on outstanding municipal warrants and that she knew that he was not the person she had jailed. The male subject then told her that he did not know whom that person would have been but assured her that he was Gage Meeder. James then told the subject that the combined total for Meeder’s warrants was more than  $1,200 and asked him why the subject she arrested would have continued to identify himself as Meeder when faced with the warrants. The male subject then told James that he didn’t know either but assured her again that he was Meeder. James asked for the male’s residence and informed him that the residence that he provided was not the residence where Meeder resided. Still, he assured her again that he was Meeder.

 

At that point James asked the male to walk with her to the other officers whom she asked if they knew him. None of the other officers were immediately able to positively identify him but one suggested that it might be Kory Pickle. Noggle placed the subject under arrest for false personation while James walked to the residence where she saw Zach Pritchett. James stated that she approached Pritchett because the male said he had arrived with Pritchett. James pointed the male out to Pritchett, who Pritchett identified as “Pickle.” James stated that at the same time another individual identified the suspect as “Kory Pickle.”

 

Upon returning to Pickle’s location, James observed that the suspect had a tattoo on his leg that read “Pickle.” James told Pickle that the individuals present were of the opinion that his name was Kory Pickle.  According to James, Pickle then jerked away from the other officers and stated, “I’m not going anywhere.”  James escorted Pickle to the patrol unit with him fighting against her grip. “He further ordered me to ‘Shut up’...several times,” stated James in the  affidavit.

 

Pickle continued to make derogatory offers, including “an invitation which I advised him I would have to decline” stated Pickle in the affidavit.  At one point during the transport to the police department James said she saw Pickle moving around in the seat and sliding downward, but when she told him to stop, he said he was just resting.  When they pulled into the department James said that Pickle sat up sideways in the seat and turned his back to her. James noticed he had a cell phone and a dollar bill. James instructed Pickle to exit the vehicle and when he refused she “reached into the vehicle, took Pickle by the arm and pulled him from the vehicle,” James reported.

 

Pickle responded by yelling at the officer and continued his previous verbal abuse as well as pulling away and continuously jerking away from her. James also stated in the affidavit that Pickle told her he was going to sue her for being too rough while she was escorting him into the booking room then to the cell.  At the holding cell, James noticed Pickle had turned toward her and pursed his lips as if to spit. James quickly spun Pickle toward the wall and saw him spit saliva and a penny at the wall. Once the incident had occurred, James placed Pickle’s chest against the wall of the holding cell and anchored him there by placing her forearm across his back as she retrieved the cell phone and currency from his hands and checked his pockets for additional items.

 

As she was conducting the search for any other items, Pickle ordered James to get out of his pockets.  James stated that during the time Pickle was in the cell he repeatedly kicked the door and maintained his insults and curses toward her and the dispatcher, Amy Watts.  Noggle and Officer Gary Hecht arrived at the police department and the affidavit states that when Noggle entered the booking room he saw that Pickle had worked his cuffed hands to the front of his body. Noggle and Hecht entered the cell and placed the again struggling Pickle to the floor and again handcuffed his hands behind his back.

 

While being re-handcuffed, Pickle reportedly told Noggle that he hadn’t moved his cuffs to the front, that he had in fact been handcuffed in the front by the officer. Noggle then informed Pickle that he knew that particular statement to be a lie because it was he, Noggle, who had initially handcuffed Pickle.  The affidavit states that while James continued the paperwork Noggle and Hecht transported Pickle to the LeFlore County Detention Center where he was booked into jail on charges of false personation, attempting to place bodily fluids on a police officer and resisting arrest.

 

Information obtained by James for Pickle through a database search indicated that he was a convicted felon and was, at that time, under community supervision by Parole Officer Michael Harrison. Pickle has since been released from the detention center.