Author: will-goldsmith

When 18-year-old Keauna Brown allegedly shot her boyfriend in the leg at the Red Carpet Inn on July 31, the Albemarle Police Department needed some assistance to find the weapon. Enter Officer Gunny, a police dog trained in explosive and weapon detection. He quickly located the small-caliber revolver—crucial evidence for investigators.
    Gunny, a Belgian Malinois, is one of three dogs on the Albemarle County Police force, and the only one trained in weapons and explosives (the others work in patrol and narcotics). Since 2003, when Gunny joined the team after serving with a state trooper, the canine has been used nearly 200 times, responding to bomb threats, explosives searches and weapons hunts. Bomb threats are the most common call, says K-9 Officer Bill Saulle, Gunny’s handler.
    “It’s generally good not to find anything when bombs are concerned,” says Saulle. Last year, Gunny—trained to sniff out multiple types of gun power—did find a pipe bomb in Scottsville in a large wooded search area.
    Like all bomb dogs, Gunny responds passively by sitting on an object when he makes a find (to minimize the chance of detonation). He doesn’t bark and bite like successful patrol and narcotics dogs do. Another differentiator: Gunny’s initial training as a weapons and explosive dog was more time-consuming than usual because there are more odors to learn, says Saulle.
    Gunny is 9 years old, which means he’s nearing the gold-watch years. Though some dogs continue working until they’re 12 or older, Gunny looks like he might get a nice early retirement. “We’re in the searching phase for a new dog to replace Gunny,” Saulle says.
    In the meantime, however, Gunny remains a valuable police officer. “I can’t tell you the last time he gave a false response,” says Saulle. “When you get the sit, you know you’ve got something.

After a few years of low-level marijuana busts, Jefferson Area Drug Enforcement (JADE) officers recently confiscated what they price as roughly $4.8 million worth of the drug—one of the biggest hauls in JADE history. Officers found 4,400 pot plants surrounded by bamboo on property near Scottsville, charging Gary Peck with manufacturing marijuana with the intent to distribute.
    With that bust alone, JADE will likely topple last year’s total, a mere five pounds. Because the yield of marijuana plants widely varies, valuations based on pounds are hard to calculate, but street prices of $200 per ounce would translate that amount to only around $16,000.
    “We’ve seen a reduction in growing operations over the years,” says JADE officer C.R. Smith. Though Smith is uncertain why numbers would be up this year, she speculates that a lull in recent confiscations made growers less cautious.
    Anonymous tips are JADE’s primary source, says Smith. “There are also indicators like high electric and water bills that might tip you off if they’re growing indoors. Or neighbors might notice the odor.” Random fly-overs, not nearly as useful as tips, are done too, according to Smith.
    Bamboo is often used to camouflage marijuana, but few have the audacity to grow the drug in a large patch, as Peck did. Smith says it is more common to find plants mixed into vegetation at intervals of several feet.

What makes a good preschool teacher? That’s the $10 million question now in the hands of UVA’s Curry School of Education, thanks to a five-year grant for a national preschool education center. The grant—possibly the largest ever for the Curry School—comes from the Institute of Education Sciences, a division of the U.S. Department of Education.
    Education and psychology Professor Robert Pianta leads the program, which is part teacher training and part experiment. In order to determine what teaching methods are most effective, some students will receive a specially designed course while studying to become preschool teachers; some will receive extensive oversight during their first year in the classroom; some will receive both; and a control group will receive only traditional training. Pianta and his colleagues (some from other universities) will measure effectiveness based on how well their preschool students score on literacy and social skills tests.
    “Our way of identifying good interactions has been validated in thousands of classrooms across the country as a factor that predicts student learning,” says Pianta. “There’s a scientific basis to know that we’re providing a lens that matters.”
    Those getting the ongoing training will videotape their classes and upload the footage to a private website, where a consulting professor will critique their methods and discuss them online. Already this year Pianta has experimented with this training model in 40 Virginia schools. (He would not comment about whether local schools have participated.)
    As for what makes a good preschool teacher, Pianta says they’re “wonderful opportunists.” “Good teachers know how to enter into play with kids and stimulate learning through that. It can occur in activities that look like lessons—or when sitting around the sand table or playing house.”
    The grant is huge for a school that received $12.2 million in grants in the 2005-06 fiscal year. Pianta particularly has drawn lucrative grants—$22 million since 1989, excluding the new award. But the sum is still small compared, for instance, to UVA’s School of Medicine, which in 2005-06 year brought in approximately $173 million.

A former Lutheran pastor charged with 20 counts of possession of child pornography, as well as two counts of videotaping non-consenting adults, has been released on $100,000 conditional bond following a July 19 hearing. Gregory Briehl—who, until this spring, was an associate pastor at the Peace Lutheran Church as well as counselor at First Stone Counseling Center—turned himself into Albemarle authorities July 18 after they issued a warrant for his arrest.
    At Briehl’s bond hearing in Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court, Detective Chuck Marshall detailed much of the evidence. The child-pornography possession charges stem from 100 images of children found on Briehl’s computer, according to Marshall. The children all appeared to be between 12 and 17 years of age, he said. Marshall also claims that investigators have evidence of videotaping involving children, including footage shot at the Lutheran Church that “focuses on private parts.” Additional charges are expected, says Lieutenant John Teixeira of the Albemarle Police Department in a press release.
    Briehl also has two misdemeanor charges for videotaping that have been filed in Albemarle General District Court. Prosecutors claim that Briehl, 52, placed secret cameras around his home—including in the bathroom—and filmed guests without their knowledge.
    Several friends and family attended the hearing to vouch for Briehl. Among them was Tom Leland, a senior minister at University Baptist Church who is helping to secure Briehl’s bond. Leland said he has made over 20 referrals to Briehl’s counseling service.
    “He was a great counselor,” said Leland during the hearing. He testified that many of those he referred to Briehl later commented that the pastor’s counsel had saved their marriages and even, in some cases, their lives.
    Briehl’s own family life has rapidly deteriorated since this spring, however, when he left the Peace Lutheran Church, reportedly following an affair with a woman in his congregation. Since then, he has been living with Dan and Sylvia Guengerich, who have agreed to continue housing Briehl until his trial is complete. While out on bail, Briehl isn’t allowed contact with a computer, or anyone under the age of 18—including his three children, all boys, who range in age from 6 to 10 years old.

Richard Berglund pleaded guilty Friday, July 21, to making illegal donations to Rep. Virgil Goode, whose district includes Charlottesville. Berglund’s admissions are the latest news in a congressional bribery scandal involving MZM Inc., a company that provides security and other military related services.
    As supervisor of the Martinsville, Virginia, branch of MZM, Berglund received cash in March 2005 from company owner Mitchell Wade for campaign donations to Goode, a Republican who also serves on the House Appropriations Committee. After making a $4,000 donation from himself and his wife, Berglund gave the same amount to two employees, telling them to donate to Goode’s campaign—a direct violation of the Federal Election Campaign Act.
    MZM has a well-established history of bribery: Wade pleaded guilty to bribing another congressman, Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, in order to help win Defense Department contracts. Cunningham pleaded guilty to taking $2.4 million in bribes and was sentenced to more than eight years in prison. Wade also admitted making illegal donations to Goode.
    When reached by phone, Linwood Duncan, Goode’s press secretary, had no comment on the Berglund case.
    Goode, who (as reported in a March 7 C-VILLE cover story) was instrumental in opening the Martinsville branch, has said he was unaware that Berglund’s donations were illegal. When the Cunningham scandal first broke, Goode’s campaign gave $88,000 of MZM-linked donations to charities around the district, presumably to avoid any hint of impropriety.