Thomas Gounley

TGOUNLEY@NEWS-LEADER.COM

At 5:06 a.m. Friday, 25-year-old Richard Deaver, while on his way to work on a scooter, was pulled over by a Springfield police officer. Officer James Whitehead says Deaver ran a flashing red light at the intersection of Cherry and Barnes.

The traffic stop ended up taking about 24 minutes, according to a police dash cam video later released at the request of the News-Leader, and Deaver wasn't happy about it. At some point, he began recording audio of his interactions with officers himself — a recording he would later upload to the online audio platform SoundCloud. A second officer and K-9 unit would search him for marijuana, but Deaver ended up leaving with two citations — one for allegedly disobeying the light, and another for allegedly not having a driver's license.

Once he got to work, Deaver started talking about what had happened to whomever was listening.

As a morning show disc jockey, he had an audience.

By 8 a.m., the Springfield Police Officers Association had asked "all members, and the public at large" to boycott KOSP 92.9 FM, commonly known as 92.9 The Beat — where Deaver is the co-host of "Rich and McClain in the Morning."

"If you use your position as a public figure to disparage an officer and lie about the facts, we have a problem with that," Association President Mike Evans told the News-Leader Friday morning.

KOSP is owned by Mid-West Family Broadcasting. Employees at the company referred a reporter to the company's general manager, who did not respond to a request for comment Friday. In a direct message to a News-Leader reporter, an individual operating the show's Twitter account said Rich had no comment per the request of his boss.

"This is out of my hands," the individual operating the account wrote.

A police incident report compiled by Whitehead alleges Deaver "became irate" when he was stopped and told the traffic stop was due to running a flashing red light.

"Deaver began using an aggressive tone and told me that no one was coming, and he did not have to stop at a flashing red light," Whitehead wrote.

Deaver then told Whitehead that he worked at the radio station, and needed to be at work. When asked for his driver's license, according to the incident report, Deaver responded that he didn't need one to drive a scooter; Whitehead advised him that he did.

During the exchange, Whitehead smelled what he "believed to be a strong odor of marijuana," and asked Deaver if he had any, according to the incident report.

"Deaver said no and asked me why I thought he was a drug dealer," Whitehead wrote. "Deaver also told me that my nose was wrong."

Deaver then again noted that he worked at the radio station, and said he was recording the traffic stop on the phone, according to the incident report. Whitehead told him that was permissible.

"It appeared Deaver was trying to threaten and influence me, by saying he was going to play his recording on his radio station's channel," Whitehead wrote.

After running Deaver's information, Whitehead told him that he had a warrant for his arrest out of Camden County, but that it was non-extraditable.

"I'm just letting you know, in case you go to Camden County," Whitehead can be heard telling Deaver on Deaver's recording.

"There's no way, there's no way," Deaver responds. "Maybe this is a mistake; maybe you looked up my dad? Because we have the same name. There is absolutely no way."

Online court records checked by a reporter indicate that the warrant was issued in July 2012 after Deaver failed to appear at a hearing related to April charges that he operated a vehicle without a valid license and exceeded the posted speed limit by 16 to 19 mph.

Whitehead asked to search Deaver, who did not respond, according to the incident report.

"At this point in the traffic stop, Deaver was still being hostile and I could still smell what appeared to be the odor of marijuana coming from his person or scooter," Whitehead wrote. "I called for a code one back up officer due to Deaver being hostile, and for the possibility that he had drugs."

A K-9 officer responded.

"You brought a K-9 unit at 5:20 in the morning?" Deaver asked dryly, according to his recording.

"Sir, you could be right. I may not have smelled it," Whitehead responded.

"You didn't smell it," Deaver said. "And I want an apology when it's not there."

According to the incident report, the K-9 "indicated the possibility of drugs on the scooter," but when the K-9 officer searched it "he did not locate any contraband." Prior to the search, Deaver was handcuffed and placed in a patrol car "for officer safety."

A major with the department arrived on scene when the officer took off the handcuffs and was completing the citations, and "Deaver became irate, because a third police officer was on the scene," according to the report. Deaver was given a Dec. 10 municipal court date and released.

Exactly what Deaver and co-host Dawn McClain said on "Rich and McClain In the Morning" is unclear. No News-Leader reporters heard the show live, and the station does not appear to make recordings of its shows available online. The show began airing Oct. 20. Deaver came to the station from WPLJ in New York City, while McClain worked as a morning show host at KSPW — more commonly known as Power 96.5 — until leaving earlier this year.

The police association — a labor group that represents those lower in rank than lieutenant within the Springfield Police Department — alleged on its Facebook page that the two hosts "used there (sic) positions as radio hosts to distort the facts and disparage Police Officers, members of our organization."

"We know Officers are not liked or appreciated by many but we find it reprehensible that a public figure would use his position to lie about facts, distort the truth, and try to intimidate our members by threatening to disparage them publicly for doing their job," the association wrote on Facebook.

Prior to saying he could not comment, Deaver communicated extensively online about the arrest. The four-minute recording was posted online, and shared by the radio station on Facebook and Twitter. The station also shared a screenshot of a public records database and suggested that the warrant referenced by officers was for Deaver's father. Both the recording and the screenshot were later deleted, although a reporter made copies, which can be viewed at News-Leader.com.

As the association's call for a boycott gained attention, the police department released the dash cam video about 12:15 p.m. Friday. The entire traffic stop was captured on the patrol car's dash cam, but Whitehead's voice link was not used, meaning that it did not record the exchanges that took place outside the car.

Fifteen minutes into the dash cam footage, Deaver — at this point inside the patrol car — can be heard mocking an officer as he apparently tries to open a compartment on the scooter.

"You wanna open the side, you take the big key and you put it in the little hole on the side," Deaver tells the officer. "And you open the seat that way. OK? … I'm just saying, that's how you open it.

Whitehead can then be heard asking Deaver if he wants to go to jail. Deaver says no.

"I don't wanna take you to jail," Whitehead says. "Just be a little nicer."

Evans said the association's attorney is reviewing the matter to see if what the station aired amounts to defamation. He said he is serious about the boycott.

"If that is what 92.9 is about, we don't think anyone should listen to it," he added.