In harassment case against off-duty Nassau cop, opening statements give different versions of encounter

The prosecution in the harassment case against an off-duty Nassau police officer painted her Thursday as belligerent and out of control during a 2013 encounter in a West Hempstead parking lot, while her defense lawyer told jurors that she was defending herself against two male on-duty colleagues who were unprofessional and demeaning.

Dolores Sharpe, 53, of Jamaica, Queens, shouted and cursed and "flailed" at the officers, and refused at first to show her police identification, prosecutor Jared Chester told a jury in First District Court in Hempstead.

"She was not in control. . . . She was not calm. She was not collected. She was not composed," Chester told the jury in his opening statement before Judge Susan Kluewer.

"She was going to do whatever she wanted," Chester said at another point.

Defense attorney Frederick Brewington of Hempstead told the jury that arresting Officers Charles Volpe and Victor Gladitz, who are white, did not behave in a professional manner in dealing with Sharpe, who is African-American.

He said the uniformed officers cursed at her and demeaned her, "but she retained her dignity."

"I'm going to admit to you she was not collected," Brewington told the jury. "But the evidence will show she was calm and composed." Brewington said at a court appearance last month that the officers' comments were a display of "racial bias."

Sharpe, on the force for almost 20 years, was charged with harassment and resisting arrest, a misdemeanor, after the encounter in the parking lot behind discount stores at 188 Hempstead Tpke.

Volpe, a 10-year veteran of the Nassau police force, then took the witness stand. He recounted how he initially encountered Sharpe while following up on an earlier traffic accident in the parking lot.

They exchanged words after she claimed his police vehicle was blocking her from a parking spot on a busy shopping day, the day after Thanksgiving, he said, adding that she claimed to be a police officer.

Volpe said he drove out onto Hempstead Turnpike and saw his usual patrol partner, Victor Gladitz, in another police car. He and Gladitz returned to the lot to investigate what they thought might be someone impersonating a police officer, he said.

Sharpe was leaving her parking space, and he turned on his emergency lights, he said. She pulled over after leaving the parking lot, jumped out of car, ran back to his vehicle and shouted at him through the closed window, he said. "She was cursing at me," he testified.

After Gladitz moved her away from the patrol car, Volpe said he approached Sharpe and asked to see her identification. She flicked the ID in his face briefly, but he could not see it, he said.

When she flicked it again, he grabbed it, she yanked backward and the chain attached to her ID snapped, Volpe testified.

Volpe was due back on the stand Friday.