E-mail asks state troopers to be on best behavior

After a string of disciplinary actions against North Carolina state troopers, state officials have asked all employees of the Highway Patrol to uphold the high ethical standards on which the agency was founded 80 years ago.

Posted 3:27 p.m. Sep 24, 2009 — Updated 4:31 p.m. Sep 24, 2009

RALEIGH, N.C. — After a string of disciplinary actions against North Carolina state troopers, state officials have asked all employees of the Highway Patrol to uphold the high ethical standards on which the agency was founded 80 years ago.

Secretary of Crime Control and Public Safety Reuben Young and Col. Randy Glover, commander of the Highway Patrol, sent an e-mail Wednesday to the more than 1,800 state troopers and 300 civilian employees in the agency, reminding them that their actions on and off duty are scrutinized.

"It is easy for the entire organization to be judged by the acts of a few, so each and every one of us owe it to our fellow troopers to be morally and ethically beyond reproach," they wrote in the e-mail. "Gov. (Beverly) Perdue has made it clear that she will accept nothing less than a state government that operates with the utmost transparency and accountability to the people, and the patrol is no exception. We ask you to join us in committing to these same ideals."

A number of troopers have been demoted or fired in the past two years for offenses including drunken driving, profiling young women for traffic stops, having sex on duty and animal abuse.

This week, a former Highway Patrol sergeant had a court hearing in his effort to be reinstated after he was fired for having a drunken sexual encounter with a subordinate's wife.

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