Bert 3

Taken from the Cincinnati Enquirer Friday, March 22, 2002

Village officials face obstruction charges

New Vienna officer jailed in isolation cell

WILMINGTON — There may be more people charged in the case of a part-time police officer in the tiny village of New Vienna who is charged with murder for shooting a suspect, a Clinton County law enforcement officer said Thursday.

Obstruction charges are possible against those suspected of withholding documents that deputies needed to make their case against the 29-year-old police officer, David M. Mueller.

“I would not be surprised to see other people charged,” said Chief Deputy Ralph D. Fizer Jr.

Mr. Mueller — a part-time officer in a village police department where the only full-time employee is the chief — was in an isolation cell in the Clinton County jail Thursday after arraignment on charges of murder and tampering with evidence. Bail was set at $100,000. He was arrested near his home in Hamilton on Wednesday.

Assistant County Prosecutor Rick Moyer would not comment Thursday on the possibility of additional charges.

Deputy Fizer would not say who might be charged, but law enforcement officials in this county 50 miles north of Cincinnati are unhappy with New Vienna village officials, who they say stonewalled their repeated requests for documents after the Feb. 4 shooting.

The officer is accused of gunning down 32-year-old Robert Cundiff at his Rice Street home in the village of about 900 people near the Highland County border.

Officer Mueller had responded to a domestic call at the Cundiff home. The man's wife had reported that her husband had threatened to burn down the home with her and her children in it, Deputy Fizer said.

Deputy Fizer said Thursday that sheriff's deputies reconstructed the event before charging the police officer.

“There was no evidence whatsoever that the officer's life was in danger at any time,” Deputy Fizer said.

Deputy Fizer also said there is no evidence that Officer Mueller knew Mr. Cundiff previously and that deputies could find no reports of earlier police calls to the Cundiff house.

In the week following the shooting, sheriff's deputies — working through New Vienna Mayor Timothy Bentz — tried to obtain Officer Mueller's personnel file, the offense report on the incident at the Cundiff home, and a copy of a detailed statement Officer Mueller made to his superiors right after the shooting.

The chief deputy said he talked to the mayor on Feb. 6 and “tried to explain to him that this is all public record and that he needed to get it to us.”

The material was not released by village officials, so Deputy Fizer said the sheriff's department went to court and obtained a warrant to search the New Vienna Village Building.

Deputy Fizer said he does not understand why village officials withheld the documents, except to say that New Vienna “is a strange, strange place. The guys with the high-powered positions there don't seem to want to cooperate with anybody.”

A Clinton County grand jury handed down its indictments against Officer Mueller on Wednesday afternoon. He is scheduled to appear in court again April 12.

Unless Officer Mueller posts bail and is released, Mr. Fizer said, he would be kept in isolation away from the general jail population.

“That's standard operating procedure when a law-enforcement officer has to be put in jail,” Mr. Fizer said.