Labels: photos, public safety

Posted by John Nephew on 5/05/2010 09:44:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
Tweet

Something else I learned today from watching the press conference in City Hall: the Maplewood Police Department has a Facebook page. Chief Thomalla said that the condolences received here and elsewhere are being read and much appreciated by Sgt. Bergeron's fellow officers.

Labels: public safety

Posted by John Nephew on 5/03/2010 05:29:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
Tweet

At a press conference held in council chambers just before noon today, the following information was distributed to the news media. I was stopping by city hall at the time and got a copy of the press release.

The services for Sergeant Joseph Bergeron are as follows:

Visitation: May 5,2010 from 4:00 pm to 8:00 pm at the Maplewood Community Center, 2100 White Bear Avenue, Maplewood, MN 55109

Funeral: May 6, 2010, 10:00 am at the Cathedral of Saint Paul, 239 Selby Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55102

Christian Burial: Following the funeral service, St. John's Cemetery, 380 Little Canada Road East, Little Canada, MN 55117

A memorial fund for Sergeant Bergeron's family has been established at the City & County Credit Union. Donations can be sent to:

Sgt. Joe Bergeron Memorial Fund
City & County Credit Union
1661 Cope Avenue East
Maplewood, MN 55109-2614

Media questions regarding logistics and other matters specific to the funeral should be directed to St. Paul Police Sergeant Paul Schnell at 651-755-1520.

General questions may be directed to Maplewood Police Department Deputy Chief Dave Kvam at 651-249-2603 or dave.kvam@ci.maplewood.mn.us.

I am told that the Community Center's regular operations will be closing starting at 3 PM on Wednesday for the visitation [Update, 5/4: Looking at the city website, it looks like the decision was made to close the Community Center earlier, at noon]. It sounds like City Hall will be closed during the time of the funeral on Thursday as well.

Also, the City Council/Manager Workshop scheduled for this evening has been cancelled. Those agenda items will come back for a workshop at a future date (probably next Monday before our regular council meeting).

Labels: events, media, public safety

Posted by John Nephew on 5/03/2010 01:14:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
Tweet

As our community faces the tragic loss of Sgt. Bergeron this morning, here are links to some of the local news media coverage of the story:

• Minnesota Public Radio
• KARE11's video of today's 3 PM press conference with Chiefs Harrington and Thomalla and Mayors Rossbach and Coleman
• KARE11's news story
• KSTP-TV story, and a comment area for people to offer their condolences
• WCCO-TV
• Fox9 story, and another place for condolences
• Pioneer Press
• Star Tribune

The police will have another press conference at 8:00 tonight with the latest updates. Some of the TV stations interrupted their regular programming to broadcast the two earlier press conferences live, so that may happen again.

Labels: media, public safety

Posted by John Nephew on 5/01/2010 05:49:00 PM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
Tweet

You know it's not going to be good news when you get a phone call from the city manager before 8 AM on a Saturday.

This will no doubt be all over the news today. At the moment, here are the preliminary "breaking news" stories I see online: WCCO, KARE, Fox9.

I'll leave it to the official channels to provide accurate and current information. Otherwise all I can say is that I'm stunned and saddened, and my heart goes out to the family, friends and colleagues of the officer.

Update: On live TV I see that it is reported that the officer was killed.

Labels: public safety

Posted by John Nephew on 5/01/2010 08:34:00 AM Email to a Friend | Permalink | Comments
Tweet