Former city cop fired in 2004, records show

The High Point Enterprise, N.C.

Feb. 23—HIGH POINT — A Thomasville woman arrested last week in connection with the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol was fired by the High Point Police Department shortly after being disciplined for violating department policies on behavior and conduct toward the public, according to personnel file information.

Laura L. Steele, now 52, held the rank of master police officer III when she was suspended for two days in July 2004, according to information released Monday by the High Point Police Department.

Steele then was fired in August 2004 "for conduct toward superior personnel, absence from duty, and violation of communications policy," the information said.

No details about what Steele did were released.

Although most information in public employees' personnel files is not public information, North Carolina law specifies information that should be released, including information about an individual's pay, changes in position and termination.

Steele is one of nine people who authorities say are associated with a group called the Oath Keepers, which includes many former military and law enforcement members, who have been arrested and charged in connection with the riot and storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6. The indictments allege that the Oath Keepers organized ahead of Jan. 6 and planned storming the Capitol, including coming equipped with tactical gear, weapons and communications equipment to coordinate the movements.

She is married to retired High Point Police Department Assistant Chief Kenneth Steele, who retired effective Jan. 1 but worked only a few days into December, a police department spokesman has said. Kenneth Steele has not been charged in the Jan. 6 riot and is not mentioned in the indictment describing Laura Steele's activities.

Until her recent arrest, Laura Steele's only prominent negative press attention happened during two pepper spray incidents with students arrested on a disorderly conduct charge in February 2001, when she was working as a school resource officer. One of the incidents involved a 16-year-old student at Southwest Guilford High School and the other an 11-year-old student at Southwest Guilford Middle School. A police investigation cleared Steele in both incidents.

Recommended Stories

  • 'X-Files', 'Lost' in Mickey's clubhouse as Disney+ Star lands in Europe, Canada

    Star, which joins Pixar, Marvel and other tiles on the Disney+ app's home screen, will feature entertainment with more mature ratings, including TV series "Grey's Anatomy" and "The X-Files" as well as movies including "Pretty Woman", "Die Hard 2" and "Moulin Rouge". Streaming service providers have been bolstering their offerings and expanding into more markets as people stuck at home during the COVID-19 pandemic turn to online content to keep themselves and their families entertained. Disney+ Star will be rolled out later in 2021 in new markets such as Eastern Europe, Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea, the company said in a statement.

  • New Jersey legalizes marijuana, scraps criminal penalties for underage users

    New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) wanted to legalize marijuana within his first 100 days in office. He succeeded three years later, and three months after New Jersey voters overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure to make weed legal for adults. Murphy signed a series of laws Monday that decriminalized possession of up to six ounces of marijuana, creates a recreational marijuana marketplace for adults, and bars criminal penalties for people under 21 caught with either pot or alcohol. Murphy quietly signed the bills Monday morning, right after the state Senate and Assembly passed the measure creating civil penalties for underage possession. The legislature had sent the other bills to Murphy in December, but he had declined to sign them until the youth penalties were ironed out. Murphy said he did not want young people, especially the young Black people disproportionately arrested for marijuana possession, to get "tangled up in our criminal justice system." He highlighted the criminal justice aspect of the legislation — and dropped in a weed pun — in a celebratory tweet Monday night. Let me be blunt: Today, I signed historic adult-use cannabis reform bills into law – with social justice, racial justice, and economic justice leading the way.https://t.co/jmPs8ng2eg pic.twitter.com/0b0X0aRyua — Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) February 23, 2021 Once a new Cannabis Regulatory Commission is seated, it will have six months to set up rules and regulations and begin licensing recreational dispensaries. The cessation of marijuana arrests, decried by some police unions, should begin much quicker. Under the new law, minors caught with alcohol or marijuana will get written warnings, escalated to parental involvement and then community service for repeat violations. More stories from theweek.comMichael Cohen predicts Trump tax investigation will end with jail timeWhat happens next in New York's criminal investigation of Trump and his businessResign, Andrew Cuomo

  • New Zealand coronavirus cluster grows with three new cases

    New Zealand reported three new locally transmitted cases of coronavirus on Tuesday, as the cluster in its biggest city of Auckland expanded just days after authorities were forced to impose fresh curbs. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern lifted a brief COVID-19 lockdown in Auckland last week, saying the measures had helped limit the spread of the infection to a family of three. However, a student from Papatoetoe High School in Auckland was reported to have tested positive for COVID-19 earlier in the day.

  • Baylor back from pause, resumes bid for undefeated season

    Baylor is back in its bid for an undefeated season. The Bears have a day to get ready for No. 10 West Virginia, and play again two days later at No. 17 Kansas. ''I'd like to believe that we're going to pick up where we left off,'' Baylor junior guard Jared Butler said.

  • HSBC resumes dividend as profits drop by a third

    HSBC announced a final dividend of $0.15 despite a 34% fall in profits in 2020.

  • UK unemployment rate rises to highest level since early 2016

    Official jobs figures underline the continued toll of COVID-19 despite prime minister Boris Johnson promising 'the end is in sight.'

  • UK jobless rate hits 5.1% as Sunak readies more job support

    Britain's jobless rate rose to 5.1% in the last three months of 2020, its highest in nearly five years but still lower than it would have been without a huge coronavirus jobs support scheme that finance minister Rishi Sunak looks set to extend next week. Separate data from the Office for National Statistics showed that the number of employees on company payrolls in January rose by 83,000 from December, the second monthly increase and its biggest since January 2015. The jobless rate - the highest since the first three months of 2016 - was in line with the median forecast in a Reuters poll of economists.

  • 75-year-old protester shoved to ground by police in Buffalo files lawsuit

    Martin Gugino, 75, suffered a fractured skull after being shoved during a protest on June 4. A grand jury declined to charge the two officers.

  • India's richest family is planning to build the world's largest zoo, and the 280-acre project has already sparked a protest by animal activists

    Activists protested the Ambanis' acquisition of two black panthers from a state-run zoo.

  • A year on, India's riot victims say justice still unserved

    The shooter shouted “Victory to Lord Ram,” the Hindu god, before pulling the trigger that sent a bullet into Muhammad Nasir Khan’s left eye. Khan placed his trembling hand on his bloody eye socket and his fingers slipped deep into the wound. At that moment, Khan was sure he would die.

  • Read Joe Biden’s speech as nation’s coronavirus death toll surpasses 500,000 lives

    ‘We often hear people described as ‘ordinary Americans’. There’s no such thing; there’s nothing ordinary about them. The people we lost were extraordinary’

  • Editorial: The price of underestimating COVID: 500,000 dead

    A year ago, the experts thought the worst-case scenario for COVID-19 was 240,000 deaths in the U.S. That wasn't the only way that we underestimated this virus.

  • Gina Carano: Mandalorian star accuses Disney and Lucasfilm of 'bullying'

    Former Mandalorian star hits back after being dropped from Star Wars series over controversial post.

  • Capitol Police: What we know about the 2 officers suspended, more investigated in DC riots

    Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told House Democrats on Monday that as many as 15 instances of officer misconduct in the Capitol riot are under investigation.

  • 'We get our President or we die': FBI issued dire warning day before Capitol riots; 170 suspects investigated

    The FBI Norfolk office issued a dire internal warning on the day before the Capitol riots that violent extremists were planning an armed uprising.

  • Major moments in Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's relationship

    Here are the biggest moments from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's relationship.

  • Biden administration asks U.S. Supreme Court to dump Medicaid work case

    President Joe Biden's administration on Monday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to cancel an upcoming oral argument on a policy introduced under his predecessor Donald Trump backing work requirements for people who receive healthcare under the Medicaid program for the poor. Acting Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar said the Biden administration has started the process of reversing the previous policy and asked the justices to dump the scheduled March 29 arguments concerning pilot programs adopted by the states of Arkansas and New Hampshire. Under Trump, the Department of Health and Human Services in 2018 approved the pilot projects in those two states as part of a push to put a conservative stamp on Medicaid, a program that was expanded under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, to provide coverage to millions more Americans.

  • Trump likely to dangle possibility of a 2024 run in first post-White House speech, activist says

    Former President Donald Trump is likely to dangle the possibility of running again for president in 2024 in his first major post-White House speech this weekend, the organizer of the conservative conference where Trump will speak said on Monday. Matt Schlapp, chairman of the American Conservative Union, which hosts the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) where Trump will speak on Sunday, said he expected Trump to outline an active role in Republican Party politics at the four-day event in Orlando, Florida.

  • Maduro’s dictatorship in Venezuela is a global challenge and demands a global response | Opinion

    Last December, I had the unforgettable opportunity to travel to Cúcuta, with the support of Colombian immigration authorities, and meet with hundreds of my fellow Venezuelans who, fleeing the dictatorship of Nicolás Maduro, crossed the border and sought refuge in Colombian territory. Women, men, and children not only talked about their suffering but also tirelessly repeated: We must continue fighting, we must put an end to the dictatorship.

  • Covid: Biden calls 500,000 death toll a 'heartbreaking milestone'

    President Joe Biden addresses the nation as the US mourns 500,000 people lost to Covid-19.