Charges Mount Against Eames

The case of Jefferson Davis Eames versus the East Hampton Town Police Department took another turn on Nov. 15, when the Springs man, who is suing the department for violating his civil rights, was arrested on a charge of driving while high on drugs. 

Police said they stopped Mr. Eames’s 2016 Chevrolet Silverado after it ran a stop sign at the intersection of Abraham’s Path and Springs-Fireplace Road in East Hampton. During questioning, the driver “displayed an inability to focus, and had shifting and dramatic mood changes.” He was asked to perform roadside sobriety tests and reportedly failed. 

Back at headquarters, according to police, he refused to allow blood to be drawn to determine whether he had drugs in his system.

Mr. Eames, who was held overnight for a morning arraignment, was also charged with a second misdemeanor, aggravated unlicensed driving. His license was suspended recently for failure to make a court-ordered payment.

Bail was set the next day at $750, which was posted. East Hampton Town Justice Steven Tekulsky again suspended the defendant’s driving privileges, saying he was a “persistent violator” of the state’s vehicle and traffic laws. 

Mr. Eames has had several run-ins with town police in the last few years, including two incidents involving road rage. One of them, from 2012, in which he was charged with criminal impersonation of an officer, has been dismissed. An unrelated charge of harassment is still pending in Justice Court.

The other road-rage complaint was lodged in December 2013 by the wife of a town policeman, following a confrontation with Mr. Eames outside his house on Neck Path. Mr. Eames was arrested two weeks later, the day before Christmas, on misdemeanor charges of reckless endangerment and reckless driving, and a violation charge of harassment. His wife, Melissa Eames, was charged with harassment as well.

Christmas Eve will mark the third anniversary of that arrest, which has yet to be adjudicated. Both East Hampton Town justices, Steven Tekulsky and Lisa R. Rana, recused themselves. The case was transferred to Southampton, but that town’s justices recused themselves as well. After a third recusal at the county level, the case was moved to the courtroom of Riverhead Town Justice Allen M. Smith. Mr. Eames is due back there on Jan. 3.

According to Michael Griffiths, Mr. Eames’s lawyer, there was a pre-trial motion to have Justice Smith try the case here in East Hampton. It was apparently denied.

Melissa Eames, meanwhile, was found guilty of the harassment charge in the Riverhead court. Her sentence is not known, but it did not involve jail time. 

Mr. Eames filed a lawsuit a year ago in Federal District Court, Central Islip, against the Police Department, its current chief, Michael Sarlo, its prior chief, Edward Ecker Jr., the officers involved in the 2012 and 2013 arrests, and the Town of East Hampton, alleging that in making the arrests the police violated his 14th Amendment rights to due process and equal protection under the law, as well as the First, Fourth, and Fifth Amendments. Patricia Weiss of Sag Harbor is his attorney. 

The suit alleges that Chief Sarlo had a personal dispute with Mr. Eames and made him a police target. It seeks damages of at least $45,000 and asks, among other things, that town police officers be required to wear body cameras while on duty.

According to court records, Mark A. Radi of Sokoloff Stern, a Carle Place law firm, U.S. District Judge Joan M. Azrack is currently considering the defendants’ motion to dismiss Mr. Eames’s suit.