This document is part of a series about Randall "Duke" Cunningham's attempted murder / suicide on November 25th, 2005

Home page for "Cunningham's Last Battle" web site / Contact the author / victim / witness Russell 'Ace' Hoffman

December 30th, 2005

Hi Alex,

If you wish to write an article like that, I sure wouldn't object!  You've certainly spent enough time on this already, it would be nice if SOMETHING came of it for you. ;)

Today, my wife and I went down to the San Marcos Sheriff's Department to see what we could make happen in person.  I was afraid that if they had any videotape which might be of some use, it might get erased after a time.  But, it turns out San Marcos has none of those cameras.

Also, unfortunately we were told that because it's an "incident number" (not a actual case number) they don't have ANY paperwork on the incident, although they do have a computer log of the event, which, they tell me, they will have for "years and years" and which includes the fact that there is a part from the other car -- which prompted the person (I think her name was Cheryl) at the Sheriff's station to say to me, "Didn't he [the responding officer] take that from you?").  I responded, "No."

Cheryl said that the officer who responded to the call will be on duty tonight and I was told to call him this evening, so that's what I plan to do.  I will ask him if he got the fax I sent about the incident (my guess now is that he's going to say no), and I will ask him specifically to contact Cunningham and ask him about this incident.  I'll let you know right away what the officer tells me he'll do (or not do, as the case may be).

We also visited the DMV today, who said they don't investigate accidents themselves, although I don't think that's entirely correct.  And we went to our local (Carlsbad) PD, too, just for good measure, where I got some really good advice, but that's all they could provide me with at this time.

[Note: The advice was given by the receptionist at the front desk, who had worked for the police for more than a decade, and who said that YES, accidents like this ARE normally investigated, and if you have the probable name of the other driver, then YES, the police will -- at the very least -- go and talk to that person. This provided us with the proof we needed that the SMSD was behaving abnormally. -- ACE]

[unrelated comments omitted]

I've thought about making an "Evade Cunningham!" game, of course -- it would be educational, but I'm afraid most of the time it would end in disaster and who would want to play THAT game?

Lastly, I'm sure there ARE a variety of tools that are available for designing straight-forward games that these, but I haven't explored those sorts of tools.

Best wishes,

Russell Hoffman
Carlsbad, CA