Bugs Overthrow Police Headquarters

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Police: Headquarters 'Bugged' With Insects
Bugs Come In Through Holes In Roof, Assistant Chief Says

POSTED: 9:02 pm EDT August 4, 2009
UPDATED: 10:02 pm EDT August 4, 2009


STAMFORD, Conn. -- Members of the Stamford Police Department said Tuesday that their headquarters is overrun with bugs and that some people who have been bitten even got sick.

They said the issue started out as a bunch of officers suffering from mysterious bug bites, but after some investigating, they said they found the source at their headquarters.

Along the roofline of the Stamford Police Department, Assistant Police Chief Susan Bretthauer said, birds are breaking in and it's turning causing a big bug problem.

"Cellulitis, and one officer has one confirmed case of Lyme disease," she said.

Bretthauer said she walks around the outside of the building, which was built in the 1950s, and can see holes where the birds are entering.

Once inside, she said, they're generating ticks and other bugs that are biting their way through the ranks all the way to the top.

"The chief is one of them," Bretthauer said. "He had a bug bite on his shoulder."

An exterminator is trying to solve the problem, she said, and the station's property crime area is currently cordoned off while it's being treated. She said that's where the officer who got sick after being bitten worked.

"At one level, it is disconcerting to say the least, the area you work to have these things inside," she said. "It's bad enough, you have them outside."

But Bretthauer said the department is treating the problem seriously, though it has become the source of some jokes.

Once the problem is fixed, Bretthauer said the department plans to cover the openings along the roof to keep