Thread: HPD: Carnaby flashed CIA card before deadly chase

April 30, 2008, 8:36PM
HPD: Carnaby flashed CIA card before deadly chase
Killed man known to his friends as a federal intelligence officer


By MIKE TOLSON, LINDSAY WISE and MIKE GLENN
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle

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Looking at Roland Carnaby's mementos

The man Houston police fatally shot after an hourlong chase Tuesday had shown a card identifying him as a CIA employee to officers who stopped him earlier for speeding, authorities said Wednesday.

"He (the officer) did not know what federal credentials looked like," said Capt. Steve Jett, with Houston Police Department's homicide division. "They look authentic, but you can do a lot of things with a computer."

Officers shot and killed 52-year-old Roland Vincent Carnaby, saying they feared for their lives when he reached under the seat of his Jeep sport utility vehicle after the chase had ended and he'd gotten out of his car.

The shiny object that Carnaby was apparently reaching for was a personal assistant-cellular phone, Jett said Wednesday.

Officers found three weapons inside the Jeep after it was impounded. One pistol was under the passenger-side floor mat while a second was between the seats. A pistol-grip shotgun was on the floor board of the back seat.

"We believe they are all legal," Jett said. "We have no reason to believe he didn't own them."

Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt also reiterated that he had no connection — personal or professional — with Carnaby.

"I didn't recall his name or realize who he was until I saw his photo" on the news, Hurtt said.

A photograph of the two men was taken at an HPD ball within the last year or so, Hurtt said.

"I've taken pictures with probably another thousand Houstonians in the last four years," Hurtt said.

Who Carnaby was remains a mystery to many.

He held himself out as a federal intelligence agent but was sometimes cagey about his precise job and employer. At times he mentioned the Central Intelligence Agency or the Department of Homeland Security. He was the president of the local chapter of the Association for Intelligence Officers, a legitimate national organization whose board contains luminaries such as former President George H.W. Bush. Friends said they have seen him in the company socially of local law enforcement officials and high-level CIA bureaucrats.

CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano said that Carnaby was not employed by the agency.

"While we do not as a rule publicly deny or confirm employment, I will tell you in this case that Mr. Carnaby was not an employee of the Central Intelligence Agency," Gimigliano said. "He was never a CIA officer."

Wife: He worked for CIA for 30 years

Susan Carnaby said her husband has worked for the agency for 30 years.

He often travelled overseas, leaving for months at a time. If he was in Washington, he would tell her, but most of the time she had no idea where he had gone, she said. It was top secret, he told her.

"Just tried to keep myself busy as much as I can," she said Wednesday. "Obviously he'd tell me who he worked for but he never could talk to me about the cases that he did. But that was for my own protection. I really didn't want to know."

Carnaby described her husband as a patriot.

"He just loved his country," she said. "I think that's his main motivation. He's just very devoted to it and he enjoyed what he did. I guess it made him feel important."

The last time she saw him was in March, she said. They kept in touch regularly by e-mail and phone.

That government officials deny her husband worked for the CIA or the FBI doesn't surprise her.

"No, because why would they even admit it?" she said. "How many cases could that blow? I think that's not their policy to make comments on that type of thing. Roland always told me that if anything ever happened to him don't expect anyone to stand up and say that's what he did for a living. They keep these things undercover for a reason."

Car dealer's close friend

Car dealer Alan Helfman met Carnaby more than a decade ago when "a mutual friend high in law enforcement" brought him by the dealership. "He bought eight or nine cars from me over the years," Helfman said.

Carnaby told Helfman he was a federal officer who worked in intelligence. The two men struck up a close friendship.

"He was always teasing me about being a reserve constable," said Helfman, who volunteers for Harris County Precinct 7.

Friends insist Carnaby was very much who he said he was, even if he was less than specific about his duties. One recalled a recent party in Washington that they both attended for retired intelligence agents.


'A blank page'
"Most of what he does is so classified that regular homicide (detectives) will come up with a blank page and then a question about why you are asking," said Fred Platt, the vice president of the local chapter of intelligence agents. "He's here because of homeland security. The port and the airport. He knows everybody on the command staff of every agency."

Local law enforcement officials, however, say they don't know him, including Hurtt and Harris County Sheriff Tommy Thomas. The local FBI office also claims to have no knowledge of him.

Carnaby traveled frequently for work, Helfman said, but whenever he was in Houston, he visited the dealership on a daily basis. Helfman said Carnaby spoke seven languages and always carried an arsenal of weapons, including several guns and a knife.

"He was always showing me his knife tricks," he said. "He was real good at karate, too."

Carnaby was tight-lipped about his work and his private life, and Helfman said he didn't question him.

"His entire life has always been clandestine. His girlfriends didn't even know what he was doing," Helfman said.

Even mundane details of Carnaby's life were tinged with mystery. His address listed with the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles is a private mailbox at a UPS Store near downtown. The address at which he registered his Jeep Commander was a different UPS Store in Pearland.

Whatever his real story, Carnaby's life came to an end about 11 a.m. Tuesday after police forced his vehicle to a stop. He didn't acknowledge the officers who encircled him with guns drawn. And he "refused to put his hands where the officers could see him," said Houston Police Sgt. John Chomiak.

"The driver refused to comply, talk or roll down the window," Chomiak said.

He opened the driver's side door only after one of the officers smashed the passenger-side window, police said.

"He stepped out of his vehicle, turned around and reached under the seat," Chomiak said.

When he did, two officers each fired one time, authorities said. The officers were identified by police officials as HPD Sgt. A.J. Washington and officer C.A. Foster. Carnaby was later pronounced dead at Ben Taub Hospital.

The incident lasted most of an hour. It began with a routine traffic stop when Carnaby was pulled over for speeding along Texas 288 near Orem. Carnaby raced away after the officers learned he had a license to carry a concealed weapon, police said.


120-mph chase
With the officers in close pursuit, the Jeep raced north along the South Freeway, with speeds reaching 120 mph toward downtown Houston before heading west on the Katy Freeway. Carnaby then headed south along the West Loop, exiting at Woodway where the chase finally came to an end.

Harris County medical examiners said the autopsy probably would be performed Wednesday.

Washington, a 22-year HPD veteran, and Foster, who has been on the force for about 15 years, later told investigators they fired because they were in fear for their safety, police said.

Police said the shooting was apparently captured by the dashboard cameras of the HPD patrol cars.

Carnaby slumped to the ground after the officers began firing. He was motionless when they placed him in handcuffs.


'This doesn't smell right'
The frontage road was closed for several hours Tuesday as investigators questioned the officers behind long lines of crime scene tape.

"What's going on?" a passing motorist shouted out as he crawled along the clogged West Loop.

That's the question his friends want answered. They say Carnaby had no reason to run or disobey police.

Platt said he had dined with Carnaby both Saturday and Sunday and nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Carnaby was engaged to be married, he said, and led a happy life.

"I can't fathom any reason why he would be running from the police because he is the police," Platt said. "This doesn't make any sense. I can't understand him running or why they opened up on him. This doesn't smell right."

Staff reporter Cindy George contributed to this report.

mike.tolson@chron.com
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mike.glenn@chron.com

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5741363.html

May 1, 2008, 9:04AM

Was it a spy, or would-be spy, in that SUV?
Despite CIA mementos and other evidence, Roland Carnaby's life remains an enigma


By LINDSAY WISE, DALE LEZON and MIKE TOLSON
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle

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Looking at Roland Carnaby's mementos

Much about Roland Carnaby's life speaks to a long career as a devoted intelligence officer — from his effort to build a local chapter of the professional association to his personal friendships with current and former members of the intelligence community to his respect and affection for law enforcement and its dignitaries.

His home in Pearland is filled with pieces of his patriotic past. Plaques honor his years of service to the Central Intelligence Agency. A book written by former CIA Director George Tenet is inscribed with a warm and playful message. Photos of him at CIA headquarters, in front of military aircraft and with various dignitaries are prominently displayed.

A small room off the front foyer was Carnaby's study. There's an American flag on the wall and a "CIA" coffee mug on the desk.

Now, in the wake of his strange death Tuesday at the conclusion of a high-speed police chase, doubts have been raised about his oft-projected persona as a CIA operative by the agency itself. It bluntly disavowed employing him. Might the denial be little more than standard operating procedure, as his wife suggests? Or could it be that he spent years constructing an elaborate fraud, with a home filled more with artifice than artifacts?

When his wife, Susan, was asked if she now thinks it possible her husband could have been lying to her for more than a decade, she hesitated.

"How would you know?" she replied quietly. "How would you know if what anybody told you was true?"

As family and friends gathered to mourn his loss, her wavering confidence loomed large. A day after police shot him as he made an ill-advised move upon exiting his SUV, the Carnaby that so many thought they knew had become a shadowy figure, one who apparently concealed from his wife his true whereabouts and from his friends many of the pertinent details of his private life. Even some who stand by him admit they never got to know him really well.

"He never really wanted to talk about his personal life," said one friend who asked not to be named. "Obviously there are some missing pieces."

This friend, and others, remain loyal, both to the warm and engaging man they knew and to the intelligence agent he claimed to be. They insist his bona fides were too solid and his recognition by former intelligence personnel too genuine for him to be a fake. A caller identifying himself only as "Chuck" and responding to an inquiry sent to chapters of the Association for Intelligence Officers insisted Carnaby worked with the CIA in the 1980s in its Soviet Union unit.

The CIA disputes this, which if true means that the agency identification he carried with him at the time of his death and which he occasionally flashed to friends and law enforcement officers would have been bogus.

"While we do not as a rule publicly deny or confirm employment, I will tell you in this case that Mr. Carnaby was not an employee of the Central Intelligence Agency," CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano said. "He was never a CIA officer."


Wife doubts CIA denial
Of course, the denial doesn't prove that the agency never used him as a contractor. Carnaby was fluent in many languages, family and friends say, including Arabic and French, and could have been useful in the Mideast, especially in the waning days of the Cold War.


Susan Carnaby does not put much stock in the CIA denial.

"No, because why would they even admit it?" she said. "How many cases could that blow? I think that's not their policy to make comments on that type of thing. Roland always told me that if anything ever happened to him don't expect anyone to stand up and say that's what he did for a living. They keep these things undercover for a reason."

A former wife, however, is less convinced. Sha'rie Burch, who lives in Willis, said much about her ex-husband struck her as odd when they were married. He told her he worked with the CIA and even had a small badge, but never explained what he did. If she asked for more details, she said, he'd get defensive and not answer.

"He had very big, tall stories that were hard to believe," Burch said. "It was kind of a suspicious thing."


Port Authority connection
On the other hand, he was friends with local federal agents and they often came to the couple's Spring home for dinner, Burch said. The couple had private dinners with the head of the Houston Port Authority, she said, and Carnaby also was close friends with former Harris County Sheriff Johnny Klevenhagen, who she said was best man at their wedding in 1986. Klevenhagen died in 1999.


The Port Authority connection could make sense for a strictly commercial reason. Carnaby's family, which used the different spelling of Karnabe, was involved in the shipping industry, which was the apparent source of his considerable but undetermined income. He paid cash for his cars.

Burch said she first met him when she was about 19. Friends introduced them. He was 10 years older, drove a Ferrari and boasted about his family homes in New York and Geneva.

He was the son of a wealthy Lebanese family that owns a shipping business, she said. She said he told her that he was born and raised in New York City.

His father, Vincent Said Carnaby, was a Lebanese ambassador to several countries, she said, and son Roland worked for the family business and often traveled for business.

He and Burch divorced in 1993. Part of the reason, she said, was his hot temper.

By the time of their divorce, Carnaby already had another romance brewing. A petite woman with curly brown hair and glasses, Susan Carnaby teaches eighth grade in Northshore. The 55-year-old met her husband about 17 years ago when she worked as the manager of a men's store in the Galleria.

She described him as a gentleman, worldly and traveled.

"He's one of those people who's very unique, very vibrant, the life of the party, knows everybody," she said. "He likes to be around people. He's a people person."

He told her he was a CIA agent and she had no reason to doubt him, she said.

After dating for about five years, the couple married in Las Vegas on Nov. 10, 1997. "He planned the whole thing," she said.

Susan Carnaby said her husband often traveled overseas, leaving for months at a time. If he was in Washington, he would tell her, but most of the time she had no idea where he had gone, she said. It was top secret, he told her.

The last time she saw her husband was in March, she said.

The news that he was in town when he was supposedly traveling, and the mention of a supposed fiancee, stunned her when she learned it after his death. She said she and her husband were not separated.

"Not as far as I know," she said, adding that the couple just moved into their new house in Pearland last June. "All his things are here."

Police Wednesday were still trying to fit together the series of events that ended when Carnaby was shot by officers who surrounded his vehicle after a chase that ended near the Galleria.

During the chase, Carnaby called a friend on his cell phone. The friend, whom police have not identified, was supposed to have lunch with Carnaby that day.

"The guy was telling him, 'You need to pull over. You need to do what the officers are telling you,' " said Capt. Steve Jett, commander of HPD's homicide division. "His answer was, 'I can't.' "


Tapes back HPD's account
Police don't know why Carnaby felt unable to comply with the officers' demands. He appeared shaky and nervous when pulled over for speeding on Texas 288 near West Orem. He presented a card identifying himself as a CIA employee.


The card was laminated and bore the seal of the espionage agency.

Police said they are waiting for federal officials to determine if the document was legitimate or a fabrication.

Investigators said the three weapons discovered in his car appeared to be Carnaby's and were legally owned. One pistol was under the passenger-side floor mat while a second was between the seats. A pistol-grip shotgun was on the floor board of the back seat. Jett said a round was in the shotgun and the safety was off.

"All he would have to do was reach over the console and pick it up," Jett said.

The officers told investigators they feared for their safety when he reached back into the Jeep for what turned out to be a "shiny" personal assistant-cellular phone.

Jett said there is video and audio that backs up the officers' contention that Carnaby acted "erratically," before making a "very quick overt move" toward an officer.

He said the HPD would probably seek to prevent release of the audio and video until the investigation concludes.

"We have no idea why he ran. We are investigating that," he said. "He was very nervous. The officer said that he was shaking, and the officer didn't understand because most law enforcement would have been friendly."

A review of public records showed that Carnaby had a clean record save for two speeding tickets, including one last summer in Fairfax, Va.

Reporters Mike Glenn, Stewart M. Powell and Matt Stiles contributed to this report.

lindsay.wise@chron.com
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http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5744733.html

Even mundane details of Carnaby's life were tinged with mystery. His address listed with the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles is a private mailbox at a UPS Store near downtown. The address at which he registered his Jeep Commander was a different UPS Store in Pearland

Under the Real ID ACT, this would not be allowed. Even if the guy was working to protect our country. No exceptions under the Real ID.