Deltona, Florida – A former officer from the Miami-Dade Police Department, Paul Fultty, was arrested this week for allegedly using his previous badge and credentials to impersonate a police officer.
Volusia County deputies encountered Fultty, 39, after a report was made by a man searching for a missing girl in a nearby driveway.
Fultty claimed to the deputies that he was a Miami-Dade officer working alongside a former U.S. official to locate the girl, stating that her phone had pinged in the area, according to the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office.
Body camera footage featured interactions between deputies and Fultty, where he displayed a police badge and showed a photo of his qualifications on his phone.
He also informed deputies that the girl had been “running from the police,” suggesting that was the reason he wasn’t in a marked police vehicle, and mentioned she wasn’t “officially” missing.
Further inquiries revealed that Fultty had been fired from the Miami-Dade Police Department earlier this year, and he was arrested shortly after his first encounter with the deputies.
In another segment of the body camera video, a Volusia County deputy can be heard arresting Fultty, who responded, “What did I do?” as he was being handcuffed. The deputies informed him that he was being charged with impersonating an officer.
“My name is Google. I got everything with this year’s executives,” Fultty remarked before being taken into custody.
In a May 2020 article, it was noted that Fultty had received the title of officer of the year from the Miami-Dade Police Department after being shot while responding to a domestic battery situation.
After his arrest, Fultty expressed to Volusia County deputies that he made a “mistake” by presenting his old badge and claims of being a police officer were made “accidentally,” according to the sheriff’s office.
Detectives collected documents during their investigation indicating that Fultty could have been a private investigator in the area for an insurance matter.
Fultty was charged with impersonating a police officer and booked into the Volusia County Branch Jail. He managed to post a $2,000 bond the following afternoon.
