DOT Error Causes Arrest of Urbandale Church Deacon

A data entry error by the Iowa Department of Transportation spurred by the arrest last week of an Urbandale church deacon.

Quan Tong of Urbandale, an ordained Catholic deacon, was strip-searched and spent six hours in a Polk County Jail cell after an error told Des Moines Police officers he was driving when his license had been revoked, according to the Des Moines Register.

Police and county officials apologized, but they also said the way the error was entered into the system, there was no way for police to avoid putting an innocent man temporarily behind bars.

“The officer would have no way to question the information in front of him,” Kim Snook, director of the Office of Driver Services for the DOT, told the Register.

Tong, as a deacon for the Des Moines Archdiocese, was delivering food to homebound people on Nov. 26 when he stopped near the intersection of 21st Street and Forest Avenue. A patrol car passed Tong while he sat in his parked vehicle; the officer came back, asked for Tong’s driver’s license and checked it via the state computer.

The computer showed the license was revoked. That’s a serious misdemeanor under Iowa law and prompted Tong's arrest, the Register reported.

The officer took Tong into custody, but allowed him to call his wife, Thu Tong. The officer also delivered the food to the homebound person.

Tong protested his arrest. “I haven’t done anything wrong,” he told the newspaper. “I was being treated like a criminal, but I hadn’t done anything wrong.”

Police had no way of knowing Tong was innocent, Sgt. Steve Woody told the Register.

“When a license is checked, the information that comes back from Iowa DOT records is the only thing we’ve got to go on,” Woody said Wednesday. “It was after regular business hours, and we couldn’t have checked with the DOT if we wanted to.”

It took six hours for Thu Tong to secure her husband’s release on a $1,000 bond.

The information that led to his arrest was most likely caused by a data entry error at Iowa DOT headquarters in Ames, officials told the newspaper. Des Moines police and officials from Polk County Attorney John Sarcone’s office worked to get Tong’s bail money refunded, as well as impound fees for his car. Authorities were also working to wipe out any traces of the case in the Iowa Courts Online database.

“We’re all doing everything we can to make it right, but unfortunately this gentleman had to spend six hours in jail,” said Woody, the police spokesman.