News and Investigations

During the early morning hours of Wednesday, February 16, 2022, a PCSO deputy sheriff who resigned immediately upon his arrest was arrested by PCSO for one count DUI (M-1).

According to the affidavit, around 1:45 a.m., Lakeland Police Officers were conducting a traffic stop in the parking lot of Tropical Smoothie on East Lemon Street when they observed another vehicle pull into an adjacent parking lot, and the Hispanic male driver, later identified as 27-year-old Michael Gonzalez-Lauzan of Lakeland, approach. They asked the man to stop and wait for them to talk with him, but he continued walking towards them, and then told them that he was an off-duty Polk County Deputy, and that the person LPD pulled over was a friend of his. He was agitated and becoming irate, and the officers could smell the odor of alcohol on him. They contacted PCSO to respond.

When deputies arrived, they talked to Gonzalez-Lauzan, who told them that he and his friend were leaving Linksters bar when he saw LPD pull her over. He said he came over to tell her to turn her car off, and then backed off after they shined a flashlight in his eyes. Deputies conducted field sobriety tests with Gonzalez-Lauzan, during which he exhibited several signs of being impaired. He was arrested and transported to the Sheriff’s Processing Center, where he provided two breath samples of 0.164/210L and 0.160/201L (the legal threshold is 0.08/210L).

Gonzalez-Lauzan was booked into the Polk County Jail for DUI, and was released after posting $500 bond. He resigned from PCSO effectively immediately upon his arrest. Had he not resigned, he would have been terminated. He was hired as a deputy sheriff in 2019.