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A high-profile city police lieutenant on duty last weekend found a "bird-dog" electronic tracker planted on his police car by a member of a department intelligence unit, who then ordered him to return the device, the lieutenant's lawyer said Thursday.

Lt. James Hinson, who heads the local black officers association and has led well-publicized youth and anti-crime programs, deferred questions to the department and to his attorney, Joe Williams, a former prosecutor and judge.

Police Chief David Wray confirmed that the tracking device was placed on the lieutenant's assigned cruiser as part of a surveillance by a retired officer and private detective, Randy Gerringer, who recently was hired back at the police department for part-time work. Wray said the nonsworn detective, one of 20 "hire-backs," was not undercover.

"We're not trying to put on a mustache and a beard and say, ‘Do you want to buy some marijuana?' " Wray said. "This was a low-key thing for us."

Still, the accidental discovery of the device has focused new attention on the role of the Special Intelligence Division, a small squad that reports directly to Wray's right-hand man, Deputy Chief Randall Brady.

Though once under Internal Affairs and Criminal Investigations and primarily assigned to keep tabs on criminal gangs and groups such as the Klan and Communists - thus earning it the nickname the "Red Squad" - Special Intelligence under Wray is an independent unit with a new moniker among officers leery of its function: "the secret police."

Said City Council member Claudette Burroughs-White, who sat in on a meeting with the chief on Monday about the tracking incident: "Until this week, I didn't even know there was such a thing as ‘the secret police.' I didn't know it existed."

But at the Greensboro Police Officers Association, which - as staff writer Eric J.S. Townsend wrote this week - made news with a survey on morale in the ranks, the union's lawyer said the "bird-dog" incident confirms what many had suspected.

"There's been some very questionable discipline of African American officers," said William Hill, lawyer for the 410-member association. "The officers I've talked to, black or white, are mad as hornets about it."

According to accounts given by Hill and defense lawyer Williams, who represents members of the all-black North State Law Enforcement Officers Association, this is how the "bird-dog" discovery occurred:

Hinson, working a late shift last Friday, had stopped at The Grande movie theater to see a corporal who was off duty. Suspicious when a tan van appeared to be following him, the lieutenant pulled behind the van, ran its tag numbers and found it nowhere in the system - usually an indication that a vehicle is part of a covert police investigation.

Recognizing the van's driver as Gerringer, the private investigator "hire-back" who this year rejoined Special Intelligence, Hinson parked his department-owned Crown Victoria and found the tracking device inside the back bumper.

After Hinson called the watch captain, as well as his own supervisor, he was told that he was being investigated on the suspicion that he was doing off-duty work while on duty, Hill and Williams said.

Wray said he could not discuss the nature of the investigation but dismissed suggestions by the union and Hinson's lawyer that the intelligence squad was targeting black officers in particular, maintaining that investigators pursue "whatever comes through the door."

He said the department had a duty to investigate all complaints against police officers, and that the intelligence unit often handled long-term probes of bribery, for example, or corruption allegations.

But against a backdrop of budget restrictions that continue to result in 911 operators broadcasting a "10-100" - meaning no cars are free to answer emergency calls - William Hill of the Greensboro Police Officers Association questioned the use of resources by the intelligence squad.

"At what point," he asked, "do we get back to protecting the public?"

Contact Lorraine Ahearn at 373-7334 or lahearn@news-record.com