From: [C upi] at [clari.net] (UPI)
Newsgroups: clari.local.new_jersey,clari.local.ohio,clari.usa.gov.state+local,clari.news.alcohol+drugs,clari.news.issues.death_penalty,clari.news.law_enforce
Subject: N.J. vice officer charged with bank robbery
Keywords: US government, US municipal goverment, legal, death penalty,
        illegal drugs, police
Organization: Copyright 1996 by United Press International
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 8:10:48 PDT
Location: New Jersey

                                         
        CINCINNATI, May 1 (UPI) -- A veteran Trenton, N.J., police vice  
officer was held on $375,000 bail Wednesday, charged with robbing a bank 
in Cincinnati, where he was attending a law enforcement convention. 
        Christopher Kerins, 39, a 13-year veteran of the Trenton Police  
Department, allegedly held up a Kenwood Savings & Loan Association 
office on Tuesday. He was also charged with possession of heroin, 
eluding police and assault. 
        Authorities said Kerins was captured following a six-mile, high-speed  
chase along Interstate 71 that began after a Madeira police officer shot 
out the front tire of his high-performance sports car. 
        He was arrested when he abandoned his car and pointed his weapon at a  
Cincinnati police officer, authorities said. 
        The drug charges were filed after police found 350 doses of heroin in  
Kerins' hotel room. 
        Kerins, of Yardville, N.J., had been attending the Middle Atlantic  
Great Lakes Organized Crime Law Enforcement Network conference in 
Cincinnati. 
        Investigators are trying to determine if Kerins is the so-called  
``camouflage bandit,'' who has committed numerous bank robberies in the 
Trenton area, the most recent of which occurred last week. 
        Kerins' court-appointed lawyer told a Hamilton County judge her  
client was leading ``a double life,'' because of his drug habit. ``I 
don't think his family had any idea of what was going on.''