Speaking out for the first time, the TLC inspector who busted newsman Mike Wallace over the summer insisted to The Post he was fired last week because of the incident.
“This was done because of the Mike Wallace incident,” said Keefe Roman, who found a letter of termination waiting for him at his Queens office last Friday. “It really bothers me.”
Roman, a provisional employee of the city’s Taxi & Limousine Commission, arrested and handcuffed the newsman for disorderly conduct on Aug. 10.
Roman, who is in his 20s, claimed Wallace posed a safety risk when he wouldn’t comply with instructions and move away from his partner.
“Our threat level went from dealing with just the driver to now dealing with the driver and the passenger,” Roman said, claiming that Wallace “had alcohol on his breath.”
When asked about the alcohol accusation, Wallace, 86, told The Post, “I will not dignify that with an answer.”
The drama unfolded after Wallace picked up a takeout order of meatloaf from Luke’s Bar and Grill on Third Avenue and East 79th Street in Manhattan.
As he returned to his car, which was double-parked outside, Wallace found the TLC inspectors questioning his driver. The famed “60 Minutes” broadcaster got in the back, but, when the questioning didn’t end quickly, he got out of the car to see if he could move things along so he could get home with his dinner.
The inspectors ordered him back into the car, but he refused. That’s where the dispute began and Wallace was busted.
The TLC decided not to prosecute Wallace after a complete investigation found that Roman and his partner made errors in judgment during the stop and that Roman lacked “special patrolman” status – an NYPD designation that allows inspectors to make arrests and write summonses.
His firing comes shortly before he was slated finally to be sworn in as a special patrolman.
But Roman, a Bronx resident who put in 1 ½ years on the job, said he and his partner did everything aboveboard when arresting Wallace. “I did my job professionally,” he insisted.
Roman also claimed his peace-officer training gave him the authority to make arrests, and his superiors issued him handcuffs, Mace, a baton and multiple summons books.
“The directors of training are the ones at fault. If they give us the equipment to do the job, then we’ll do it,” Roman said. “It bothers me that they tell you to do your job and you get the short end of the stick. You end up getting the raw deal.”
After the Wallace arrest, Roman was taken off the streets, posted to communications dispatch and promised his job would be safe after a disciplinary review, he said. Roman wants his inspector job back, but said, “I don’t know what I’m going to do about it.”
When asked whether he thought Roman was fired over his wrongful arrest, Wallace replied, “Certainly not.”
The TLC agreed. “While it is the TLC’s policy not to discuss personnel matters in specific detail, I will tell you that there were multiple other dimensions to the actions taken here in this case that are separate and apart from the Mike Wallace incident,” said TLC spokesman Allan Fromberg.