© contributed photo / CTAaron Huntsman, a state trooper, was arrested after police said he took a chain and cash from the dead victim of a motorcycle crash in Fairfield in September 2012.
Bridgeport - A veteran state trooper denied stealing $3,700 from the mangled body of an Orange man on the Merritt Parkway, even after his superiors learned it was captured on the dashboard video camera of the trooper's car.
Trooper Aaron "AJ" Huntsman argued that he was asking about the "crash" -- not for the "cash" -- from 49-year-old John Scalesse, who was lying unconscious in the back of an ambulance, according to the arrest warrant affidavit released Tuesday.
Huntsman, 43, is charged with two counts of third-degree larceny, interfering with police and tampering with evidence. He is scheduled to be arraigned in state Superior Court in Bridgeport on Dec. 10.
Scalesse was killed Sept. 22 after his motorcycle crashed into a construction truck in the northbound section of exit 44 on the Merritt Parkway in Fairfield.
"The more we think about it, the more upset we get," said Scalesse's father, John Scalesse Sr. "It's just shocking that a police officer with 18 years would so something like this."
The affidavit states that Huntsman, who was the first trooper at the crash scene, walked to where Scalesse lay on the ground, and bent down and picked up Scalesse's gold chain from a pool of blood. Later, Huntsman told Scalesse's grieving father that he didn't see any money on the victim.
Police said a second trooper who was on the crash scene, Mark DiCocco, initially claimed he didn't see Huntsman take the money and was evasive when questioned about the incident.