Almost exactly a year after he chronicled the North Providence bribery scandal for the Gray Lady, former Projo reporter Dan Barry returned to the city for his “This Land” column today, this time to tell the tale of Police Chief John Whiting’s recent arrest:

Here, then, is temptation, or fate, or truth, in the guise of a pocketbook. It bears a brand name evoking a striving elegance, Coach, and sits in the hastily abandoned car — doors open, engine running — among lingerie, high heels and other items that hint of the inelegant working life of that woman now in the wind.

And here he is, man, in the presence of John Whiting, the broad-shouldered police chief of the neighboring town of North Providence, and a three-decade veteran of law enforcement. Decisions apparently made in anger just moments ago have led him to this place beyond his jurisdiction, where there dangles a pocketbook with $714 in cash and no owner in sight.

The test.

You can read the rest here. For more local Barry columns, check out his pieces about a graveyard in Narragansett; Buddy Cianci’s radio career; Nicky Pari’s deathbed confession; the Camp Runamuck tent city under I-195; and the 33-inning PawSox game. He stopped by Fall River in 2009, too.

(h/t: Erika Niedowski)