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By PORAC | December 1, 2003 | Posted in PORAC LDF News

Officer Reinstated After Challenging Suspension

Posted by Elizabeth A. Barker, Esq.

Sr. Officer Charles Wright joined the U.S. Marine Corps in 1967. He will be retiring in January 2004 after years of dedicated service to his country while serving on active and reserve duty. He is a former teacher/coach and has been with the Huntington Beach Police Department for 17 years. He was on the SWAT, trauma support team, an FTO, and was an original member of the honor guard.

The department uses daily logs for officers to fill out during each work shift to show what activities they are performing. These logs were not used for federal or state crime reporting purposes. The logs were not always required; it depended on what assignment an officer was working on. In fact, the logs were not required at various times, while at other times, it was mandatory to have one completed at the end of each shift. Since there was no standardized way in which the forms were to be completed, even the manner in which the reports were filled out varied from individual to individual.

As part of the information kept, each officer was to log his or her misdemeanor and felony arrests. The “handling” officer was to take credit for such arrests. Unfortunately, there was no definition of what constituted the handling officer. It was conceded by the city of Huntington Beach that the idea of a handling officer was a fluid concept with many variables that could change as an arrest progressed. The department also admitted that credit for statistics could be, and often was, “given away.”

One evening, Wright’s squad sergeant was tasked to do a yearly evaluation on him. Since this sergeant was not familiar with Wright’s work activity, he consulted with the sergeant who supervised Wright during the evaluation period. That sergeant said he did not have time to do the evaluation and suggested that the other sergeant review Wright’s daily logs to get an idea of his work productivity. While reviewing Wright’s logs, the sergeant discovered that another officer had also taken credit for the same arrest. Without any investigation into the matter, the sergeant decided Wright was not the handling officer and should not have taken credit for the arrest.

The sergeant, who was new to supervising Wright, spoke with his previous sergeant who claimed to have counseled Wright on this issue. The new sergeant then decided to go back several years to see if Wright was taking credit for other arrests he should not have. In the new sergeant’s opinion, Wright had taken inappropriate credit for arrests and found six such alleged incidents in a two-year period. The sergeant brought formal allegations against Wright without so much as a “by your leave” to correct the situation. The sergeant did not check the logs of other officers for the same two-year period, nor did he consider whether or not the other officers might have been the ones who should not have taken credit for the arrests.

Wright went to his interrogation and his Skelly meeting unrepresented. The police chief found that a 40- hour suspension with removal from all honor assignments to be the appropriate punishment in this case. The worst part of this punishment was the sting of being removed from all of his honor positions. Wright is the type of person who, had he been counseled as to the way the administration wanted its logs kept, would have conformed to their wishes. Although there were no formal policies or procedures regarding the filling in and maintaining daily logs, the department chose to single out Wright for selective enforcement of a merely written training directive.

A five-day hearing held before Arbitrator Lou Zigman. Zigman rendered a decision in favor of Wright. The city appealed his decision to the personnel commission; written briefs were submitted and oral arguments were made. The commission found unanimously that Wright had not been properly counseled, the standard for filling out the logs was vague, and the punishment was inappropriate. Wright was restored to his positions with the SWAT, the trauma support team, as an FTO, and a member of the honor guard. He also received pay for his 40 hours of suspension, plus all back pay and benefits with interest. The discipline was stricken from his personnel file. It was a pleasure working with such a fine officer to right such an obvious wrong.

Since the new chief has taken over the reins of the police department, many changes have taken place. He has given a member of his staff the task of rewriting the policy manual and assuring that each officer is aware of how to correctly complete the daily logs. Thankfully, the daily logs are no longer an issue.