An investigation into wrongdoing in the Sandy Springs Police Department turned up numerous violations of policies and has resulted in the police chief's resignation and the departure of three other supervisors.
Sandy Springs released the investigative report Friday, which details officers working off-duty jobs when they were assigned to work city shifts. It also criticized the chief and another commander for accepting guns as a gift.
The report was prepared at the city's request by a private investigator, and it concludes a culture developed within the department in which some supervisors condoned the rule violations and failed to report inappropriate behavior. City officials received the report on July 10.
Since the report was released, Chief Gene Wilson and Maj. James Moore, who oversaw the special operations unit, have resigned. Two supervisors, Sgt. Tanya Smith and Lieutenant Trudi Vaughan, have been fired.
Wilson said this week he did nothing wrong. But in his resignation letter, which the city quoted in its documents, he said: "It has become apparent recently that I no longer have the confidence of the Mayor and the Council."
Sandy Springs Mayor Eva Galambos said Friday she didn't believe the investigation represented a wide-spread problem with the department, and she felt the city could move past the issue.
"We've got 120 (police) positions, and we've got about three people in trouble," Galambos said. "We have isolated the problem, we have identified the culprits and we have cleaned house."
City Attorney Wendell Willard could not be reached for comment Friday night. The city's acting police chief, David Bertrand, declined to comment.
According to the nearly 900-page report - prepared for the city attorney by James Walker, an investigator for the Charlotte-based U.S. ISS Agency - both Wilson and Moore had accepted gifts from Bruce Weiner, a Sandy Springs businessman, who is chairman of a non-profit organization that provides financial support for the police department.
Although neither Wilson nor Moore violated city policy in accepting firearms and knives from Weiner, a federally licensed firearms dealer, the investigator found Wilson "should have exercised better judgment, when he accepted the gifts." Wilson later returned the handguns and a rifle he had received, the city report indicates.
Moore, who acknowledged receiving two handguns and a knife, "should have recognized" the perception of receiving the gifts, the report says.
When asked about any perceived wrong-doing on the part of chief Wilson, Mayor Galambos demurred.
"I'm going by what the investigator put in his report that [Wilson] did not specifically break the rules," Galambos said. "We appreciate what he did to build up the department." But she acknowledged that by accepting the gifts, Wilson may have cast a pall around himself within the department.
"I think a lot of other police felt uncomfortable about it," Galambos said.
The report concludes the department, which was led since 2006 by Wilson, had numerous incidents in which officers violated city policy relating to how they could perform privately paid assignments in their off hours.
Smith, who was fired Friday, was found to have violated city policy by adjusting her regular schedule as a patrol supervisor at least twice to work an off-duty job, according to a termination letter released by the city.
On Friday, Smith said she had received permission to adjust her schedule from a supervisor, because otherwise she would have exceeded her city hours.
" I was given permission to come in late," she said. "I got permission from my lieutenant. They said I did not have approval."
According to her dismissal letter, Vaughan, who was fired Wednesday, was found by the city to have violated policy in numerous decisions, including directing officers on duty to fill off-duty jobs in traffic detail, which she coordinated.
Among the criticisms leveled at Vaughan was that she made poor decisions as the senior officer at a training session April 10 at which officers fired weapons they had not been trained to use, and rode all-terrain vehicles without helmets.
The report describes 20 officers participating in a training exercise at Weiner's property in Madison. The officers were allowed to select weapons from his collection, with his permission, the documents state. They later fired them on a private range.
In a dismissal letter released by the city Friday, Acting Police Chief David Bertrand said Vaughan "should have recognized the magnitude of danger the officers were placed in," and the liability for the city.
Vaughan is challenging her firing, and said it is politically motivated. Her attorney, Edwin Marger, said the incident has been exaggerated and that the officers were not injured. The independent review by Walker began with an internal police investigation initiated in mid-June.
This is the second internal investigation that has been made public by the 2-year-old department.
In January, Roberto Alvarado was fired and charged after being accused of sexual assault against a woman he pulled over. He fled the state and was arrested by U.S. Marshals in Mobile, Ala.
1 comment:
By the way, you guys left out that Sgt. Smith passed a polygraph confirming that she had in deed been given permission to work the jobs. In Lt. Vaughan's case, you guys left out that the investigation DID reveal that she had obtain permission for the training day prior to the day. And, furthermore, the training day was not conducted with run of the mill, every day street cops, it was with trained SWAT team and special operations team members who are trained in dangerous settings as a matter of being prepared for anything (as is the entire point behind their job description).
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