Friday, September 12, 2008

Officer Chad Broder Suspended Without Pay

An Erie police officer was arrested and jailed Wednesday in Weld County on suspicion of attempting to sexually assault an 18-year-old woman he had arrested, according to police and court reports.

Chad Broder, 25, was arrested on suspicion of attempted sexual assault on a victim in custody and sexual contact with a victim in custody, according to court records. He is scheduled to appear in Weld District Court today.

“The officer has been suspended without pay pending the outcome of our investigation and the investigation of the Greeley Police Department,” Erie Police Chief John Hall said, adding that he could not comment on Greeley’s open investigation.

Greeley police detectives arrested Broder at his Frederick home Wednesday after investigating the Aug. 31 incident since Sept. 3, Greeley police spokesman Sgt. Joe Tymkowich said.

He said Broder arrested the woman Aug. 31 on suspicion of violating a restraining order. The woman told police that Broder was driving her to the Weld County Jail, allowing her to ride in the front seat, when he stopped his marked patrol car in Greeley and kissed her, released one of her hands from the handcuffs and placed her hand on his crotch, Tymkowich said.


“She was able to protect herself, as it were, and she (told him she) wasn’t interest in doing that,” Tymkowich said.

Broder then took the woman to the jail and booked her, Tymkowich said.

When she bonded out the following day, she told a friend what had happened, and the friend talked with a Longmont police officer, who recommended that she report the incident to Greeley police, according to Tymkowich.

“From personal experience ... you pursue it just as you would any other case,” he said of investigating allegations against a fellow law enforcement officer. “We’ve got to police our own just as you would anyone else.”

Broder was sworn in as an officer with the Erie Police Department in June 2006 and has worked as a patrol officer since then.

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