Cop fired 40 days before retirement

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.omaha.com/article/20120219/NEWS01/705019775#cop-fired-40-days-before-retirement

By Todd Cooper

Roger Anderson was 40 days from retirement — and the pension he would have earned after a 29-year career at the Bellevue Police Department. Y Then one day his boss found out that Anderson had spent an hour of sick time taking a friend — former Bellevue Police Officer Chris Parent — through a state firearms certification test.

Police Chief John Stacey called Anderson on the carpet about administering the test for Parent — an officer Stacey had gone to great lengths, and great expense, to keep off the force.

Anderson told his supervisors he made a mistake; that he had spent four hours of sick leave with one of his children, then an hour at a gun range administering Parent's firearms test.

Anderson offered to forfeit that hour of sick time.

Stacey's response: You're fired.

FULL story and photos at link.

[hobbit709]

1. I'd say he has grounds to appeal that.

[Lasher]

4. He certainly does.

Progressive steps of discipline were called for, and apparently not followed.

[2pooped2pop]

6. yep, should get his job back with full back pay

He just has to show up for one day to get it then he can retire, I believe.

[RBInMaine]

2. The chief and the city official who approved the firing are being real assholes here. For christ

sake, they should have given him a reprimand, made him pay back the sick leave, and then with only forty days left, and then let him cash in any remaining sick time and leave time to get out as soon as possible and have full retirement. To take hundreds of thousands from his retirement over this is just mean nasty bullshit.

[hobbit709]

3. you hit it there, they want to screw him out of his money.

[Ikonoklast]

5. Looks like a long history of mutual dislike between those two.

But actual malice and reprisal from the police chief.


Looks like the chief will once again cost that city hundreds of thousands of dollars.


I would fire him if I was the mayor.

[sarcasmo]

11. +1

[Blue in Red State]

7. Unfair

[Justice wanted]

8. This was completely and totally unfair.

[lpbk2713]

9. An easy win for the terminated officer's attorney.

If I was Roger I'd have my attorney drag out the case as long as possible and then get compensated for the lost time after the certain victorious judgement. The Chief was just playing out a personal vendetta with his reprisal. He needs to pay for his vain pettiness. The city should have it pointed out to them they can't afford the Chief on their payroll by making costly personal errors in judgement. He should be the one to be fired.

[sarcasmo]

10. Time to lawyer up, in order to save that pension.

[Greybnk48]

12. Please post any follow-ups.

I would like to see how this one turns out, but I think it's an easy win for Anderson.

[FourScore]

13. Sounds like a vendetta. n/t

[Ilsa]

14. I think a new procedure needs to be implemented.

When someone is that close to retirement, I think the union should ask that a committee review the cause for firing before the employee is fired. Or there should be some automatic appeal to a review committee. Screwing over someone's career shouldn't be so easy.

[onethatcares]

15. if this could happen in a civil service system,

imagine what it would be like in a privatized law enforcement system.

Jeeeez, the pettiness of some folks in charge never fails to amaze me.

[Honeycombe8]

17. There would be no pension in a privatized system, so no need to fire someone to save $. nt

[Honeycombe8]

16. Sounds like they were looking for an excuse. That sucks. How cruel. nt