Category: Recent Developments

CLEVELAND, Ohio – The union for Cleveland’s firefighters wants City Council to get involved in its dispute with Mayor Frank Jackson’s administration over whether fire Chief Angelo Calvillo should be sacked. Attorney Joseph Diemert, who represents the fire union, alleged Monday in a letter to council President Kevin Kelley that the city Law Department and city prosecutor are “deliberately ignoring” the union’s case against Calvillo. “I read with interest…

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ALFRED – The relationship between the union representing York County Sheriff’s Office deputies and senior management at the sheriff’s office has been described as acrimonious, hostile and tense by the Maine Labor Relations Board. The MLRB, in a July 24 decision regarding grievances filed by the Fraternal Order of Police, referenced the sour relationship five times and the grievances were dismissed for lack of evidence. “The events described here…

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An arbitrator has determined the Lockport Fire Department’s six-man shifts are unsafe and is requiring the City of Lockport to restore minimum staffing levels of nine firefighters, which means the city will have to hire 12 firefighters to obtain the ordered minimum staffing level.  In 2014, former Mayor Anne McCaffrey had dropped the fire department’s ambulance service amid the city’s financial distress and cut the department’s minimum staffing levels…

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The Fraternal Order of Police said the incoming acting chief of the U.S. Park Police used his position to improperly get criminal charges dropped, including in cases where officers were assaulted. Gregory Monahan is set to become acting chief of the Park Police in D.C. next week, when outgoing chief Robert MacLean becomes the head of the Interior Department’s Office of Law Enforcement and Security. He was recently the…

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INDIAN ROCKS BEACH, Fla. — While Friday typically means payday, first responders in Indian Rocks Beach are still trying to get their money back after several reports claim a payroll company took $35 million from workers across the country. “I opened up my phone and looked at my account and I was about $2,000 in the hole,” said Douglas Higley, a lieutenant paramedic for Pinellas Suncoast Fire Rescue. “It…

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With all the chicken pot pie dinners and bingo games that fire companies across Pennsylvania run, it might surprise you that there are 59 of them out there – ones in Harrisburg, Lower Allen Township and Susquehanna Township among them – at last check that had access to more than $1 million sitting in their volunteer firefighters’ relief association account. State Auditor General Eugene DePasquale on Thursday called attention…

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BOISE, Idaho (CBS 2) — A decorated Boise police corporal is suing the City of Boise, the police department and Police Chief William Bones, claiming all of them retaliated against him for whistle blowing activities. As first reported by the Idaho Statesman, the case dates back to December 2015 when Cpl. Norman “Denny” Carter says he complained to a deputy chief at BPD that another officer was selling firearms to…

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MOBILE, Ala. (WKRG) – The Mobile Police Department says a national crisis of recruiting and retention difficulties hits home. “We’re experiencing the national crisis that exists as it relates to recruiting,” said Chief Lawrence Battiste. He tells News 5 says a big part of the struggle involves bringing in and keeping quality applicants. “We don’t want someone we had to lower the bar for, and six months into their…

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ST. JOSEPH COUNTY, Ind.—September is Suicide Prevention Month and is used on both national and local levels to both bring awareness to and educate communities about the often stigmatized issue. To support awareness, local advocates, law enforcement and survivors of suicide loss are speaking out about what’s working and what still needs to be done to end suicide. Story of hope: A younger brother opening up Bob Lyons had…

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One year ago, no one would have predicted that for the first time in years, Atlanta police would announce dramatic increases in applicants, new hires and re-hires. Turns out, throwing money at a problem can sometimes produce the desired result. Since Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms’ announcement last October that Atlanta Police Department officers would receive pay hikes of up to 30 percent, the city’s longtime struggle to recruit and…

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PHOENIX — KTAR News 92.3 FM interviewed four firefighters working in the cities of Glendale, Goodyear and Casa Grande. They have all been diagnosed with various types of cancer they say they contracted while on the job. In the first part of this investigative piece, we tell their stories — from their diagnoses to their subsequent denials for workers’ compensation coverage. These firefighters claim the cities they work for are getting around…

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San Antonio’s airport and park police last week sued the city to win the same pay and benefits as San Antonio Police Department officers. The move sets off what at least one legal expert describes as an uncommon dispute. “This is an unusual setup,” said David Harris, a University of Pittsburgh law professor and longtime scholar of policing issues. “Usually, when you see these kind of discrepancies, it’s between…

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RICHMOND — Just one day after a vote of no confidence from the city’s police union, Richmond’s interim city manager announced Friday that police Chief Allwyn Brown was “out of the office” and that an assistant chief was taking over in his stead. Assistant Chief Bisa French — the city’s youngest captain and its first African-American woman to achieve the rank — will serve as acting police chief, Interim City Manager Steve…

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ST. LOUIS – A St. Louis police officer is accused of misconduct by the department’s internal affairs division after he wrote a social media post about a particularly violent shift and allowed the local newspaper to publish part of it. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that officer Ryan Lynch’s post included a plea to state officials to support police officers. The Aug. 23 Facebook post detailed a shift during…

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The Tulsa Police terminated Officer Wayne Brown Thursday over posts made on social media. Screenshots of the Facebook posts made by the TPD rookie have been shared online hundreds of times. The person who shared them, voiced concern about Brown’s ability to police certain communities because of the nature of the posts. We reached out to the Tulsa Police Department and they sent us this statement: “Early yesterday morning…

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LAPORTE — LaPorte Police Chief Tom Owens said an error is to blame for a Wednesday morning post on his personal Facebook page that triggered accusations against him of racism and bias, as well as calls for his resignation. The shared post in question contained a photograph of a young woman handling a firearm along with the caption, “Here is your precious Muslim congresswoman at a Al’ Qaida training…

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Anne Arundel County police Capt. Jeffrey Silverman issued a written apology to the Caucus of African American Leaders after it filed a complaint to the department highlighting his “disparaging” social media comments about U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris, a black presidential candidate. Carl Snowden, convener of the Caucus of African American Leaders, said a person who wished to remain anonymous pointed him to Silverman’s Facebook posts, sending screenshots of his…

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PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — Philadelphia community leaders say more firings are expected in the wake of the police social media scandal. In July, 13 officers were dismissed for their racist and controversial posts on social media. On Monday, Mayor Jim Kenney updated the leaders on the investigation into the controversial posts involving Philadelphia police officers during a meeting at City Hall. “The original number of officers who had those Facebook posts was…

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Michael A. Fewless, a 30-year law enforcement veteran with a spotless record, must pay back the $541,000 he received from the state’s Deferred Retirement Option Program, or DROP, lawyers for the state’s retirement system said. They dispute an administrative law judge’s recommended order saying Fewless can keep the money and resume getting his retirement benefits — which he stopped receiving a year ago when his predicament came to light. Fewless said that he got bad advice from David Kent,…

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Police departments in small towns throughout northeastern North Dakota and northwestern Minnesota have increasingly closed their doors as shrinking populations suffocate their already small budgets and it becomes harder to recruit staff to the remote locations. Everyone smiles and waves at Northwood Police Chief Mark Pollert as he walks into Skip’s Cenex to buy a cup of coffee. He jokes with three men sitting at a corner booth and…

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The San Diego Fire-Rescue Department has a chronic understaffing problem. Now it has a plan of attack: It aims to add more than 200 firefighters over the next five years. The idea is to offset the employees retiring or otherwise leaving by creating a relief pool of workers who can fill in for firefighters who call in sick or go on vacation to trim skyrocketing overtime costs. But will…

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STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — A former NYPD psychologist said that the department needs to fully change its approach to mental health treatment if it wants to seriously address a spate of recent officer suicides. “From my estimation, this is fundamentally and primarily a policy issue,” Dr. Tom Coghlan said. “You need a complete root-and-branch tearing-up of the current wellness policy in the NYPD.” In the last eight years of…

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In January, Lt. Roger Marks, head of recruitment for the Bismarck Police Department, had an interview scheduled with a midcareer officer from Williston. But in the days leading up to it, the job candidate canceled. The officer said he would have accepted a pay cut, but what the Bismarck police offered wasn’t enough. “The pay differential was too much,” Marks said. North Dakota’s capital city is struggling to retain and recruit police. Most…

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In the latest blow to the city, a three-judge panel upheld previous findings that officer Adam Huot should get his job back. The Minnesota Court of Appeals on Tuesday affirmed a ruling that would give a Duluth police officer his job back after he was fired for dragging a handcuffed man through the downtown skywalk system. The appeals court concluded that a district judge did not err in declining…

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If police had realized that a patient was attacking an Austin medic inside an ambulance a few weeks ago, Austin-Travis County EMS union president Selena Xie believes officers would’ve arrived sooner than the eight minutes it took them to get there. “The patient took off all his restraints — his seat belts — and then just started pounding on the medic,” giving him a black eye and a busted…

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