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View Full Version : New Orleans cops retire by the hundreds after federal probe




Tyreez
12-08-2014, 01:24 PM
http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2014/12/consent_decree_spurred_mass_ex.html
CLEVELAND, Ohio – More than 500 New Orleans police officers retired in the wake of a federal investigation that brought sweeping changes to their department, leaving one of the nation's most crime-ridden cities struggling to police its streets.


The departures, blamed in part on restrictions placed on off-duty jobs and other reforms that began in 2012, amounted to nearly a third of the force of 1,600 officers. And two years later, the city still has not replaced all the retirees with new recruits.


The U.S. Justice Department now is focusing on Cleveland, where investigators this week recommended sweeping police department reforms similar to those adopted in New Orleans. How Cleveland police respond remains to be seen. But the reforms come at a time when more than 21 percent of the police force is eligible for retirement within the next four years.


According to a department roster provided by the Cleveland Police Patrolmen's Association, the union representing the city's rank-and-file officers, 348 of 1,545 officers will have been on the force at least 27 years by 2018.


Mass retirements or resignations would be costly for the city because officers are entitled to payment for used vacation and comp time. In the past, veteran officers have received retirement payouts in excess of $100,000.


But the city's law department told Northeast Ohio Media Group that it does not track payouts due to retiring officers.


City spokesman Dan Williams said that Cleveland police administrators do not expect retirements at the level experienced by New Orleans.


"We are not sensing that there will be a mass exodus," Williams said in an email. "We will continue to have change-overs and retirements and as they occur, and we have training programs to fill in where we have shortages."


Steven Dettelbach, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, said in an interview that the goal of the federal investigation in Cleveland was "not to force officers to retire."


The Justice Department began its investigation in New Orleans in 2010. Two years later, the U.S. attorney and the city announced it would enter into a so-called consent decree that mandated the city to make reforms. The scope of the agreement is considered one of the most sweeping since 1994, when Congress gave the Justice Department authority to undertake "pattern and practice" investigations of law enforcement agencies across the U.S.


As in other cities where the Justice Department investigated police practices, New Orleans agreed to many reforms, including beefing up internal affairs unit, and more rigorously investigating alleged police misconduct.


But the New Orleans agreement went further, according to New Orleans Police Association president Capt. Mike Glasser, by restricting outside employment by police officers. Officers previously had sought their own off-duty jobs and negotiated fees with businesses or event organizers. Their moonlighting required approval from their supervisor, and ultimately the chief's office, Glasser said.


Cleveland police use the same process for overseeing off-duty jobs, department spokesman Sgt. Ali Pillow said.


Federal investigators called New Orleans' handling of off-duty jobs an "aorta of corruption" that allowed officers organizing off-duty jobs to hire their friends, among other claims.


To root out the corruption, the city stripped the department of its ability to manage off-duty assignments and moved all oversight to City Hall. Glasser said the new restrictions resulted in the approval of far fewer off-duty jobs, which had been an important source of income in a department where the starting salary is $37,000 and officers haven't received raises in eight years.


Already frustrated with an increase in paperwork, Glasser said, many officers decided to quit.


New Orleans is the first city to experience such a mass departure following a consent decree, according to observers familiar with other Justice Department investigations.


"It has not been my experience that a consent decree leads to mass resignations," said former U.S. Attorney Merrick Bobb, who now serves as the court-appointed monitor of consent decree governing police in Seattle.


Samuel Walker, emeritus professor of criminal justice at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, said he knew of no other case similar to what happened in New Orleans. But having a large turnover of officers after reforms are made may not be a bad thing, as long as the positions are filled with new recruits trained under new policies, Walker said.


"The reason you have a consent decree in the first place is that officers were doing some serious things that were seriously wrong," he said.


But that's as long as new recruits are hired.


Cleveland has graduated two academy classes in 2014, adding 79 officers to the force, and is expected to graduate about 50 more cadets in January.


But 1,000 miles south, New Orleans' police department hired 17 officers in 2014.

Ronin Truth
12-08-2014, 02:42 PM
They probably just really didn't want to get 'probed' again.

Lindsey
12-08-2014, 03:47 PM
I don't know the details here, but on the surface: less cops sounds like a good thing to me.