OFFENSE

EMPLOYER’S PENALTY

RESULT ON APPEAL

DESCRIPTION

CASE NAME

Conduct Unbecoming On Duty

Termination

Reinstatement With Back Pay

Police captain terminated for purchasing automobiles from citizens whose vehicles had been impounded and were awaiting auction. Employer had knowledge of the captain’s activities several years before conducting an investigation, and imposition of discipline was not timely under Texas state statute.

City of Corpus Christi, Texas, LAIG 6737 (Britton, 2009).

Dishonesty

Termination

Reinstatement With Back Pay

Dispatcher was terminated for disclosing confidential information about an arrest to the suspect’s aunt, and lying to cover up her misconduct. Arbitrator concluded that dispatcher was not dishonest, but there could legitimately be “differing interpretations of what she meant,” and that the City’s “hearsay and double hearsay evidence from less-than-forthright witnesses” did not establish that the dispatcher ever even knew of the confidential information.

City of Sidney, Fraternal Order of Police, LAIG 6707 (Stein, 2009).

Sick Leave Abuse

1-Shift Suspension

No Discipline

Firefighter suspended for excessive use of sick leave. Employer inappropriately relied on prior reprimands that should have been expunged from the firefighter’s personnel file.

City of Newark, Case No. 08-0402 (Gifford, 2009).