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SCHENECTADY
Police officer charged with DWI
Now arrested twice in 2 months
BY MICHAEL GOOT Gazette Reporter


    A city police officer has been arrested for the second time in two months.
    Police arrested John W. Lewis, 39, of Oregon Avenue on Saturday morning for allegedly driving while intoxicated. Department spokesman Officer Kevin Green said Lewis hit a parked car in the area of 1052 Eastern Ave. at 4:26 a.m.
    Lewis has been charged with two misdemeanor charges of operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated and aggravated driving while intoxicated for allegedly having a blood alcohol content of greater than 0.18 percent. He also was issued two violation tickets for imprudent speed and improper lane use.
    This is Lewis’ fourth arrest in the last eight months. Lewis was charged last month with misdemeanors of third-degree stalking and second-degree aggravated harassment for allegedly threatening his former wife a total of four times in August and November. Court papers allege that Lewis said if he found his ex-wife with someone, he was going to kill whoever she was with and her. That case is pending.
    Lewis’ divorce became fi nal in late September. He also has an- other pending contempt case for allegedly violating an order of protection by calling his former wife several times.
    He was acquitted in June of a violation harassment charge, which stemmed from allegations that he grabbed and pushed his wife in a dispute over their child.
    Lewis has been suspended without pay for 30 days after each arrest. He was then returned to the payroll but did not return to work. Green said Lewis was suspended without pay for 30 days as a result of the most recent incident.
    Lewis also has filed a notice of claim against the city. He alleges that the police collaborated with his ex-wife to force him from his job and embarrass him. City officials attempted to fire Lewis 10 years ago over allegations that he used a racial slur while off duty. An arbitrator restored him to his post. Lewis’ attorney Kevin Luibrand said previously that his client has gone on disability for an undisclosed ailment.
    Police union President Lt. Robert Hamilton did not return a call seeking comment.      

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City wants new rules
Schenectady to use case of troubled cop to ask for more disciplining power

By PAUL NELSON, Staff writer
First published in print: Tuesday, December 30, 2008

SCHENECTADY --The city plans to tell a state agency that the current disputed system for disciplining Schenectady cops is ineffective and change is needed.
     
Officials say they'll use the matter of suspended police officer John Lewis, among others, to make its case.

Schenectady Corporation Counsel L. John Van Norden said Monday they will highlight Lewis' ongoing legal woes and that of former officer Kenneth Hill who was imprisoned for giving a stolen handgun to a drug dealer in 2004.

Only months earlier, the city had on the recommendation of a hearing officer fired Hill for calling a black man a monkey during an off-duty incident only to have an outside arbitrator reverse the decision.

In 1998, the city was forced to rehire Lewis, 39, after he was terminated, also for using a racial epithet in the presence of three people, including a black YWCA counselor at the Police Department while off-duty. An arbitrator sided with Lewis, paving the way for his return to the force. In that way, the two officers' cases are similar and will be chronicled to state Public Employment Relations Board. Van Norden said.

Currently, the city is locked in a fierce battle — likely headed to court — with the police union over department protocol on disciplinary hearings.

The city favors having Commissioner of Public Safety Wayne Bennett hear and decide on disciplinary matters while the police union favors using a hearing officer to make a recommendation to the mayor with the officer being able to appeal that decision to an outside arbitrator.

On Saturday, the 14-year-veteran was arrested for drunken driving after a automobile wreck in the city and later suspended with pay for 30 days.

Specifically, he is charged with driving while intoxicated, aggravated driving while intoxicated, speeding and improper lane use. It's the second time Lewis has been suspended in as many months. In November, he allegedly threatened to kill his former wife and anyone she dated leading to third-degree stalking and second-degree aggravated harassment.

Lewis was released without bail after his arrest in that case. Before that, a City Court judge acquitted Lewis of harassment for allegedly pushing his wife. He is suing the department, contending they conspired with his wife in a bid to get him fired.

Van Norden called the arbitrator based system "horrible," saying it makes it tough for the city to fire police officers who routinely break the law.

"It hasn't proven easy under the old system," he said, adding that city officials and taxpayers alike are frustrated by the system which will likely be roiled with what is expected to be a protracted court fight that could impact other officers out on paid leave.

"The police should be treated differently because they're not picking up garbage, they carry guns and .............................http://timesunion.com/AspStori.....;newsdate=12/30/2008

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Thank the FBI for the increase in murders, burglaries,etc.  10 years ago the police department had some proactive officers not afraid to
go after the gun-carrying dealers on the street and the gang members and murderers.  The FBI insured that will never happen again in
the city of Schenectady.  I still remember reading about and hearing about the trial where they paraded dozens of drug addicted
prostitutes they threatened with life in prison unless they testified to what they wanted them to say.  The feds could have cared less if
they told the truth or not- as long as they said something incriminating about a cop- their charges would be dismissed.  

There is still talk at the Schenectady Police Department that the feds even got 2 Schenectady police officers to lie in order to win their
case.  One is a relative of Falvo- the Assistant Chief- his brother in law is a city cop and the other is  a retired detective that
made up some crazy story about a drug deal he claimed to witness one or 2 of the cops make, but the FBI investigated it and found out he made up the whole story, so they covered it up and never charged the cops.  

The fact that the feds and the Administrators at Schenectady PD that worked that case 10 years ago went as far as getting officers to
commit perjury in hopes to win convictions is something that officers do not soon forget.  If your bosses are willing to go as far as
arresting crack-addicted hookers and threatening them with life in prison if they don't tell a story and getting their own officers to commit perjury- then how hard are you going to work for them?

Anyone that is suprised that things in the city of Schenectady are far worse than 10 years ago needs a reality check.  Again...
thank you to the FBI. Looks like you've done a great job.

Quoted from 215

Thank the FBI for the increase in murders, burglaries,etc.  10 years ago the police department had some proactive officers not afraid to
go after the gun-carrying dealers on the street and the gang members and murderers.  The FBI insured that will never happen again in
the city of Schenectady.  I still remember reading about and hearing about the trial where they paraded dozens of drug addicted
prostitutes they threatened with life in prison unless they testified to what they wanted them to say.  The feds could have cared less if
they told the truth or not- as long as they said something incriminating about a cop- their charges would be dismissed.  

There is still talk at the Schenectady Police Department that the feds even got 2 Schenectady police officers to lie in order to win their
case.  One is a relative of Falvo- the Assistant Chief- his brother in law is a city cop and the other is  a retired detective that
made up some crazy story about a drug deal he claimed to witness one or 2 of the cops make, but the FBI investigated it and found out he made up the whole story, so they covered it up and never charged the cops.  

The fact that the feds and the Administrators at Schenectady PD that worked that case 10 years ago went as far as getting officers to
commit perjury in hopes to win convictions is something that officers do not soon forget.  If your bosses are willing to go as far as
arresting crack-addicted hookers and threatening them with life in prison if they don't tell a story and getting their own officers to commit perjury- then how hard are you going to work for them?

Anyone that is suprised that things in the city of Schenectady are far worse than 10 years ago needs a reality check.  Again...
thank you to the FBI. Looks like you've done a great job.

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SCHENECTADY
City may lose first round on arbitration
PERB decision likely to be appealed in long fight
BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter

    Schenectady is poised to lose its first legal battle in the war against police arbitrators, a city official said.
    The city wrested control of police discipline from the arbitrators in June 2007, but the police union sued a year later. The first battle in what may be a very long — and expensive — war over the issue will begin Jan. 9 when both sides submit their legal briefs to the Public Employment Relations Board.
    Once PERB makes a decision, the losing side will almost definitely appeal it to the state courts, so this is just the first step – but it’s one Schenectady will probably lose, Corporation Counsel L. John Van Norden said.
    Essentially, Van Norden says, the deck is stacked against the city. The PERB judges who will rule on the issue were appointed by the state partly because they favor having arbitrators make the final decision on police discipline cases, rather than allowing a civilian authority like Public Safety Commissioner Wayne Bennett fire or punish officers.
    “My general understanding is the recent appointments to PERB were more labor-oriented than management-oriented,” Van Norden said. “[The discipline issue] is always vetted during confirmation hearings.”
    He plans to fight it out anyway.
    “This is probably the most significant issue between the city and the PBA in many, many years,” he said.
    In his attempt to win over the PERB board, he will bring to light the details from years of police misconduct. His goal is to prove that when arbitrators overturn the city’s attempts to fi re officers, the officers not only continue their misdeeds but commit worse offenses as time goes on. Others also act recklessly because they do not believe the city will be able to discipline them, Van Norden said.
    “I think our case is compelling,” he said, but added, “It’s quite possible that PERB will render a decision contrary to the city’s position.”
    His two poster children for local discipline are officers Kenneth Hill and John Lewis, who were fi red locally for uttering racial slurs but were reinstated by state arbitrators.
    Hill went on to give a gun to a known drug dealer and went to state prison. Lewis is still on the force but has been arrested four times in seven months, most recently on allegations that he drove drunk and hit a parked car.
    Before that, he allegedly threatened to kill his ex-wife. He has spent much of the year on suspension because of the arrests, all of which involve allegations of angry outbursts toward the woman he recently divorced.
    Police union attorney Michael P. Ravalli said Wednesday that only twice have cases gone to arbitration in the past 20 years. In neither case was the firing upheld.
    The two cases that went to arbitration were Hill and Lewis, Ravalli said. But the facts weren’t there to fire them then, as evidenced by the court rulings.
    “For the city to take the position that they can’t discipline police officers is ridiculous,” Ravalli said.
    An independent arbitrator, he said, is crucial to the process, ensuring the decision maker is not biased toward either side.
    “The only thing the PBA is looking for is that at some point in the procedure you have an independent person who’s not employed by the city and not employed by the PBA to review discipline cases,” Ravalli said. The discipline procedure is something that’s in the contract and something that’s been agreed to for many years, he said.
    Van Norden has done extensive research into the issue and says the record is muddled in just one place — when the city switched from having a city manager to an executive mayor in 1980. The mayor’s responsibilities did not specifically address police discipline — but the officer was supposed to take over all city manager duties, which had specifically included police discipline.
    “What happens is, in 1935, the city went to a city manager system. They abolished the office of commissioner of public safety. They vested all of the duties and responsibilities in the city manager,” Van Norden said.
    The city is believed to have never actually filled the commissioner position before abolishing it. The responsibility went to the city manager and from there should have gone to the executive mayor.
    “The question is, was it conferred on the mayor in 1980? I think of course it was. It had to be. He had taken all the responsibilities of the city manager,” Van Norden said.
    The disciplinary responsibility was never used by the executive mayor. Van Norden said that’s because mayors thought they had to use arbitration under the Taylor Law, which was passed in 1967 and was widely misunderstood. Most union contract negotiators throughout the state thought they had to negotiate police discipline, and generally both sides would only agree to arbitration.
    But New York City didn’t want to do that, and after a long court battle, brought the issue to the state Court of Appeals in 2006. The court ruled that New York City’s police commissioner had been wrongly stripped of his disciplinary powers by the Taylor Law.
    Other cities that had a provision for a commissioner — including Schenectady, which had reinstated its position in 1991 — claimed that they too could toss out any contractual agreements about arbitrators deciding discipline.
    The trouble is that .................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....amp;EntityId=Ar00901

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Cop discipline in limbo too long in Sch’dy

    It’s not just hard to believe but unconscionable, frankly, that Schenectady Patrolman John W. Lewis is still on the city’s payroll.
    Arrested four times last year — three for threatening his ex-wife and once for drunken driving — he’s been suspended for months. But thanks to an overly lenient police contract and state labor laws, the city can’t easily fi re him and can only withhold his pay for 30 days with each arrest. Thus, for much of the past year, when he wasn’t allegedly harassing his ex or driving drunk, he’s been sitting at home (while the department remains short-staffed) and drawing a nice, fat paycheck. Outrageous!
    Lewis is a poster child for the city’s effort to change the way it disciplines bad cops. Rather than the customary method of having a hearing officer make recommendations to the mayor, the results of which are usually appealed to a state arbitrator (with the results often overturned), the city wants its police commissioner to be able to handle the matters.
    That makes more sense: The commissioner is the boss, he knows his department, and if he’s to be held accountable for the way it’s run, then let him run it — without interference from prolabor toadies on the state Public Employment Relations Board.
    The effort to fire Lewis will undoubtedly move more quickly once the various legal cases against him are resolved (he was acquitted on one, while the other three are pending). But on the larger question of who controls the police department’s disciplinary reins, the ball is once again in PERB’s court because the Schenectady Police Benevolent Association has fi led an improper labor practice complaint against the city.
    Rather than try..........................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....amp;EntityId=Ar00702

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Don’t use suspect data to disparage Schenectady police

    In 2003, I remember working on the Weed and Seed official recognition document and trying to get the crime stats. The U.S. attorney’s representatives said, “we struggle with the fact that we can’t get reliable data from these upstate cities!”
    That was five years ago. I question the reliability of comparing 2008 to the last century [Dec. 28 Gazette] since most departments found it difficult to provide useful information for federal grants, lacking personnel and funds to generate the data. Healing the woes of [the] Schenectady Police Department is a work in progress, but at least that work is under way.
    Rather than continue the mantra of “blame the police department” for our woes, time would be better served looking at the many failed experimental county programs — formal and informal. The list is long. Sadly, Weed and Seed that started with such promise and many, many partners, has diminished to a federal prisoner re-entry program for serious and violent offenders.
    Restorative justice programs with few funds to change human behavior have been relegated to something like a fishing program, “catch and release!”
    As a member of the Civilian Police Review Board, which monthly reviews policy and procedures of the police department, in the last five years we have had only one resident attend to admonish the department. There appears to be little outrage. If there is, it does not get to the board.
    Perhaps in cities like Schenectady, we should look at the many systems that have failed before the police became involved in a crime. This list is long here, too: personal responsibility, family, church, school, not-for-profi t and government agencies that choose to work with returning prisoners. A failure rate in these programs of 70 percent adds to the department's struggles. Knowing full well that there are few jobs for uneducated, drug-addicted persons, the state and federal governments continue to saturate upstate communities with criminals.
    Perhaps without the efforts of the police, as a by-product of this “prisoner re-entry tsunami” the crime increase would be 1,000 percent!

    FREDERIC LEE
    Schenectady
The writer is president of Schenectady United Neighborhoods.

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SCHENECTADY
Drug case dismissed over illegal search
Appeal ruling now part of state case law
BY STEVEN COOK Gazette Reporter

    A drug case where the evidence was thrown out on appeal was officially dismissed Monday.
    Schenectady County Court Judge Karen Drago dismissed the case after prosecutors confirmed they could not go forward with the case against 24-year-old Jonathan Gonzalez without the drugs.
    The Appellate Division of the state Supreme Court suppressed the evidence last month, ruling that a police cavity search went too far.
    Gonzalez was arrested May 16, 2006 following an undercover drug operation. He was convicted at trial and spent two years in state prison before being released last year. That was Gonzalez’ real loss in the case, attorney Mark Sacco said.
    Sacco represented Gonzalez at trial. After the conviction, an article in a law journal about a similar case prompted him to encourage an appeal, Sacco said, and the case will also have a legacy in case law. Though the court’s decision only references “visual cavity inspection,” Sacco expected it to be used in future cases by defendants alleging illegal search.
    “Now the police know they can’t just randomly search people without a reasonable basis,” Sacco said.
    Schenectady County District Attorney Robert Carney has said his reading of the ruling is that police must have some direct reason to suspect that contraband is in a body cavity before ordering such a search.
    Gonzalez, whose last name has also been spelled Gonzales, remained at the Schenectady County jail Monday evening. A related drug case still is pending.
    Gonzalez was arrested in 2006 in an undercover drug operation after he allegedly agreed to provide drugs. He was arrested and then strip searched for drugs. He was also required to submit to a body cavity inspection. The drugs were soon allegedly found in Gonzalez’ rectum.
    But Gonzalez‘ alleged statement to “get you whatever you need” was vague and did not give enough reason for police to do the more thorough search, the court ruled.
    The decision overturned the conviction, as well as the sentence. Gonzalez could be heard in court indicating during a break that he intended to file a lawsuit.
    What remains to be seen is how far the decision will go for Gonzalez. He has been at the jail since Dec. 16, when he was brought in on a parole violation stemming from the now-overturned 2006 drug case.
    It was then that Gonzalez was accused of again possessing crack cocaine, a misdemeanor level amount.
    This time, however, Gonzalez volunteered the information, according to papers. When asked by jail officers if he had any contraband, Gonzalez allegedly said he did, then “reached down the back of his pants” and pulled out a small amount of crack cocaine. He faces one..........................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....amp;EntityId=Ar01001

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Schenectady officers honored for accomplishments

Last updated: 3:50 p.m., Tuesday, January 6, 2009

SCHENECTADY — Seven police recruits and three command staff members will be recognized tonight during the city police department's gun, badge and promotion ceremony.
     
Additionally, Brian Kilcullen, promoted in October to assistant chief, and Thomas Harrigan and Todd Stickney, both of whom made sergeant, will be singled out for their achievements.

The seven patrolman receiving their guns and badges are .............http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=757175