On LEOs And Politicking

In follow up to the citizen complaint Adam Longworth filed with the Marion County Election Board this week complaining about law enforcement officers employed by the Marion County Sheriff's department being used to stage press conferences and campaign commercials and photos for 7th District Democratic candidate Andre Carson, which was dismissed yesterday, I have some information to share with you. Chief Deputy Kerry Forestal, who has appeared at a press conference with Carson and shown up in television commercials and campaign photos in full uniform, told a source that all of these activities occurred at the Indianapolis Firefighters Hall on Massachusetts Avenue downtown and a UAW hall on Rockville Road. He insists none of his or other deputy sheriffs' activities took place on government property according to the source who spoke to him. Forestal is Sheriff Frank Anderson's heir apparent. He is already campaigning for the Democratic nomination for sheriff in 2010 and has both Anderson's and Carson's support. According to an FEC filing, Anderson, Forestal and the department's chief legal counsel, Kevin Murray, each contributed $1,000 to Carson's campaign. It is worth noting that Carson, a city-county councilor, voted against the recent ordinance transferring control of IMPD to the mayor's office from the Sheriff's Department.

Carson and his supporters see nothing wrong with the active participation of the Sheriff's Department brass in his campaign. The TV ads and campaign photos prominently display the recognizable faces of the department's top brass, including Forestal, in their police uniforms. Indeed, Indiana law, while prohibiting law enforcement officers from electioneering while in uniform, allows them to be photographed. It does not, however, allow law enforcement officers to engage in certain political activities while on duty and, in some instances, even while off duty. Sheriff's Department employees must remember that because it receives federal funding, some employees are subject to the federal Hatch Act. This law says that employees whose principal employment duties are connected with a federal loan or grant cannot be candidates for partisan office. The Act also prohibits the use of an official position to benefit or to oppose a candidate in a partisan campaign. Further, covered employees must refrain from soliciting covered co-workers for political donations. Supervisors have been found to be inherently coercive in the context of seeking political contributions from subordinates. The law also forbids covered employees from advising other employees to make political contributions.

In the case of the Marion Co. Sheriff's Department, there is plenty of reason for the public to be concerned about the political activities of the persons employed there. The department has a long history of being one of the most political and powerful offices in the State of Indiana, heightened by the fact that the Sheriff for many years has earned even more money than the President of the United States. Abuse of power and politics run amok have been hallmarks of the Sheriff's Department. Taxpayers were forced to pay out hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay a judgment rendered against former Marion County Sheriff Jack Cottey, a Republican, in a U.S. federal district court a few years ago. According to the lawsuit, a whistleblower claimed he was fired by Cottey because he reported on the department's deliberate alteration of the county's crime statistics to reflect badly on former Sheriff Joe McAtee, who at the time was seeking to take the term-limited Cottey's place. Cottey favored former Lawrence Mayor Tom Schneider over McAtee. The altered statistics were used in campaign commercials for Schneider to portray McAtee as soft on crime. After Schneider defeated McAtee in a close primary race, McAtee endorsed current Sheriff Frank Anderson, a Democrat. McAtee and his son, Bart, in turn were rewarded with jobs by Sheriff Frank Anderson.

That's just one tale. A former Indianapolis Star reporter, now working out of state, shared with me another account of how a former Republican sheriff went after reporters who ran negative stories about his office. One reporter was targeted by sheriff's deputies for a DUI arrest, while other reporters discovered people rummaging through their garbage outside their homes. Yet another Star reporter recounts how a former sheriff succeeded in getting a reporter fired from the newspaper because of a negative story she had written about his department. Abuse of power for political gain or self-preservation is simply wrong. Isn't that what the Democrats told us during Watergate?

During the discussions over the merger of the Indianapolis Police Department and the Marion Co. Sheriff's department, Sheriff Anderson testified that politics had no place in public safety. Clearly, the events of the last few weeks show that politics is alive and well within the Sheriff's Deparment. The only saving is that IMPD has been removed from the jurisdiction of the sheriff and placed under the mayor, relegating Anderson, Forestal, et al to the status of glorified jail keepers. Hopefully, IMPD will be less political under the mayor's office than it was under the sheriff's department, but there are already rumblings there as well. Republican City-County Councilor Lincoln Plowman, who voted for the transfer of IMPD, received a promotion under the reorganization announced by Mayor Ballard this week. Bart McAtee, an Anderson appointee, was demoted. Are these decisions based on merit, or are they based on politics? I can't answer the question, but you can understand why people would ask the question given the recent history of law enforcement in Indianapolis.