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Ex-police employee ordered reinstated (followup)
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Ex-police employee ordered reinstated
May 10, 2002 Posted: 06:35:08 AM PDT
By MICHAEL G. MOONEY
BEE STAFF WRITER
The city of Modesto has been ordered to reinstate a key figure from the Police Department's gun sale fiasco of the late 1990s and award her $182,000 in back pay.
Former records supervisor Carol Mosconi -- once the department's highest-ranking civilian employee -- was fired in August 1999 for her role in the 1996-97 sale of surplus weapons, which violated city policy and state law.
At the time of her dismissal, Mosconi was paid $32.57 an hour or about $68,000 a year.
City officials have 30 days to respond to the ruling, which an arbitrator issued late last week. The city could appeal the decision in Stanislaus County Superior Court.
Should the city decide to comply, Mosconi's back pay would be roughly the equivalent of the annual salaries of four full-time police officers at the first step of the department's pay scale.
Police Chief Roy Wasden and City Attorney Michael Milich declined to comment on the arbitrator's order, calling it a personnel matter that they are forbidden by law from discussing.
"Our office had a conflict in this case," Milich said Thursday, "and the matter was handled by outside (legal) counsel, who has advised us not to comment because the process is not completed and may be subject to legal challenge."
Stuart Adams, Mosconi's Southern California-based attorney, said that until the city makes a decision, he is not sure whether Mosconi will return to the Police Department.
"We're in a wait-and-see mode," Adams said. "We don't know what the city's going to offer. They have indicated only that they have received the 113-page ruling and are reviewing it."
Adams, whose law office is in Westlake Village, said he, too, was restrained by law from making specific comments about the arbitrator's ruling.
The lawyer did, however, say that Mosconi was a "scapegoat" whose superiors unfairly dumped responsibility for the gun sale on her.
Former Police Chief Paul Jefferson put Mosconi and Capt. Dave Leonardo on paid leave at one point, saying that they had botched the gun sale. Mosconi later was fired.
"She had been on the job only two weeks when the gun sale was conceived in 1995," Adams said. "She was still a probationary employee when the gun sale was going in 1996.
"We're supposed to believe she was given complete responsibility for the sale with no supervision?"
The gun sale, which ran from February 1996 through July 1997, resulted in the sale of as many as 241 handguns to 97 active-duty and reserve Modesto police officers.
Jefferson launched the sale as a means to recoup costs incurred when the department switched from using .38-caliber revolvers and .45-caliber semiautomatics to 9 mm Sig-Sauer models.
The sale was mishandled from the beginning and ran afoul of state law because required paperwork was missing and the guns were not sold through a licensed firearms dealer.
News of the gun sale and the way it was handled fueled a monthslong controversy that was a factor in Jefferson's forced retirement and City Manager Ed Tewes' resignation.
Leonardo, Mosconi's immediate supervisor, was accused of improperly profiting from the gun sale, a misdemeanor. A jury acquitted him of the charge and he later became a deputy chief in an Arizona city.
The 48-year-old Mosconi was charged with embezzlement -- taking one of the guns without paying for it. The charge was dropped, however.
Later, Mosconi sued the city in federal court, claiming wrongful termination, intentional infliction of emotional distress and sex discrimination.
The lawsuit was dismissed in June, however, by a judge who said Mosconi failed to produce evidence that her civil rights had been violated.
Mosconi no longer lives in Modesto, and Adams said he was not authorized to say where she now makes her home.
"I can tell you she's still in California," he said.
Adams said Mosconi has been unemployed for most of the time since her firing.
"No other law enforcement agency would have her because of this," Adams said. "It's been like a black cloud over her."
http://www.modbee.com/local/story/2589059p-3122416c.html
'We're in a wait-and-see mode. We don't know what the city's going to offer.'
-- Stuart Adams, Carol Mosconi's attorney
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
May 10, 2002 Posted: 06:35:08 AM PDT
By MICHAEL G. MOONEY
BEE STAFF WRITER
The city of Modesto has been ordered to reinstate a key figure from the Police Department's gun sale fiasco of the late 1990s and award her $182,000 in back pay.
Former records supervisor Carol Mosconi -- once the department's highest-ranking civilian employee -- was fired in August 1999 for her role in the 1996-97 sale of surplus weapons, which violated city policy and state law.
At the time of her dismissal, Mosconi was paid $32.57 an hour or about $68,000 a year.
City officials have 30 days to respond to the ruling, which an arbitrator issued late last week. The city could appeal the decision in Stanislaus County Superior Court.
Should the city decide to comply, Mosconi's back pay would be roughly the equivalent of the annual salaries of four full-time police officers at the first step of the department's pay scale.
Police Chief Roy Wasden and City Attorney Michael Milich declined to comment on the arbitrator's order, calling it a personnel matter that they are forbidden by law from discussing.
"Our office had a conflict in this case," Milich said Thursday, "and the matter was handled by outside (legal) counsel, who has advised us not to comment because the process is not completed and may be subject to legal challenge."
Stuart Adams, Mosconi's Southern California-based attorney, said that until the city makes a decision, he is not sure whether Mosconi will return to the Police Department.
"We're in a wait-and-see mode," Adams said. "We don't know what the city's going to offer. They have indicated only that they have received the 113-page ruling and are reviewing it."
Adams, whose law office is in Westlake Village, said he, too, was restrained by law from making specific comments about the arbitrator's ruling.
The lawyer did, however, say that Mosconi was a "scapegoat" whose superiors unfairly dumped responsibility for the gun sale on her.
Former Police Chief Paul Jefferson put Mosconi and Capt. Dave Leonardo on paid leave at one point, saying that they had botched the gun sale. Mosconi later was fired.
"She had been on the job only two weeks when the gun sale was conceived in 1995," Adams said. "She was still a probationary employee when the gun sale was going in 1996.
"We're supposed to believe she was given complete responsibility for the sale with no supervision?"
The gun sale, which ran from February 1996 through July 1997, resulted in the sale of as many as 241 handguns to 97 active-duty and reserve Modesto police officers.
Jefferson launched the sale as a means to recoup costs incurred when the department switched from using .38-caliber revolvers and .45-caliber semiautomatics to 9 mm Sig-Sauer models.
The sale was mishandled from the beginning and ran afoul of state law because required paperwork was missing and the guns were not sold through a licensed firearms dealer.
News of the gun sale and the way it was handled fueled a monthslong controversy that was a factor in Jefferson's forced retirement and City Manager Ed Tewes' resignation.
Leonardo, Mosconi's immediate supervisor, was accused of improperly profiting from the gun sale, a misdemeanor. A jury acquitted him of the charge and he later became a deputy chief in an Arizona city.
The 48-year-old Mosconi was charged with embezzlement -- taking one of the guns without paying for it. The charge was dropped, however.
Later, Mosconi sued the city in federal court, claiming wrongful termination, intentional infliction of emotional distress and sex discrimination.
The lawsuit was dismissed in June, however, by a judge who said Mosconi failed to produce evidence that her civil rights had been violated.
Mosconi no longer lives in Modesto, and Adams said he was not authorized to say where she now makes her home.
"I can tell you she's still in California," he said.
Adams said Mosconi has been unemployed for most of the time since her firing.
"No other law enforcement agency would have her because of this," Adams said. "It's been like a black cloud over her."
http://www.modbee.com/local/story/2589059p-3122416c.html
'We're in a wait-and-see mode. We don't know what the city's going to offer.'
-- Stuart Adams, Carol Mosconi's attorney
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878