Crime & Safety

Gallo's Punishment: Slap On Wrist or Termination?

Supporters of the embattled East Haven police chief cry political vendetta and insist Leonard Gallo be reinstated.

Former Hamden Mayor John Carusone tried to do it in 1989. Last year, East Hampton Town Manager Jeffrey O'Keefe did it but it didn't stick. Now East Haven Mayor April Capone might take a whack at it. And perhaps just once in Connecticut history -- in Madison -- has a police chief ever been successfully fired, according to local sources.

Tuesday night East Haven police commissioners unanimously agreed to recommend to Capone punishment for Chief Leonard Gallo, who was placed on paid administrative leave in April 2010, pending the outcome of a federal investigation into bad police practices and protocols. Though, so far, just a preliminary report has been issued.

The discipline the cop board is recommending includes termination. The mayor is the only one who can fire the chief.

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Earlier Tuesday, Gallo said the town didn't inform him about the special police commission meeting, which had just the one item on the agenda. Gallo didn't attend.

"No one ever called me about this meeting or any other meeting or anything to do with anything in the department for the last year and a half," said Gallo. He said he learned about Tuesday's meeting "through the grapevine."

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"The Board of Police Commission has no authority or power to do what they're doing," he said. "It's politically motivated to facilitate a personal and political vendetta" -- words that would be reiterated by his supporters after the meeting.

Capone showed up before the meeting began to unlock the door to Town Hall, but left right away declining to comment.

After the vote, Police Commission Chair Fred Brow would only say, "The motion speaks for itself. It's a personnel matter." Commissioner Fred Krebs said the same.

In 10 minutes

Fourteen months ago, the commission recommended to Capone to put Gallo on leave while the federal Department of Justice conducted a civil investigation into the police department. That investigation spurred a criminal probe into allegations of racial profiling and police brutality against East Haven's Latino population, and only a preliminary civil report has so far been issued. An ensuing $85,000 commissioned report from the Police Executive Research Forum handed to the town in March pretty much mimicked the DOJ findings. Based on those reports, the police commission recommended the disciplinary action.  

At the 10-minute special meeting Tuesday, police secretary Virginia Williams rattled off 15 points from those reports used to justify the commission's recommendation to the mayor. They include:

1) Gallo failed to engage the Police Commission in revising outdated policies and procedures;

2) Gallo failed to require all officers to report all uses of force;

3) Gallo failed to require supervisors to review justly and sign off on all incidences on an officer's use of force;

4) Gallo failed to provide a citizen complaint process that is readily accessible to the public in both English and Spanish;

5) Gallo failed to investigate all complaints regardless if they were by telephone, fax, email, in person;

6) Gallo failed to require that the supervisor review the findings with the police officer who is the subject of the complaint;

7) Gallo failed to use a risk management early-warning system to detect potential patterns of at-risk conduct even after receiving numerous complaints about the same officer;

8) Gallo is responsible for costing the taxpayers of East Haven tens of thousands of dollars in unnecessary overtime;

9) Gallo failed to file state-required racial profile data.

Supporters, colleagues cry politics, vendetta

After the meeting, many said while not surprised at the vote they were nonetheless angry. Gallo, they said, has done nothing wrong. He should be reinstated. This was nothing more than a vendetta harbored by the commission and mayor against him.

Detective Robert Ranfone, vice president of the police union Local 1662,  said he was "expecting" the commission's vote but strongly disagreed.

"I don't think they have enough to terminate him. This is politically motivated," said Ranfone. "They're trying to drag the whole police department into this."

Former Democratic Councilman Ronald Toothe and Republican Councilman Paul Carbo got into a heated row after the meeting, shouting and cursing at each other. Toothe argued that the matter was police business and everyone else should butt out; Carbo countered that the matter was no longer police business as it's in the mayor's court.

"I think all this crap is political," said Toothe. "I don't think there was enough to bag him and I know that's what's going to happen. I don't think anything should have been done until the final (DOJ) report. If you're going to have rules, you've got to have them for everybody," said Toothe, referring to Capone's assistant Ralph Mauro, who's been charged with felony gun possession.

Carbo called the commissioning of the PERF report a "witch hunt." He said Capone and Gallo "definitely have issues" and it shouldn't be up to the mayor to decide Gallo's fate. "The right thing to do would be to reinstate the chief. He's committed no crimes. If he did, he would have been arrested," the councilman said.

Republican Councilman Ken McKay said, "It's been a witch hunt for the past three to four years (Capone was first elected mayor in 2007). The chief had been asking for updates on policies and procedures from the police commissioners and they haven't done anything. Any time he's asked for money for training," Gallo's been turned down, said McKay. "The Police Commission should be held accountable" for the PERF and DOJ findings.

McKay called Gallo a "good guy" with "good ideas," speaking of him in the past tense.

"He had an outside vision," said McKay. "He stood up to everybody. He wasn't a yes man. He had trouble in New Haven, also. I honestly believe she's (Capone) going to fire him. Unfortunately, it's going to cost the town a lot of money."


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