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| NEWS > 14 May 2011 |
Other related articles:
Scotland: Police Officer Tries
A POLICE officer snapped after discovering her postman hubby was cheating - and tried to run over him and his lover.
WPC Sarah Brand, who now faces the sack, targeted love rat Colin, 37, and Gillian Baird, 39, after uncovering their affair.
The 36-year-old flew into a rage and mounted the pavement in her car, forcing the pair to leap to safety.
She also poured paint-stripper on Baird's red Audi and punctured all four tyres with a kitchen knife.
Brand is almost certain to lose her job after admitting the attacks as well as driving while drunk.
T... Read more
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Palm Beach Daily News
14 May 2011
This article appeared in the above title/site.
To view it in its entirity click this link.
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Ethics in Policing
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County to vote on stricter code of ethics, corruption probes
An internal audit that revealed some town police officers failed to report within a timely manner their receipt of discounted tickets to the Policeman’s Ball puts a focus on ethics regulations in Palm Beach just as the county is preparing to enact more stringent guidelines.
A police union attorney reported during a recent impasse hearing that he had advised some officers to not comply with the gift disclosure policy.
On Tuesday, the Palm Beach County Commission is set to vote on a tougher code of ethics for county offices and, separately, vote on whether to allow Inspector General Sheryl Steckler to start, as of June 1, auditing and investigating all public offices within the county for fraud, corruption and other ethics violations.
Last May, the county’s ethics commission, State Attorney Michael McAuliffe and Public Defender Carey Haughwout tapped Steckler for the new post. The hiring of Steckler, then the inspector general for Florida’s Department of Children and Families, came a month after the ethics commission selected county corruption prosecutor Alan S. Johnson to serve as the commission’s executive director.
The positions were created in large response to honest services fraud charges that led to the resignations and imprisonment of county commissioners Tony Masilotti, Mary McCarty and Warren Newell within a three-year period.
Even though the county likely will have a more stringent code of ethics in place within a month, or by fall at the latest, the basic framework for avoiding an ethics violation is not complicated, according to Steckler and Johnson.
Both say transparency is key.
“One of the ways to combat the appearance of impropriety is to have everything on the table so it can be scrutinized by the public,” Johnson said.
Last week, the Town Council asked resident Leonard Lauder, through Lauder’s attorney James Green, to fund a $10,000 engineering study for public restrooms at Midtown Beach. Before the council made the request, Green reported that Lauder agreed to raise about all of the estimated $200,000 needed to construct the restrooms. Having a bathroom facility at the beach would be a way to reduce the state’s requirements for public parking for beachgoers.
Although declining to address this specific solicitation, Johnson said officials in the county are free to request donations from residents as long as they receive no benefit above what the public in general would get from the solicitation.
“The point is, if something is going to benefit everybody and it’s transparent and there are no ulterior motives and it benefits all residents of the county or municipality, that’s a public good,” Johnson said.
Steckler concurred.
“It’s a nice thing when the community has the ability to help take care of their areas,” Steckler said. “It goes off the train tracks when it benefits an individual, a council member or an employee. There’s a balance there of the general public willing to help and ensuring accountability and transparency in the process.”
Town Manager Peter Elwell and his staff have worked for several months to strengthen accountability and transparency in regard to procurement procedures and other functions in the wake of the Steven White scandal.
The town construction manager was arrested in April 2010 and charged with multiple counts of unlawful compensation and one count of conspiracy after an investigation by McAuliffe’s office and the Palm Beach Police Department. He was accused of soliciting and accepting nearly a quarter of a million dollars in bribes from contractors for directing town construction jobs to them.
When enacted, the county’s tougher ethics code — along with Steckler’s new powers — will put public officials and staff under greater scrutiny.
The new code will require public officials to file a disclosure form to the Commission on Ethics for any solicitation of funds they make on behalf of a nonprofit charity. Such solicitations are permitted “so long as there is no quid pro quo or other special consideration” including any direct or indirect financial benefit to the official, according to the draft of the new ethics code forwarded by Johnson. The form would have to be submitted within 30 days of a charity event or within 30 days of the solicitation if no specific event is part of the solicitation, Johnson said.
Though he said some might argue that public reporting of solicitations might cause charities to suffer, Johnson said there is good reason for the requirement. “You don’t want the perception that people who conduct business with the government are buying good will by contributing. You want to tightly control it,” he said.
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