They Would Stop at Nothing: How One Female Police Sergeant Fought A Three Year Court Battle Against Her Department, Winning At Every Level

One of the biggest missteps the department took in their retaliatory efforts towards me was delivered on January 6, 2004, by Lieutenant Potts. Just a few days earlier, the Chief had recognized me at the department's Christmas party, held December 19th, by awarding me with two commendations. I'm recognized for doing outstanding investigative work on two separate cases in front of all my fellow officers. Then days later, Potts gives me my "parting evaluation" with six out of eight job responsibilities rated as "Below Good", one of them being investigative work. After I made an arrest in one of the biggest B&E's to occur on campus, Potts sent out a department-wide email praising my investigative work. He also shared how I had worked with CCBI to check the suspect's fingerprints against the ones found at the entry point on top of the building; therefore, sealing the case against the defendant and leaving no room for his lawyer to work any plea deals. It resulted in securing a felony conviction. Some of the things they did were just astonishingly dumb. The ratings scale in State government could range from Outstanding, Very Good, Good, Below Good, to Unsatisfactory. It ended up backfiring on them because I had all of my past evaluations and never received any job responsibility grade lower than a "Good". Then to add even more proof to this being retaliatory in nature, Potts gave me a "Below Good" in the very area where I excelled the most, physical fitness. I came out of the Academy with final fitness scores of Excellent/Superior and ran the 1.5 mile run in 13.56 minutes.