2 Detroit Command Officers Under Investigation

Oct. 28, 2012
Two command officers with the Detroit Police Department are being investigated for alleged inappropriate conduct with fellow employees just weeks after former chief Ralph Godbee Jr. was forced to retire amid a sex scandal.

Oct. 27--Two command officers with the Detroit Police Department are being investigated for alleged inappropriate conduct with fellow employees just weeks after former chief Ralph Godbee Jr. was forced to retire amid a sex scandal involving an internal affairs officer, Interim Chief Chester Logan said Friday.

Although Logan would not go into details, a member of his administrative staff said that Commander James Moore is being investigated for alleged domestic violence involving an incident in a party store -- caught on surveillance videotape -- with a female subordinate.

And Inspector Donald Johnson, head of the Police Department's Homeland Security and Tactical Support operations, is being investigated by the department's Internal Affairs section for allegedly sending suggestive cell phone text images to a female co-worker whose rank was described as "executive level" by the administrative staffer, who is not authorized to speak about the investigation.

Neither man has been suspended, although Johnson was put on paid furlough this week; and prosecutors, who months ago declined to charge Moore, are revisiting his case after the surveillance videotape surfaced, the staffer said.

Logan, at an unrelated police event Friday in southwest Detroit, said, "It depends on what we find" before any decision can be made to suspend or terminate the men. He spoke while standing beside Detroit Mayor Dave Bing during an event at the 4th Precinct in southwest Detroit.

Bing, fresh off demanding the retirement of Godbee and pledging that the department would no longer tolerate sexual rendezvous in the ranks, said earlier this week that the city is creating a policy to prevent command officers from having sexual relationships with subordinates.

"I'm disappointed. ... This is something that will not be tolerated," he said Friday.

"We'll wait until we get the facts," Bing said.

If the allegations are true, "I think it's horrific," Bing said, adding, "I think we've got a culture -- maybe in the department, certainly across the city -- that needs to change."

Neither Johnson nor Moore could be reached for comment Friday.

The department has reeled from repeated scandals involving top brass having affairs with subordinates. Former chief Warren Evans was ousted in July 2010 when Bing learned that Evans was involved with a subordinate. Godbee replaced Evans, although he and Bing acknowledged at the time that Godbee, too, had been involved with the same subordinate that Evans was dating.

Then, earlier this month, Godbee retired after an Internal Affairs officer claimed she and Godbee had been romantically linked. Both are married.

This is not the first time Moore has been in potential trouble. He was suspended with pay in November 2009 for conduct unbecoming of an officer after he crashed his newly issued department squad car on I-75 near Clay on his way from a cancer fund-raiser for an officer's child. He was cited for careless driving.

Later Friday, a spokeswoman for Prosecutor Kym Worthy said her office is forwarding the domestic violence investigation to another jurisdiction after learning she is acquainted with Moore's wife.

"In light of this information, we will ask the attorney general to take the case or assign the case to another prosecutor to avoid any potential conflict of interest," said Maria Miller.

Copyright 2012 - Detroit Free Press

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