NEW ALBANY, Ind. -- The New Albany Police Merit Commission declined Tuesday night to take further disciplinary action against NAPD Cpl. Paul Haub after he was suspended two days this week for changing code classifications for 169 case reports.
The findings of an internal investigation that included testimony from Haub suggested he did not switch the codes in the department's computer system in a deceptive or self beneficial way, Police Chief Todd Bailey told the commission.
Haub actually corrected the listings for some of the case reports he adjusted, though the majority of the potential crimes were switched to less serious offenses, Bailey said.
He stressed that "no narratives were changed, and no charging information was changed" by Haub, who is the president of the New Albany Fraternal Order of Police lodge.
The modifications in the reports were made from September to early November, according to Bailey. After the investigation -- which was performed by Capt. Keith Whitlow -- was completed, Bailey ordered the two day suspension without pay.
Bailey brought the matter to the commission so it could consider additional disciplinary action, but members of the body said they were satisfied with how the police chief handled the situation.
What happened in the system
In addition to other responsibilities, Bailey said Haub had been a crime analyst as part of the NAPD's Problem Oriented Policing, or POP program in the Midtown neighborhood. One of Haub's duties was to breakdown statistics and distinguish crimes as either preventable or nonpreventable.
Bailey said the goal of defining and analyzing crimes is being able to focus on eliminating offenses that can be prevented, such as theft from a van that is parked in an alley.
Haub was to study the crimes, and help assess which ones could be prevented. Bailey said based on the investigation and testimony, it's believed Haub was using the system to narrow crimes into the two categories.
Voluntarily, the department submits to a private agency the reports taken by officers who respond to service calls as a way to track crime statistics.
The NAPD's data entry system is safeguarded so administrative staff can tell who has accessed the network and what they did while online, Bailey said. Haub never changed an actual charge on a suspect, but he did switch how a crime was defined in some of the case reports, Bailey said. One of the main reasons Bailey said he didn't suspect Haub was changing the case reports in an untruthful way was because he had little to gain by doing so.
Haub could have manipulated statistics to make it appear that some crimes were less severe than initially reported, but he actually strengthened the classification of several of the offenses, Bailey said.
Some of the case report definitions were lessened, Bailey said. For example, some theft codes were changed to vandalism, he said.
According to Bailey, the only difference any of the changes made was it switched the reported crime drop in the POP area from about 4 percent to about 3.8 percent for the year.
Bailey said the changes have already been made in the data system.
"Everything problematic has been changed," Bailey said.
Haub's mistake
Haub should have notified the administration before making the changes and failed to consider if each case was truly closed prior to updating the codes, Bailey said.
In addition to the suspension, Bailey said Haub was removed as the crime analyst for the POP program.
Haub was remorseful in his statement recorded with the disciplinary action, Bailey said.
Bailey added he believes "this behavior will not happen again with him."
He said Haub had a clean record before the incident, and has been a hard worker during his tenure at the department. Haub admitted the mistake and there was "no smoking gun" that he was trying to falsify reports, Bailey said.
The fact the reports had been altered came to the administration's attention after an officer mentioned there were changes in the classification of a case he filed.
Political games?
Bailey said Haub disobeyed the department's policy, but that he's not the only officer who should be disciplined for the situation. In addition to a supervising officer possibly knowing about Haub's action and not alerting the administration, Bailey said it's also against NAPD policy to leak disciplinary information to the public until the proper procedures such as notifying the merit commission have been followed.
There were five officers that knew about Haub's situation, and all were instructed to keep silent about the matter until the investigation had been completed, Bailey said.
But obviously at least one of the officers spread the information because the matter has "shown up on blogs and it's totally viral" Bailey said.
Mayor-elect Jeff Gahan has yet to announce his choice for the next police chief, and Bailey inferred the information might have been leaked as way to discredit him.
He said he has a "strong suspicion that if this was not a political season" Haub's offense would not have been leaked by officers to the media and public.
Bailey vowed to find out who has spread the information and appropriately discipline them for the violation of NAPD policy. With only two members of the media in the audience Tuesday, Bailey agreed to discuss the case openly with the merit commission.
He said there have been other discipline matters in the past that were probably worse than Haub's offense, but they were not leaked to the public.
Haub was not in attendance, but Bailey said he returned to work on Wednesday.
Bailey said the decision to suspend Haub was fair, and that he's always focused on maintaining a respected department.
"I'm not happy about this, I'm extraordinarily concerned," he said.
Copyright 2011 - The Evening News and the Tribune, Jeffersonville, Ind.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
