Only a handful of El Paso Police Department officers were allegedly abusing department grants by altering their log sheets, according to an internal audit.
The audit of the department's grant division found that 166 officers out of 183 were properly using the grants, and only three out of 39 grants graded poorly.
The Police Department announced the findings Friday morning.
Of the 35 grants that were properly managed, 32 graded "Good" and three graded "Very Good." One was not rated because of a pending investigation.
During the audit, 13 officers resigned and one retired. Police Chief Greg Allen said those resignations were warranted.
"As the department head, that falls on my shoulders," Allen said. "Unfortunately, not making excuses for it, we did not know there was a fire to be looked at, as far as that concern being in place. Now that it has been brought to our attention, I think the oversight that wasn't in place before is now going to be in place."
The officers who resigned are Scott McFarland, Jose Ruiz, Ana Reza, Michael Arzaga, Kenny Huynh, Luis Ortiz, Luis Acosta, Jorge Arrellano, David Jimenez, Francisco Chavez, Charles Romo, Gabriel Castaneda and Oscar Candelaria. Enrique Davila retired.
"All the ones that resigned, have resigned when they were called into internal affairs and we presented them with the evidence we had of their misconduct," said Internal Affairs Supervisor Sgt. Chris Mears. "At that point, they chose to resign their employment with the Police Department.
"No one at this point has decided to let the discipline process go through its course, which is every employee's option."
A few of the officers who resigned have hired lawyers to contest the allegations made against them.
Their lawyers, Theresa Caballero and Stuart Leeds, contend that the officers were forced to resign and were working to meet illegal mandated quotas.
Allen said the most glaring mistake by the department was that six out of 10 program managers, who oversee the grants, did not receive any formal training.
"This investigation, if nothing else, has pointed out failure on the part of the department in providing training in grant monitoring," Allen said. "We are correcting that and we are inserting more civilian oversight over grants. My feeling on it is to take police officers as much out of the equation in dealing directly with grants and making that a provision that has to be handled simply by professionals that actually have the expertise in those particular fields."
With the right management, the department hopes it can prevent any similar problems from going unnoticed.
"Oversight would not have prevented this from happening; it would have just caught it earlier," Mears said. "These 14 employees made a conscious decision to participate in their misconduct, which ultimately led to this issue. You can't prevent an officer from disregarding their oath; you can just catch it quicker."
Allen and other officials said three officers are still being investigated after problems were allegedly found in their paperwork.
Two are on administrative leave and another is on administrative duty. Internal affairs is still investigating those cases, Mears said.
Originally, the Texas Department of Transportation, which supplies many grants to the Police Department, requested that internal affairs look at 20 officers, including those who had earned the most from the grant division. Instead, the department decided to look into everyone.
"Chief Allen decided that we were going to go beyond that," Mears said. "We told internal affairs to look at all 183 officers that ever worked the grant during calendar years 2009 and 2010."
In the process of reviewing the 183 officers, internal affairs found more officers in question. About half of the officers who resigned were among the initial 20 who were "red-flagged" by the Texas Department of Transportation. The remaining officers were discovered by internal affairs.
The audit also found something the Police Department was proud of, officials said.
Besides showing that three grants were being managed above standards, the audit showed that two of the six program managers who did not receive training were shining examples of management.
Lt. Tyler Grossman and Officer Greg Furr were program managers whose grants were graded "Very Good," despite never receiving training.
Chief Internal Auditor Edmundo S. Calderon said that Grossman has a degree in business administration and Furr received leadership training in the military. By applying what they had learned, they were able to perform the duties needed of a program manager.
"These two individuals were very strong to begin with," Calderon said. "With the grant training, I expect them to become even stronger."
He said the department has had to pay more than $50,000 in reimbursements to various granting agencies.
"We're still calculating the amount that will be reimbursed to TxDOT," Calderon said. "It's an ongoing project."
Deputy City Manager David Almonte said a grant administrator will be hired to oversee the grants division.
"We are starting the interview process," Almonte said. "We had a pool of candidates that came in out of approximately 54 applicants. We will be aggressively narrowing that field down to the top five, do the interviews and hopefully have someone on board before the end of the year."
The administrator will have full review over the department's 39 grants and any grants added in the future. Grants will also be reviewed quarterly, officials said.
The department is also working on producing a grant administration manual.
Internal affairs will continue its investigation. Once it's completed, the district attorney's office will decide whether the officers who resigned will be charged.
Aaron Bracamontes may be reached at [email protected]; 546-6156.c
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