| NEWS | Protection from p 11 her will,” and that she had been raped. There was evidence, she said: The hand- cuffs were still at the property, she said, as was an audio recorder that she thought had captured the incident. “[Potter] is drinking a lot, okay?” she said. “I want him charged.” Thatcher, in their conversation, refused to collect evidence from the scene (“No ma’am,” he told her) and continually de- nied that the assaults had been non-con- sensual. “I don’t think there’s an adequate basis to believe that a crime occurred,” he said, at the end of their meeting. Thatcher would go on to tell his super- visors that the woman had not alleged any crime at all. She was “just annoyed,” he told a supervisor, according to one ser- geant’s account; the sex was consensual, he said. He did not attempt to gather any evi- dence. Eventually, another call from the woman prompted Phoenix’s investigations unit to look into her claims, but the offi- cers’ work was “absolutely” impacted by Thatcher’s statements, one officer later testified. “Had the information been delivered in the unbiased manner that it should have been ... it would have been an easy call to say, okay, let’s jump on this,” another ser- geant told investigators. Ultimately, the Maricopa County Attor- ney’s Office declined to prosecute Potter for the assault, citing a low likelihood of conviction. Potter was never investigated internally by Phoenix police, either, ac- cording to court documents, because he re- tired shortly after the incident. At that time, according to city records, he was still able to collect a lump sum retirement pay- out of over $75,000, in addition to a monthly pension. (He did not reply to an inquiry from New Times.) An internal in- vestigation determined that Thatcher, meanwhile, had failed to “properly investi- gate” a complaint, and sent him on the short, unpaid suspension. “It felt like it was not given the attention it deserved,” says Jody Broaddus, an attor- ney who represented the woman who brought the case. The eventual settlement was kept out of public view, as the city pushed the payment low enough not to re- quire approval by the city council, Broad- dus says. (The amount was $7,500, per records obtained by New Times, plus an unknown amount paid by Potter.) Confi- dentiality provisions included in the final agreement prevented the woman from speaking out. It seemed that Thatcher would face no further consequences for the incident. Ari- zona officers can be banned from law en- forcement for failing to properly investigate crimes, or for dishonesty in in- vestigations, and they frequently are. But that’s only when the AZPOST board be- comes aware of the misconduct. And un- der Arizona law, local departments are only mandated to report violations when officers depart the force. Suspensions, meanwhile, have no reporting require- ments — even if the offenses are potentially fireable, as in Thatcher’s case. So for Thatcher, and the union repre- senting the city’s sergeants and lieutenants, the new investigation has caused some un- ease. In a statement to New Times, Thatcher wrote that he felt the proceed- ings “smack of political retaliation” for his role with the union, where he is involved with officer discipline. “Should AZPOST staff decide to con- tinue to try and take action against my cer- tification,” he wrote, “I will provide information showing that nothing I did rises to the level of impacting my peace of- ficer certification.” He added that he would attempt to “uncover” the reasons why AZPOST had taken action. As for the incident at hand? It “could “WHEN WE ARE MADE AWARE OF POSSIBLE MISCONDUCT, WE HAVE AN OBLIGATION TO THE COMMUNITY WE SERVE TO HOLD OFFICERS ACCOUNTABLE.” have been handled better,” Thatcher ad- mitted. Ben Leuschner, the union president, wrote in an email to New Times that the in- vestigation was “fundamentally unfair,” given the time that had passed since the initial case. “Absent some type of clear ne- glect or investigative misconduct by a po- lice agency,” he said, it was inappropriate for AZPOST to step in. But Phoenix police have long faced pressure to share more incidents of mis- conduct with AZPOST, beyond what is mandatory — precisely because officers have remained on the force even in the face of serious allegations of misconduct. Last September, Chief Jeri Williams pledged to bring more such cases to the state, al- though the details of the new policy are still fuzzy. According to police spokesperson Ann Justus, the department has done so: Out of 11 cases sent to AZPOST for review in 2021, she told New Times in an email, just five were mandated by law — a trend con- firmed by Matt Giordano, AZPOST exec- utive director. Among Phoenix cops, the policy has faced pushback. Leuschner wrote that it could result in “the weapon- ization of AZPOST for political pur- poses.” Giordano disagrees. “When we are made aware of possible misconduct,” he wrote in an email to New Times, “we have an obligation to the community we serve to hold officers accountable.” 13 phoenixnewtimes.com | CONTENTS | FEEDBACK | OPINION | NEWS | FEATURE | NIGHT+DAY | CULTURE | FILM | CAFE | MUSIC | PHOENIX NEW TIMES SEPT 2ND – SEPT 8TH, 2021
