AURORA, Co. – A Colorado cop caught making racist comments on a bodycam video is returning to work.
Charles Deshazer was fired shortly afterwards, but a decision to reinstate him was recently made by the local civil service commission. And not everyone is happy about that.
“We have all the Alabama porch monkeys contained,” said the officer, Charles Deshazer just before a fellow officer shut off his body camera.
Aurora Police Chief Nick Metz says it’s inexcusable, “I’ve heard from so many people in our agency, so many police officers, officers who have been here you know 5, 10, 15, 20-plus years of all races who are absolutely appalled by what he said and many not happy by the return.”
Deshazer was suspended soon after the June 18th 2017 body cam remark. Chief Metz fired Deshazer on September 1st, 2017. But about a year after the incident, June 29th of this year, the civil service commission reinstated Deshazer writing his “statement was absolutely reprehensible and should never have been uttered by an Aurora police officer, much less a lieutenant. However, the majority of the commission finds that termination is an excessive sanction.”
“The message I would want to make sure the public knows is that its police department did its job . We said you know what that’s not representative of the Aurora police department, we’re better than that,” says Chief Metz.
TV station KDVR found Charles Deshazer at his farm in Hudson, Colorado but he had nothing to say, asking the reporters to leave almost immediately.
He won’t be allowed back at the department until he goes through the training academy again and he’ll return as a sergeant not a lieutenant.
Plus the chief says Deshazer will not be allowed to supervise other officers or interact with the public as a street cop.
The city could have appealed the decision by the civil service board but reportedly has decided not to.