CALIFORNIA COPS THINK THEY ARE ABOVE THE LAW

Until they get found out

After an Elk Grove police officer wrote a traffic ticket to an off-duty Sacramento County sheriff's captain, the sheriff's union president called on his members to hassle Elk Grove officers in the jail and suggested a "ticket war" on the streets. The letter -- which led to the president's suspension last week -- bristles that officers in the nascent Elk Grove department "don't know what professional courtesy is."

The letter by Steven Fisk reflects only one man's opinion, and in no way describes practices among officers or animosity between the agencies, said sheriff's Capt. Jim Cooper, who is also an Elk Grove city councilman. "The bottom line is public safety," Cooper said. "I think, in honesty, on the line level when it comes to the guys and gals -- they didn't miss a beat."

In a telephone interview Friday night, Fisk said that he had viewed the ticketing situation as an emerging conflict that he wanted to stem before animosity grew. "I didn't tell anybody to do anything," he said of the letter. "The way I look at it, it was tongue-in-cheek and kind of amusing." He added that the ticket issue had been resolved and that he immediately wrote a retraction letter.

The original letter refers to an incident in which sheriff's Capt. Erik Maness received a ticket while driving a personal car in Elk Grove. Maness did not have a front license plate on the car, and one officer pulled him over and let him go. Shortly after, another officer pulled him over and ticketed him, officials said. "Both of the officers knew who he was," Fisk's letter says. The letter goes on to say he would "hate to see them start a ticket war," noting that the "last agency we engaged with lost."

Sheriff's spokesman Sgt. Tim Curran said no revenge tickets have been issued in the past or recently. "Even the old-timers we talked to have no idea what that was," he said of the war Fisk eluded to.

Fisk's letter also suggested that deputies could give Elk Grove officers the runaround when they book prisoners into Sacramento's Main Jail, which the Sheriff's Department operates. "I wish I was working booking at the main jail, I would make damned sure that every Elk Grove officer's paperwork was absolutely perfect. If they had to rewrite it a few times before I accepted it, oh well," the Sept. 14 letter says.

Sacramento County Deputy Sheriffs' Association Vice President Brannon Polete, who is acting as president, said Fisk posted the letter on the union's internal Web site. He said he quickly took the letter off the site and convened a special meeting of the union's board. At the Sept. 21 meeting, the union board voted to suspend Fisk and launch an investigation into his misconduct, Polete said.

Fisk had been leading negotiations with the county over the union's labor contract, which is in arbitration. In the phone interview, he described the board's action as a "power play." "They're taking a cheap shot because they're mad at the contract," Fisk said. "I have some disgruntled board members who are using this as a lame excuse to get me out of the way so they can take over negotiations in arbitration."

Sheriff John McGinness said he's not aware of any officer responding in the ways the letter suggested. "No member of the Sheriff's Department should in any way treat any member of the Elk Grove department or any other law enforcement agency inappropriately because of an officer's decision to enforce the law," he said. He added: "I certainly don't approve of what (Fisk) did."

Elk Grove police union President Dan Koontz said his officers have not noticed a change in demeanor among sheriff's deputies. He said about half of the Elk Grove officers were sheriff's deputies before the new department was launched this summer. "There's a friendship and a bond that was built, so that's not going to happen," he said. "There's a bond beyond a ticket."

Further, Curran said, the idea of "professional courtesy" in the department simply means being respectful to each other and the public. "Definitely in our mind, professional courtesy isn't a free pass," Curran said.

Elk Grove activist Connie Conley said she was surprised by the letter and saw it as a lapse of Fisk's judgement. "It's petty," she said. "In Elk Grove, we just passed a street racing ordinance ... to save kids. Then you look at something as petty as this ticketing thing -- let's put it in it's proper perspective, people."

Taken at face value, the letter endorses police practices that the public only suspects officers of engaging in, criminal justice scholars say. "It's the worst-kept secret in law enforcement that officers tend not to ticket each other," said Eugene O'Donnell, a former New York City police officer and law professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. "The cardinal mistake for this guy here is to put this into writing."

The sentiments expressed in the letter are not likely to play well with taxpayers, said Dan Carlson, director of the Institute for Law Enforcement Administration in Plano, Texas. " 'Why do I get a ticket for the same behavior that a police officer doesn't get a ticket for?' " he said. "That doesn't pass the smell test."

All said, Cooper is certain that -- as in the case of the March shooting spree in Elk Grove -- sheriff's deputies would not hesitate to support the city's officers. "If something happens, the Sheriff's Department is there to back them up," he said

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