With a stretched-thin budget and lack of some county services as
a result, it is distressing when taxpayer dollars are used to
settle lawsuits.
With a stretched-thin budget and lack of some county services as a result, it is distressing when taxpayer dollars are used to settle lawsuits.
What is even more distressing, however, is when the actions that spurred lawsuits could have been avoided – such as one involving a civil rights suit filed by an elderly Hollister man against a now-retired Sheriff’s deputy.
The county settled the suit against former deputy David Hackman – who also is awaiting trial in Orange County this month in a felony case for an alleged assault at a baseball playoff game in 2004 – for allegedly beating Hollister resident Jose Jimenez in April of 2004. Jimenez recently received a settlement of $21,000 and Hackman, who had been on paid medical leave for more than a year, was allowed to retire in August and collect a portion of his pension.
While the county got off cheap and Sheriff Curtis Hill said the deputy was cleared of any wrongdoing in an internal investigation, there is an obvious pattern of behavior that begs the question: What exactly does it take to get fired around here?
The police brutality suit and felony assault charge were not the sum total of Hackman’s troubles. Formerly with the Riverside Police Department, Hackman left in 2000 amidst controversy surrounding the highly-publicized shooting of a Riverside woman in 1999. According to a CNN.com report, Hackman was suspended after making a racist remark at the scene following the shooting of 19-year-old Tyisha Miller.
Although Hill claimed Hackman had moved beyond that remark, law enforcement officers are held to a high standard for a reason. It raises concerns with the hiring process at the Sheriff’s Department when a cop with a history of trouble is given a job and then allowed to retire with benefits despite a pending lawsuit and felony charge that could put him behind bars for four years. As the mother of the man Hackman allegedly beat told the Free Lance, “I think the average person would look at these three incidents in the course of a career spanning less than 10 years and conclude that we might have a bully on our hands. But instead it seems to add up to three strikes and you get a pension.”
If Hackman is found guilty of the 2004 attack, he should be stripped of his pension. It was wrong to allow him to collect a portion of it in the first place considering his track record, and San Benito County taxpayers should not have to support a convicted felon.
