Mankato Police Chief's License Suspended For Training Errors
MANKATO, Minn. (AP) — Mankato's police chief will have his peace officer license suspended for five days after a state board found problems with his department's training and documenting of a dozen new part-time officers.
Todd Miller signed an agreement Thursday with the Minnesota Board of Peace Officer Standards and Training following its investigation into his department. The settlement calls for a 10-day suspension, half of which will be put off for five years if Miller follows licensing rules during that time.
Miller can remain Mankato's public safety director during the suspension, which will likely occur sometime next month, The Free Press reported. But for those five days he will not be able to perform actions that require a license, such as make an arrest or issue traffic citations.
The board found the 12 new officers were not trained in police pursuit or emergency vehicle operations before taking their licensing exams. But the settlement said "it is undisputed" that the officers got that training before operating an emergency vehicle.
Miller told the Star Tribune on Friday the document proves his department's mistakes were "clerical, process or timing issues" — in one case using an equivalent, but incorrect, form.
"There's nothing intentional. There is no misrepresentation," he said.
City Manager Pat Hentges called the findings "irregularities," and said there were no grounds to discipline Miller.
"None of the original charges were proved, none of them," Hentges said.
Hentges said the "serious nature" of those allegations merited hiring a law firm. The city spent $36,000 on attorneys' fees, he said.
But the head of the Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association is calling for Miller's resignation.
"It is outrageous that the person who is a director of a police department would violate any rules of the licensing board," Executive Director Dennis Flaherty said. "This is a black mark on the city of Mankato and their police department."
Miller brought in the new part-time officers in a hurry. State lawmakers had passed a bill in 2014 to stop issuing new part-time peace office licenses —which require less training and no two-year degree — after June 30. Part-time officers who got that lesser license before that can keep working "indefinitely," the law says, but cannot switch to another agency.
So Mankato started moving a dozen applicants through "hundreds of hours" of curriculum, firearms training and first-responder education, Miller said.
"We had to compress this into two months," he said.
The department failed to maintain written documentation of the firearms training course, the settlement said. The training was videotaped, Miller said.
The 12 applicants passed the exam by the deadline.
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