Document Casts Doubt On Chesterfield Police Chief's Claim

By DAMIEN FISHER, InDepthNH.org, InDepth NH

A document obtained by InDepthNH.org from the New Hampshire Police Standards and Training Council shows Chesterfield Police Chief Lance Rouse claimed that he finished an internal affairs investigation two months before informing the investigation’s target.

Rouse is accused in a civil lawsuit brought by his former Lt. John Ciarcia of mounting a biased internal investigation, based on errors and falsehoods, because Ciarcia questioned the way Rouse managed the department. Ciarcia was fired from his post in June and his name submitted for inclusion on the Exculpatory Evidence Schedule, all based on Rouse’s investigation.

Rouse did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday, and the March Form B raises questions about the process he used in investigating and firing Ciarcia.

Rouse signed and submitted two Form B’s to PSTC this year regarding Ciarcia. One, in June, stated that Ciarcia had been terminated. The other, sent on March 7, states that Ciarcia had been placed on administrative leave. On the March Form B, Rouse checked boxes indicating Ciarcia’s administrative leave was the result of the internal affairs investigation, and that Ciarcia was either terminated or had already resigned.

“That an Internal Investigation was conducted and that, in the course of the investigation, it is sustained beyond a preponderance that the officer committed a violation of Pol 402.02(a)(5),” Rouse selected on the form.

Police chiefs are required to inform PSTC through a Form B every time a police officer’s job status changes due to resignation, retirement, termination, or suspension. Rouse repeatedly selected answers on the March Form B that Ciarcia had either been terminated or left due to the findings of an internal affairs investigation. Rouse repeatedly cited the state policy governing certified police officers to indicate that Ciarcia’s actions were sustained by the investigation, and those findings damage Ciarcia’s credibility.

But, according to Ciarcia and his attorney Marc Beaudoin, Rouse didn’t interview Ciarcia as part of the internal investigation until April. It then took weeks more before Rouse informed Ciarcia and Beaudoin in May via a letter that the investigation was complete, and the alleged misconduct sustained.

The March Form B sent to PSTC casts doubt on Rouse’s actions, and supports Ciarcia’s version of events. InDepthNH.org obtained the June Form B last week through a Right to Know request. PSTC staff said at the time the June document was the only Form B submitted by Rouse regarding Ciarcia. However, this week, at InDepthNH.org’s request, PSTC staff kept looking and found the earlier, March Form B sent in by Rouse.

Rouse was allegedly upset that Ciarcia spoke to Town Administrator Alissa Thompson in February about overtime pay. According to the lawsuit, Rouse refused to pay Ciarcia or other officers legally required overtime despite regularly having them work more than 40 hours a week.

Days after Ciarcia met with Thompson, Rouse put him on suspension and told him to resign by March 3, the lawsuit states. Ciarcia refused to resign, and days later Rouse then told him he was conducting an internal investigation.

“[Rouse] never outsourced the internal investigation to another agency. [Rouse] was the complainant, the investigator, the Loudermill [employee due process] hearing decision maker, and the department head that recommended termination to the Board. Essentially, [Rouse] made himself the Judge, Jury, and Executioner,” the lawsuit states.

Rouse’s one-man, months-long investigation ended with allegations Ciarcia’s daily activity log did not always match the GPS data. Ciarcia was not accused of doctoring his time cards to earn more pay, an impossibility under Rouse. Ciarcia was also not accused of falsifying any official police document.

Police daily activity logs are not official police reports, and are generally used daily for internal staff management.

One of the instances brought out in Rouse’s investigation have Ciarcia claiming to be at Chesterfield Gorge State Park at 9 a.m, when he was actually at the park 14 minutes later. InDepthNH.org has been told the GSP data software used by Chesterfield frequently crashes, sometimes losing days worth of GPS information.

The problems with the software make it next to impossible for Chesterfield officers to update their activity logs daily with the data. Often, officers will complete a week’s worth of activity logs in one sitting, sometimes using their best guess on times.

In May, the town’s selectmen upheld two of those data discrepancies as supposed instances of misconduct, and terminated Ciarcia. Such discrepancies are unlikely to make it through a legal challenge as grounds for EES inclusion, given recent New Hampshire Supreme Court rulings.

Ciarcia’s lawsuit is fighting to clear his name and keep him off the EES. The list for police officers who engaged in credibility damaging misconduct, known as the Laurie List, is maintained by the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office. However, individual police chiefs, with little oversight, are largely responsible for submitting the names of officers to the Attorney General.

This story was originally published by InDepth NH.