Court Denies Clarkstown Police Chief's Injunction Request

NEW CITY, NY — Supreme Court Justice Robert Berliner ruled Wednesday against Clarkstown Police Chief Michael Sullivan’s motion for an injunction to keep the first hearing from proceeding while his lawsuit against the town goes forward.

Following that decision and referencing last week's Appellate court's decision denying Sullivan’s request for a stay, Special Prosecutor William Harrington released the following statement:

“On January 27 the Appellate Division, Second Department denied Michael Sullivan’s motion to stay prosecution of the two sets of Town administrative charges pending against him. In addition, today the Rockland County Supreme Court also denied Sullivan’s motion for a preliminary injunction to enjoin the administrative hearing on those charges."

“The Town is gratified by both well-reasoned decisions and intends to continue to vigorously pursue the pending charges against Michael Sullivan.”

Those charges against Sullivan include additional ones filed in December. Harrington said the Town Board would prosecute the new charges separately because they were based on different violations of Police Department orders than the earlier accusations.

In December Harrington said:

"The new charges preffered against Chief Sullivan relate to his conceded hard reset and complete deletion of all the electronic data on his CPD cell phone upon his suspension. This misconduct occurred within 36 hours after Sgt Cole-Hatchard’s, aware of Chief Sullivan’s imminent suspension, engaged in the identical permanent deletion his CPD cell phone, notwithstanding the fact that Cole-Hatchard remained a CPD employee for approximately 8 additional weeks until his was forced to resign in disgrace upon discovery that he also tampered with and removed his CPD computer hard drive upon being advised that it was to be seized for forensic analysis in conjunction with the special prosecutor’s investigation of both he and Chief Sullivan.

"Sullivan and Cole-Hatchard’s actions are expressly prohibited by multiple CPD General Orders which apply with equal force to all CPD members. In addition, Sullivan’s and Cole-Hatchard’s coordinated destruction of the their cell phone data may well have violated document preservation orders and laws applicable to two separate federal lawsuits ( Lynn and Garvey) currently pending against the Town and Sullivan. This may subject the Town and Sullivan to serious sanctions for the destruction of electronic evidence.

"Sullivan’s misconduct is unprecedented. Despite his public excuses to the contrary, the destruction of CPD cell phone data is not standard CPD operating procedure in the context of pending disciplinary hearings or federal litigation. His alleged desire to delete personal information on the CPPD cell phone could have been achieved by simply deleting that information, rather than all the electronic data on his CPD phone. While the Town was able to recover some of the destroyed electronic data, voice messages, text messages and similar non email communications were permanently deleted and cannot be recovered."