Wrapping up the tale

John Patten of Venice Florida! dot com finishes up with Part 3 of his interesting series on the utter mess that purports to be the Police Department down there.

At Officer Frassetti's arbitration hearing, six fellow Venice PD officers bravely go to bat for him, directly contradicting the IT guy's assertion that the computer system simply never, ever eats reports, despite receiving explicit threats about doing so from the brass:

"[Officer Demitri] Sorrentino also testified that he had been warned against testifying by his supervisor. According to Sorrentino's testimony, which was backed up by subsequent testimony of Officer Serianni, the pair of them had been warned by their supervisor that if they testified in support of Frassetti, their careers as cops with the Venice Police Department would be seriously jeopardized. 'You better dot all your I's and cross all your T's correctly from here on out because the chief will be out to get you.'"

Bottom line - Frassetti has been ordered reinstated, although one wonders why he would want to work in such a nightmare of a department, as Patten notes:

"According to Serianni, who is the current vice-president of the local FOP, in the last three years, there have been over 100 internal affairs investigations. That's an astounding number. That's a "why the hell would you even want to think about working there?" number. That's just paranoid nuttiness that contributes to stress, mistakes, serious health issues, and the ever-dreaded cop suicide death rates. I've worked either in or around law enforcement for most of my adult life, and for the size of the Venice Police Department, that number is nothing short of sheer insanity."

Total cost to the Florida taxpayer for the Frassetti fiasco alone? Oh, only about $150,000 or so.

We hope the peasants down there wake up and realize exactly how much money the likes of Venice Chief Julie Williams and City Manager Bob Anderson is costing them.

Patten isn't anti-cop at all, by the way. He's just anti-crooked cop, and is merely after fairness, the same as us:

"My thanks go out to the many good and honest officers of the Venice Police Department, many of whom have risked their careers to point me to information in order that this story could be told. It is due to their bravery and their hopefully deserved trust in me, in the face of a very real and scary internal political machine, that I have been able to tell this tale."

Great job, John.