Opinion ID: 880451
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: dishonesty findings

Text: This issue involves whether the Police Commission was correct in determining that all these officers lied during the investigation under oath to the Police Commission when they denied that officers Damon and Gentry denied being drunk but admitted to drinking from 12:30 in the afternoon until late the same evening at several bars in Helena. Gleich testified that both officers were sober when he transported them in a city police car from the Red Meadow bar in Helena to the parking lot of the Hofbrau, another bar, where the officers had left their car. Several witnesses who met or observed Damon and Gentry during the course of the afternoon and evening testified that they were intoxicated or that they exhibited strong evidence of drinking by their actions. An audiotaped telephone record of Gentry's call for a ride in a police car are revealingly stark about his condition. The amount of liquor they admit drinking over the period of time militates against their sobriety. Very substantially, the record supports the Police Commission that these officers were in fact intoxicated, and that they were dishonest in denying it, especially under oath. The appellants, especially Gleich, maintain that when they testified that Damon and Gentry were sober, and not impaired by their drinking, they were merely expressing a matter of their judgment or opinion, not fact, and thus cannot be guilty of dishonesty. The officers cannot escape the tenor of their testimony this easily. Their statements were intended to state facts, and for the Commission to accept their statements as facts. The evidence supports the Commission's findings of dishonesty. The Police Commission did find that Officer Gleich was less culpable. He undoubtedly was torn between loyalty to his brother officers and his duty to state the facts openly. He apparently chose the wrong course, and the Commission and the City Manager set the consequences.