Sheriff’s drug investigators did not go ‘rogue’ despite writing fake reports, review finds
An embattled Pierce County sheriff’s drug unit did not violate any major policies and an internal investigation launched last year was due to communication issues and a “broken relationship” with prosecutors, according to an outside investigation.
The Special Investigation Unit was disbanded in April after concerns arose the team wrote fake police reports to protect an informant and possibly conducted improper searches. Criminal charges were ruled out, but a fact-finding mission found Lt. Cynthia Fajardo and four members of the team might have violated dozens of department policies and procedures.
Earlier this month, the Clark County Sheriff’s Office turned over a 27-page report that essentially clears the drug unit of serious wrongdoing.
“Based on the evidence we were provided, we did not find the Special Investigations Unit to be a rogue unit of detectives tossing the law, protocols, policy and procedures to the wind,” investigators wrote in the report. “Instead, we found minor violations during the execution of several search warrant operations and subsequent arrests.”
Sheriff Ed Troyer said he is still reviewing the report and couldn’t answer specific questions on whether there would be policy changes, if any SIU members would be disciplined or when the drug unit would start working again.
SIU members said they feel vindicated after reading the report and are grateful an outside review done by Clark County supported what they’ve been saying all along.
“We all knew that eventually, when we were able to get the allegations in front of an unbiased, educated reviewer, we would all be exonerated,” the drug unit said in a collective statement through its attorney, Joan Mell.
Internal investigation
The need for an internal investigation arose in April after prosecutors and at least one drug unit member brought forward concerns about certain SIU members not following department procedures, which resulted in criminal charges not being pursued against two drug traffickers.
In an attempt to ensure transparency, former Sheriff Paul Pastor asked the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Office to conduct the investigation. Kitsap interviewed 27 people, produced a 461-page summary of their investigation and provided lists of possible policy violations for individual drug unit members.
SIU personnel insisted they’d done nothing wrong and said the investigation was launched because of clashes with the Pierce County Prosecutor’s Office. They complained that Kitsap investigators were accusatory and it seemed like they’d decided the drug unit was guilty before the fact-finding mission began. Recently, the unit called the months-long investigation a “witch hunt.”
“It was quite obvious to all interviewed that there was an outcome that Kitsap was trying to achieve,” according to SIU’s joint statement. “This was demonstrated by their reaction whenever an SIU member tried to present their position and was then met with being additionally charged with insubordination.”
Once Kitsap finished the internal investigation, Pierce County officials worked with the drug unit to find another law enforcement agency to review the investigation and determine whether any of the five accused SIU members violated policies or procedures. They agreed on Clark County, which started its review in late September.
The tone from Kitsap and Clark investigators was noticeably different, and Clark investigators seemed to back up the drug unit’s claims by saying, “We found a theme of outcome-oriented questions” throughout Kitsap’s investigation. Attempts by The News Tribune to reach someone from the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Office to comment were unsuccessful.
Out of the 45 policy violations suggested by Kitsap investigators, Clark County sustained seven of them.
Fajardo, who was in charge of the unit and criticized for orchestrating a plan to create false police reports to protect an informant’s identity, was found to have violated only one policy, unsatisfactory performance for not better communicating with her superiors about the plan to write fake police reports.
Detective Ryan Olivarez was cleared of violating all policies.
The two sergeants in the unit, Chris Adamson and Tommie Nicodemus, were found to have each violated one policy for not filling out a specific use-of-force form after a Feb. 7, 2020, arrest where they pinned a suspect’s legs and used “elbow strikes.” Although they wrote details about the encounter in police reports, they were cited for failing to fill out the specific form that helps the department track use of force.
Detective Shaun Darby was found to have violated five policies, including failure to obey lawful orders for continuing to text with an informant while on administrative leave, unsatisfactory performance for not communicating with prosecutors in a timely manner about whether an informant should be charged, and a confidential informant violation for telling an informant he wouldn’t be charged if he provided information when Darby did not have the authority to make that deal.
Lack of communication
Clark County investigators said many of the drug unit’s policy violations stemmed from a lack of communication.
They highlighted something Adamson said in his interview: “Most of these issues brought out during this investigation could and should have been resolved through inclusive discussion, redirection and training. Because of this communications breakdown, these issues were never brought forward to be resolved collectively. They were just converted to allegations of intentional wrongdoing and implied personal gain.”
Clark investigators also pointed to a “long-standing broken relationship” between SIU and the Prosecutor’s Office, something drug unit members have said since the beginning was fueling the problem.
Moving forward, SIU proposed having a prosecutor embed with the drug unit or have a prosecutor assigned only to SIU and act as a go-between between the unit and other prosecutors.
They also suggested sheriff’s command staff get more familiar with SIU operations and narcotics training so they can understand why drug unit personnel operated the way they do.
“We hope to build bridges and our biggest hope would be that communication would start to flow,” SIU said in its joint statement. Unit personnel said they still have concerns about working with certain prosecutors and fear being retaliated against.
During the internal investigation, the broken relationship did “shade the nature of the testimony of the prosecutors,” according to Clark County’s findings. “They could not get past instances that were long over and resolved.”
Pierce County Prosecuting Attorney Mary Robnett pushed back on that, saying, “That may be how Clark County characterizes it. We don’t see it that way. The deputy prosecutors interviewed called things as they saw them. They did not gloss over the concerns or sugarcoat the situation.”
Robnett said the priority is prosecuting major drug cases and that she has confidence that Troyer, who was elected in November, will correct problems within SIU.
Troyer said he cannot yet comment on specific plans on how to move forward.
“In fairness to the deputies, the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office and the public, the Sheriff’s Department is still carefully reviewing and analyzing the report,” he said.
“We want to balance the needs and interests of all of the above along with the need to serve and protect the citizens of Pierce County.”
Fake police reports
Many of the alleged wrongdoings within SIU stemmed from an arrest at a Tacoma home that netted 14 pounds of methamphetamine and several guns.
The unit made a deal with the suspect that he would not face criminal charges if he provided information about his supplier, who was arrested a month later hauling nearly 19 pounds of meth up Interstate 5 from Mexico.
Shortly afterward, the Mexican Cartel threatened to kill the informant and his family because it suspected he had snitched, so Fajardo and her team brainstormed ideas to protect him.
They settled on writing fake police reports that the informant could show the Cartel. Fajardo detailed the plan at a team meeting.
No one objected, but hours later a deputy reached out to a deputy prosecutor with concerns, sparking the internal investigation.
Ultimately, two unit members wrote false police reports, and others said they would have but were ordered by the administration to immediately cease all work. That also meant the fake reports were never given to the informant, who eventually agreed to pay the Cartel $30,000 to repay the drugs that were taken in the bust, according to the Kitsap County investigation.
Drug unit members defended their actions, arguing that ruses are common practice and that they did it to potentially save the informant’s life.
“We as a unit went to great lengths to aggressively, ethically and within the letter of the law stem the flow of drugs into our county and went to further lengths to protect individuals that assist us in reaching those goals,” according to SIU’s joint statement.
Clark County found that SIU personnel did not violate department policy by creating fake police reports because ruses are allowed in those situations.
“This was NOT a report created to cover up an illegal or unethical act by the Sheriff’s Office,” investigators said. “This was more of an elaborate ruse than most and other options could or should have been explored before creating a report that ended up in the official report writing system.”
Fajardo should have talked to department administrators and the Prosecutor’s Office before moving forward with the plan to write fake police reports, Clark County’s review found.
Moving forward
Most SIU members hope to get their old assignments back.
During the investigation, 10 of them were reassigned to patrol, the Central Investigation Bureau, court security and the Department of Emergency Management.
“There was a knee jerk reaction to false allegations and subsequently 10 SIU members lives were turned upside down,” SIU said in its joint statement, pointing out their names and reputations have been unnecessarily tarnished.
Those same 10 drug unit members were also placed on the prosecutors “potential impeachment recurring witness list,” which means information that calls into question their credibility must be turned over to defense attorneys.
Deputies and detectives placed on the potential impeachment list include Adamson, Jason Bray, Lucas Cole, Darby, Fajardo, James Maas, Nicodemus, Olivarez, Darrin Rayner and Elizabeth Reigle.
Adam Faber, spokesman for the Prosecutor’s Office, said it’s possible SIU members could be removed from the list, but there are no immediate plans to do so.
“The prosecutor has a constitutional duty to share potential impeachment information with the defense,” Robnett said. “The Clark County report is their opinion on internal discipline issues, which is a separate matter and for the Sheriff to decide.”
There are currently 105 names on Pierce County’s potential impeachment list, 38 of which are from the Sheriff’s Department.
Then there are the $1.5 million claims, filed by nine members of the drug unit against Pastor, Undersheriff Brent Bomkamp, former chief of staff Mike Blair, Robnett, deputy prosecuting attorneys James Schacht and Fred Wist, and prosecutor’s investigator Keith Barnes.
Troyer, who ran against Fajardo in November’s election, is not named in the claims.
The claims were filed in September with Pierce County Risk Management as a precursor to lawsuits.
Mell, the attorney representing SIU, said she has made an offer to resolve the claims “by reinstating the officers, providing them back pay, pay their attorney’s fees and costs, and acknowledge they did not do what they have been accused of doing so they are off the Brady list.”
The Sheriff’s Department and Prosecutor’s Office have not yet responded to the offer.
This story was originally published January 24, 2021 at 12:00 AM.
