Exclusive: Dover report finds police chief’s behavior ‘troubling,’ but not illegal

Why Should Delaware Care? 
Questions over what exactly transpired between the Dover mayor, police chief and police union have dominated the city’s political discourse over the past year. A full release of findings from a third-party investigation into the controversy provides an assessment of the allegations and recommendations for the city moving forward. 

The City of Dover has released the complete findings from a third-party investigation into the yearlong conflict between its local police union, police chief and mayor, concluding that while some city leaders’ actions were “nasty” and “troubling,” none were illegal.

The 37-page report confirms allegations that Dover Police Chief Thomas Johnson drove his city-owned police vehicle to family vacations and other personal obligations, and he sometimes did work for a second job as an instructor at Pennsylvania State University during standard work hours in Dover. 

Despite the fact that Johnson’s vehicle use and second job hours violate the city personnel handbook, the report concluded the police chief was “exonerated” of any “bad faith or ethical misconduct,” because he had the permission of Mayor Robin Christiansen, his direct supervisor. 

Instead, the report, completed by Washington D.C.-based consulting firm 21st Century Policing Solutions, concluded the deeper issue at hand was an “institutional failure” stemming from the lack of any written expectations to which Johnson could be held accountable.

“The fundamental problem is not Chief Johnson’s conduct, but the absence of clear, written, and enforceable expectations for the Chief’s use of City property and secondary employment — an institutional failure that created ambiguity, fueled distrust, and allowed a problematic situation to persist without resolution,” the report said. 

Spotlight Delaware obtained the complete report following a ruling by the Delaware Department of Justice instructing the city to turn over the document.

Dover officials originally denied Spotlight Delaware’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the report in May, citing personnel and law enforcement file exemptions, but Spotlight Delaware successfully argued in an appeal that those exemptions should not apply to one of the city’s most important public positions.

The city already released a portion of the report in early October relating to allegations against Christiansen because the mayor publicly gave the city council permission to do so. Johnson, however, did not give such permission. 

The previously released findings concluded that Christiansen had engaged in “nasty politics” by telling police union leaders to attack two members of the city council, but his behavior did not violate any city or state codes. 

In a statement, Johnson declined to comment on the report Wednesday, saying he did not want to violate expectations of confidentiality for his staff cooperating with an internal investigation.

“Any further contribution on my part to the discussion of this report will continue to draw undue attention to other persons who have not waived their rights to the protections afforded them under the law, including those who can easily be identified, despite the redactions in the latest version of the report. My focus, therefore, remains on public safety and the men and women of my department — not on re-litigating long settled administrative matters,” he wrote.

When asked about the full report findings, Christiansen defended both his and Johnson’s actions. 

“The chief is a straight-shooter, as I am, and we did our job,” he said. “I think it’s a sad state of affairs that this all had to come about.” 

James Nolan, a West Virginia University professor who studies police reform, described the report and overall situation as common when an outside hire chief, like Johnson, takes the helm of a department. 

Still, Nolan, who also used to be a Wilmington police officer, said the scandal has amounted to a year of distracting the city from the “really serious problem Dover has about crime,” and coming up with alternative ways of policing.  

This is a sentiment a number of Dover residents have echoed, often giving public comment at city council meetings raising the alarm about gun violence in the city. 

New findings in the report

Based on a series of interviews with Johnson, Christiansen and five members of the Dover Police Department, the investigation generally confirms allegations made by the local police union about Johnson’s behavior, albeit with some differences in the details between the various accounts.  

The version of the report provided to Spotlight Delaware includes redactions of the names of the police officers interviewed. However, Christiansen said 21 Century Policing conducted interviews with Deputy Police Chief David Spicer, Capt. Robert Roswell, Lt. Jordan Miller, union president Tim Mullaney and the chief’s administrative assistant, Rebecca McNamara. 

It is not clear, however, which account of the situation belongs to whom, given the report’s redactions. 

Johnson’s and Christiansen’s accounts of the situation in the report establish that the pair “negotiated the terms of his [Johnson]’s employment verbally” – including using his city vehicle “more broadly” than is standard, having a flexible work schedule so long as he completed full-time hours, and continuing to work as an adjunct instructor at Penn State. 

Johnson also said he asked Christiansen a number of times to put the agreement in writing, and the mayor declined. Christiansen told Spotlight Delaware putting the agreement in writing was not necessary, as it is not standard practice among other city employees, like the city manager. 

The other Dover Police Department employees interviewed described a more dramatic story of Johnson driving his city vehicle all around town for leisure activities, and using it to transport belongings between his previous home in Upper Darby, Pa., and Dover, and to visit his daughter in college in Virginia. 

Johnson’s account does not specifically address these alleged trips, but he said he had Christiansen’s permission to go everywhere he did. 

While Johnson said he only taught Penn State courses roughly once per quarter and would compensate for those missed hours, the officers interviewed described a “materially different picture” of arriving at the station to meet with Johnson during normal business hours and being told he was unavailable due to teaching. 

One interviewee also raised concerns that he would not take formal time off when he was sick or away on an annual beach vacation, nor did he have his meeting calendar public to be accessible, creating confusion and double-booked meetings. 

Johnson and Christiansen both said in the report that the police chief reported his timekeeping to the mayor in the form of a Word document on a biweekly basis. Their tracking system, Johnson said, was necessary for his “flexible schedule arrangement.” 

The allegations about Johnson’s vehicle use and secondary employment were also the subject of a city Human Resources department investigation in late 2022, in which the city HR director found that Johnson violated the city vehicle use policy, but discipline was not necessary because Christiansen authorized his behavior. 

With the various accounts of Johnson’s vehicle use, second job and work schedule taken together, the investigators concluded that the descriptions of Johnson’s secondary employment and time off were “somewhat more troubling” than his vehicle use, though he had Christiansen’s permission for all three. 

Still, the report states that the bigger issue was the lack of concrete city systems for verifying the arrangement between Johnson and Christiansen, which created an inconsistency with other city employees. 

“The result was that a substantial deviation from established norms was allowed to persist in a way that generated legitimate grievances from rank-and-file officers who were held to a stricter standard,” the report said. 

Christiansen said the less formal, more flexible terms for Johnson were fair because he put in more work hours than previous police chiefs and brought valuable work experience to Dover. 

“He had this adjunct professor job that he wanted to continue to pursue, and it was a feeling that would enhance not only him but the entire Dover Police Department,” the mayor said. 

Recommendations, moving forward 

In addition to addressing allegations made against Christiansen and Johnson, the report recommended a series of changes for the city to make to its policy handbook. 

The report found “significant weaknesses” in city policy allowed the accusations made against Johnson and Christiansen to blow up into a major controversy, with yard signs and billboards sprinkled around the city and press releases from the police union gaining traction on social media. 

The recommendations in the report include prohibiting meetings between elected officials and Dover police personnel while the personnel are on duty, referring to an allegation against Christiansen; establishing more thorough take-home vehicle and second job policies; and creating “uniform and transparent” timekeeping requirements for command officers. 

City Councilman David Anderson introduced a set of recommendations similar to the ones outlined in the report during committee meeting in late September, before any of the report had been released publicly.  

The committee ultimately tabled the recommendations at that meeting, but Anderson said on Wednesday he plans to reintroduce them before the end of the year. 

City Council President Fred Neil also said he intends to implement the recommendations. 

“You don’t spend $50,000 and ignore the advice of a highly respected organization you hired,” he said. 

While the police union has largely been quiet on social media since last fall, and Johnson told Spotlight Delaware in May he had made “a lot of progress” in his relationship with the rank-and-file officers since last year, it is not exactly clear how the department is moving forward from the scandal. 

Nolan, the West Virginia professor, said he views the disputes over the vehicle and secondary employment as “tiny little details” in the broader scheme of high crime rates and policing issues in Dover. 

“There’s big problems in Dover, and there’s big problems in Delaware policing,” Nolan said. “And they get concealed by these small disputes.”

Maggie Reynolds is a Report for America corps member and Spotlight Delaware reporter who covers rural communities in Delaware. Your donation to match our Report for America grant helps keep her writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by visiting https://spotlightdelaware.org/support/.

The post Exclusive: Dover report finds police chief’s behavior ‘troubling,’ but not illegal appeared first on Spotlight Delaware.