Tuesday, June 21, 2011

IF YOU'RE A COP IN UTAH, DON'T BANG A PROLEE

In my opinion, unless she was supervising this parolee in an official capacity, revoking this cop’s state certification was rather harsh. On the other hand, she should have lost her law enforcement license if she banged him while he was in jail.

EX-SERGEANT WHO SLEPT WITH PAROLEE BOYFRIEND LOSES COP CERTIFICATION
By Nate Carlisle

The Salt Lake Tribune
June 14, 2011

SANDY -- When Leah Carpenter began a romance with a childhood friend, she didn’t consider the implications for her job.

"She rekindled a relationship that had lasted for decades," said Carpenter’s attorney, Bret Rawson.

But Carpenter was a sergeant at the Davis County jail and her boyfriend was on parole. It’s against Utah law for peace officers to have sex with anyone they know to be on parole, so Monday the state’s police council revoked Carpenter’s law enforcement certification.

The Utah Peace Officer Standards and Training Council also disciplined nine other officers at its quarterly meeting. But none received the scrutiny of Carpenter’s case.

Rawson told the council that Utah’s law banning sex between police and offenders was meant to prevent abuses of authority, such as when a jailer forces an inmate into sex. The relationship between Carpenter and her old friend, by contrast, was consensual and can be traced to a time before the boyfriend had legal problems.

"This is not what the legislature had in mind when they codified this statute," Rawson said.

But council members disagreed. Summit County Sheriff Dave Edmunds, a member of the council, said he was "shocked" that anyone working in a jail would think sex with a supervised offender was OK.

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