A former Mountlake Terrace police sergeant — and an outspoken critic of the War on Drugs — has settled a federal lawsuit with Snohomish County, the city of Lynnwood and Mountlake Terrace for a combined $815,000.
As part of the agreement, the city of Mountlake Terrace agreed to reinstate Jonathan Wender, place him on paid administrative leave through Nov. 10, 2010 and pay him $410,000, plus pay $28,118.95 into his retirement fund covering the period after his firing, court documents show.
Wender essentially alleged that his constitutional rights to free speech and due process were violated and that the county, through a disciplinary process, had branded him as an untrustworthy cop as part of a retaliatory conspiracy.
The police department fired Jonathan Wender Oct. 19, 2005, after conducting an internal investigation during which the department received a sanction against Wender from the county prosecutor’s office.
Wender challenged the city and county’s use of that sanction, known as a “Brady Letter,” claiming that the way it was handled violated Wender’s constitutional right to due process.
“This is a reaffirmation of the role of police officers to speak out,” Wender said during a Jan. 9 interview. “It should encourage police officers that they can and should speak out.”
Mountlake Terrace officials declined to be interviewed for the story. The city’s attorney in the case, Charles Bolasina, did not return Enterprise telephone calls.
Parties in the case reached a settlement agreement in mid November, according to court documents. Insurance covered the settlement payments.
Wender’s lawsuit alleged that he was unfairly singled out by then police chief Scott Smith after Wender chose not to arrest a Mountlake Terrace man whose estranged wife told police she had seen a small marijuana plant next to her husband’s house when she picked her daughter up June 9, 2005.
According to court documents, the woman said “she wanted to have an official record of her call, because the presence of drugs at his residence was forbidden by a pending parenting agreement and because this could be an issue in the finalization of their divorce settlement.”
After determining her estranged husband had no criminal history, Wender “admonished him to comply with the law to avoid risking the loss of parental rights with his daughter,” according to documents.
The next day, according to court documents, the woman entered her husband’s house, where she photographed a small marijuana growing operation. She brought those photographs to the police department, which referred the case to the South Snohomish County Narcotics Task Force, according to court documents filed by Wender.
The task force, along with Mountlake Terrace police, arrested the estranged husband the same day.
Wender, who now teaches sociology and criminology at the University of Washington, alleged that some fellow officers within the Mountlake Terrace Police Department, including assistant chief Pete Caw and former chief Smith, as well as Lynnwood Cmdr. Steve Rider, a task force leader, “knew of Sgt. Wender’s drug policy reform views and disagreed with them.”
The lawsuit said Rider initiated the criminal investigation of Wender on June 14 by writing a memorandum critical of Wender’s handling of the June 9 incident and his political views.
The cities of Lynnwood and Mountlake Terrace disagreed with many of the allegations.
For its part, Snohomish County, which contributed $395,000 to the settlement, said it acted appropriately in issuing the Brady Letter.
“We believed the process that was used in this matter did not violate Jonathan Wender’s right to due process,” said county attorney Michael Held.
Wender’s lawyer, Seattle attorney Andrea Brenneke, said the case showed there are problems with laws and procedures and that more needs to be done to protect police officer’s rights to free speech and due process.
“Our hope is that all government agencies respect not only the rights of criminal defendants but also the rights of police officers,” she said.
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