Barry Levinson
Why would both Fullerton Police Captains, John Siko and Scott Rudisil, good buddies with former Police Chief Danny Hughes retire at the same time? As Captains directly under the Police Chief they basically run the police department. All that experience leaving at the same time with one of the replacing Captains coming from the Anaheim Police Department with no FPD experience whatsoever. Is this just a coincidence? I do not think so Fullertonians because any Police Chief would want one captain with experience during this transitional time. But what if, like I said in the title, this was a clearing of the house? What if this was a clearing of the Danny Hughes connections at the top of the management food chain? Then under those circumstances it would make perfect sense.
Capt. Scott Rudisil, left, Police Chief Dan Hughes and Capt. John Siko all out the door
Siko refused not once but twice to take a police report from us when we attempted to report obstruction of justice involving the former police chief.
Was Mike Chocek waiting to present information that was never asked for, waiting to answer questions that were never asked or waiting for just another opportunity to set up Barry Levinson? Read the story below and you be the judge.
Was this just another failed attempt to set up Barry Levinson?
But Fullertonians it gets much more interesting. We now have heard from an anonymous source that another favorite son of Danny Hughes, Sgt. Jeff Corbett has been placed on Paid Administrative Leave. You remember Sgt. Corbett, the field Sgt. Danny boy called in the wee hours of November 9, 2016 to complete or should I maybe say not complete the job that four officers on the scene of the Joe Felz DUI accident apparently could not do according to former Police Chief Danny Hughes. Now if true, Corbett will be getting additional paid vacation for an extended period of time while under an apparent cloud at of course taxpayer’s expense.
We tried to confirm the status of Sgt. Jeff Corbett but our current Public Information Officer, another Danny Hughes favorite, Sgt Jon Radis would not confirm the current status of Sgt. Corbett. A Public Information Officer making close to $200,000 a year in salary and benefits would not give us the public any information. His reasoning was that it was a personnel matter and that according to Radus that is not given out.
Rudisil and Radus.
FPD pubilc information withholder Radus and his pal, ex Chief Dan Hughes
Read this anoymous unconfired information post to the Informer last year about Radus, Corbett, Siko, Hughes and others–This came from the same source that leaked the Felz drunken hit an run the morning after the election in 2016 that let the cat out of the bag.
“In the Hughes letter regarding Felz hit and run, DUI. Hughes writes that he calls Sgt. Corbett directly. There is something called the chain of command. After hours at a police department the Watch Commander is the acting “Chief of Police”. Why would the Chief of police violate the chain of command and call a field Sgt. directly? Does Hughes have no confidence in the decision-making ability of his Watch Commander Andrew Goodrich? This never happens and in itself is very suspect but we all know why it occurred. Is it possible that Sgt. Corbett called his buddy Hughes, “ The chief of the Untouchables” to directly to start the cover-up ball rolling?
Several days after this incident Division Commander Siko calls the four initial responding officers to his office, the officers are chastised for comments they made regarding the obvious state of extreme intoxication displayed by Felz and recorded on their Axon body cameras. The Captain was dismayed that the officers did not have the common sense to know when to turn off their cameras when dealing with a highly political situation. (An officer turning off a body camera in the middle of a call is a very serious policy violation and when politics are involved, just plain stupid). The Captain Siko told the officers that they had just ruined the life of a good man.
One other overlooked fact that may have factored into the nights decision making of the Felz incident by the Mayor, Chief of Police and Watch Commander was on-going police management salary negotiations. At the time of the incident Lt. Andrew Goodrich was representing the Fullerton police management bargaining group and was in the process of working out a new agreement with Felz and the HR manager. One wonders if the thought of leverage in a late night “get out of Jail free pass” played a role?
Hughes has a history of attempting to trump-up charges on his foes and people he hates. This goes all the back to his patrol days. Hughes has a broad interpretation and selective misunderstanding of the elements of a crime when it suits his needs which when needed he uses as a weapon against others, as in the case of Mr. Barry Levinson. In most if these past cases the charges were baseless and were shot down once they were review by the DA’s office as in the case of Mr. Levinson and Corporal Irish.
In the case of Corporal Paul Irish the department had suspended Irish for changing his mind about conducting briefing training on “seat belt policy” and instead spoke about “Ethics”. The changing of training topics by a presenter happens all the time in a police briefing and is not a violation of policy.
Most of the persons present at the Irish briefing were interviewed by PSB and married to their story…a couple supervisors present who knew of Irish’s past history for reporting Hughes and Hughes’ “Untouchables” for ethics violations had embellished their accounts of the Irish Briefing training. Why would those officers embellish and lie about what Irish said in briefing, to gain or maintain favor with Hughes to preserve the status quo?
Irish was never asked by PSB about a recording but when asked later by the lawyer representing the city if he had recorded his training, Irish told the lawyer that he in fact had a copy of the recording. Fearing that the recording would be used to impeach the conflicting statements of some “Untouchable” witnesses Hughes and the city’s lawyer fought to have it thrown out. Hughes argued that by Corporal Irish, recording himself in a police briefing room in a city building attending by 25 people (most of which are uniformed cops with cameras strapped to their chest) is “confidential communication” as defined by California penal code section 632 PC.
Hughes amended the administrative charges against Irish and now charged him with the crime of 632 PC. A criminal investigation was now conducted against Corporal Irish. Months later the DA reviewed the charges and determined that Irish committed no crime. Later during arbitration, Irish’s lawyer, Mr. Michael Williamson was able to prove that in fact not only no law was violated by Irish recording himself no departmental policy was violated either.
One piece of evidence introduced in the Irish arbitration that shed some light on the Fullerton Culture of Corruption was a copy of a poster that was hanging in the locker of Fullerton Police PIO Sgt. Jon Radus. It is a photo-shop likeness of a movie poster from the movie the “Untouchables”. It depicts the face of Dan Hughes overlooking a gun toting gang of thirty’s era cops with the faces of Sgt. Corbett, Sgt. Radus, Sgt. Garah and Sgt. Petropulos superimposed on the bodies. All of these police supervisors played a dubious role in the termination of Corporal Paul Irish.
The arbitrator allowed the photograph of the poster to be introduced to support the theory that this “Untouchables clique” may have played a role in the treatment of Corporal Irish.
After one listens to the briefing training given by Corporal Paul Irish on September 6th 2014 those present and the listener does not hear a bitter employee using the platform of briefing training as his personal soap box to deliver a self-serving diatribe. One hears a honest, proud seasoned cop fed-up with the corruption at his department and sick of working with crooked cops and the supervisors who support and defend them.
Corporal Paul Irish wants his job back. He wants to serve the community of Fullerton again. He thinks he can because Hughes and Felz are now gone. I fear that when the City Council hears the recording and knows the whole story behind the termination of Corporal Irish, fearful of more city embarrassment, they will offer him a settlement he can’t refuse just to go away.”
end of anonymous post————–
FPOA sellout Doug Chaffee
FPOA sellout Jennifer Fitzgerald
FPOA water boy lackey Jesus Silva
We await to learn the fate of Sgt. Jeff Corbett as well. His departure would also be a very good sign that indeed the new police chief is clearing out the dead wood leftovers from the Danny Hughes regime. Will Tony Rackauckas, our OC DA finally step up and file obstruction of justice charges against Sgt. Corbett and Danny Hughes for allowing Joe Felz to be given a ride home after smashing his car into a tree and reeking like booze fleeing the scene of an accident? I can only pray that finally our DA will do the right thing.
Felz and Fitzgerald’s husband
#1 by Barry Levinson on January 22, 2018 - 3:45 pm
A more accurate title for the Fullerton Police Public Information Officer would be Hiding Information from the Public Officer.
Where else but in the City of Fullerton government, specifically the FPD can someone make almost 200K in salary and benefits for covering up basic information about the status of the department’s members.
May I suggest to our new Police Chief, David Hendricks that more deadwood still needs to be removed from the FPD to rid itself from all taint of the past corrupt FPD administration.