ACTING CHIEF JOHN SIKO
the die has been cast but we cannot allow the ink to dry on this
Just a few weeks ago, Interim City Manager Allan Roeder gave the citizens of Fullerton an update on the status of finding a new Police Chief. He said then that it was only a few weeks away until the city named this new Police Chief.
Here is a photo of the New Fullerton Police captain John Siko eager to help shape future of agency back in 2015-shape it into what?
During the short time since 2011 since Siko was promoted to lieutenant and later to captain by Dan Hughes who was the chief, 35 percent of the Fullerton police force left for greener pastures and these were the good officers who left leaving us the dregs. Yes he and Hughes sure shaped it alright and shaped in in their image leaving the worst of the worst to take care of the population of Fullerton.
A week or two later, I learned to my surprise (not a complete surprise since nothing the city does truly surprises me anymore), that the city has named Fullerton Captain John Siko (pronounced psycho) as our new Acting Police Chief. I then asked myself why this turn of events. Why didn’t Hinig wait a few more weeks for the naming of the next permanent Chief of Police as was the plan according to City Manager, Allan Roeder?
The city attorney dozing for dollars while chief Heinig prematurely abandons ship
Did the scheduling of that event just change due to the recent corruption allegations against our last permanent chief Dan Hughes? Did Hinig finally have his fill of embarrassment to continue as chief? As an example he remained publicly silent about a very important police matter, i.e. the repeal of a law enacted to help protect our children from pedophiles, Ordinance 3149. For he did not speak on that agenda item at all. He sat in his chair during that Agenda Item and said absolutely nothing on a matter that should have been front and center for any police chief. Well all I could say is that the only thing for sure that David Hinig appeared to do from my vantage point was to collect a whole bunch of money for 6 months?
Heinig on the right. Was the heat was too much for Heinig?
Will Mayor Bruce Whitaker or any of our other council members bring up that the city just wasted approximately $100,000 or more to bring in an very high price temporary employee for the sole purpose of being a powerless figurehead? Why did they ignore their fiduciary responsibilities once again?
Now lets talk about the guy who really has been running the FPD since Dan Hughes retired from his police chief role in early November 2016. The person I am referring to of course is none other than the recently appointed ACTING POLICE CHIEF JOHN SIKO.
My only exchanges with then Captain Siko (Captain of the Fullerton Uniform Division) was a few weeks ago twice at the Fullerton Police Department. Both times he showed up to deal with our request to file a police report against former Police Chief Dan Hughes for criminal obstruction of justice. The first time he told us that we could not file a report. The second time he told us that he actually filed the police report for us. I specifically asked him then if the police report stated that we were filing charges of obstruction of justice against Dan Hughes. He responded in the affirmative. We learned a few days later from a Cadet at the front desk that Captain Siko did not file a police report on our behalf but rather a Miscellaneous Report outlining the conversation that is solely a Receive and File Report. Unlike a criminal police report that requires the department to investigate the allegations in such report, the Miscellaneous Report requires absolutely no action by the department. Its only function I guess is to gather dust in a file cabinet.
So what did these two encounters teach me about our new Acting Police Chief? First that he can look me in the eye and flat out not tell me the truth. Second, I learned that as the Uniform Officers’ Division Captain that he apparently was already running the FPD micromanaging the department or at least the potential scandals. For I learned that he was informed by the Watch Commandersf when Joe and me made a request concerning former Police Chief Hughes. For in an honest police department, filling out a police report is a very simple and straightforward activity. But Captain Siko apparently had made it his business to be notified of our attempts to file such a report immediately each time. He then chose to take total control of the situation twice while telling us he was actually off-duty both times. Why this perceived kind of paranoid interest in making sure that he would deal with us personally?
One might expect that over the top involvement by an off-duty police captain or chief to come from the Nazi Gestapo or from another fascist police organization but certainly not from an honest small city police department that has nothing to hide.
I have learned one more very disturbing alleged fact about Captain Siko. An unnamed reliable source claims that it was Captain Siko who called the four initial responding officers to the Joe Felz accident into his office a few days after the incident. The source claims that Captain Siko chastised them for not having the common sense to turn off their Axon cameras in such a political situation and for ruining a good man’s life (Joe Felz). This by itself, if it could be confirmed by one of those officers would be such a serious violation of police procedure and ethics to merit severe punishment, even dismissal. For the source is alleging that Captain Siko was upset that the officers did not destroy evidence (shut of their cameras). He also was alleged to be upset with them for being truthful about the condition of Joe Felz at the scene of that accident (i.e. the stench of alcohol). I am hoping that one of those officers or anyone who has first hand knowledge to come forward to stop our City Council from making John Siko’s appointment permanent. We have one former Police Chief, Dan Hughes being accused of criminal obstruction of justice by a OCDA investigator. We certainly can’t afford to appoint another one who allegedly condones the obstruction of justice by FPD personnel.
#1 by Old School on June 9, 2017 - 7:48 am
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.
#2 by Anonymous on June 10, 2017 - 8:09 pm
Hughes has a real special place in hell waiting for his phony christian ass.
#3 by Roxanne on June 11, 2017 - 2:35 pm
This is very disturbing information about our former Chief. How on earth do people in the police department keep a zipped lip when this kind of outrageous behavior takes place? My boys are scouts and we teach them to respect those who enforce the laws. How does this make any rational person feel about what we instill in our children?
I really thought Dan Hughes cleaned up the department. If this is all true then many concerned residents, including myself and my husband, have had the wool pulled over their eyes once more. Not acceptable. What can be done? Protests out in front of the station again?
#4 by Barry Levinson on June 11, 2017 - 7:04 pm
Roxanne, yes all of this is very disturbing. In the FPD, they have a Sgt. in the position of PIO, Public Information Officer. This role is supposed to only take up part of that Sergeant’s time. Currently. Sgt. Radus is the PIO. I do not know his exact pay, but an educated guess is that with benefits his total pay package is between $150,000 to $200,000 a year. Why is such a high priced police asset in a non-essential position of PIO? Isn’t all that training and money wasted on having any police officer in that position let alone a Sergeant? I believe the answer is simply that in the FPD in order to ensure complete control of the information coming from the department only a trusted insider police officer, in this case one who was identified by Old School as one of the FPD untouchables would be acceptable for our past Police Chief. I believe a few years ago, they hired an in-house non-officer to also work in getting out information to the public in addition to Radus. On top of that they hired a Communications company, i.e. Cornerstone Communications (about four years ago) as PR consultant that puts out PR feel good stories for the department at the taxpayers expense. Police Chief Hughes must have more than doubled the PR budget for the FPD. Question: Why does any well-run small department need so many assets both within and outside of the department for putting out information about themselves?
Well, I believe that is the crux of his so-called reform to make sure only good stories come out from within the FPD. The most important reform recommendation by far by the OIR (Office of Independent Review) Report after the Kelly Thomas debacle was to set up an Independent Civilian Police Review Board. PC Hughes fought this tooth and nail and stopped it from becoming a reality. Instead we got a review board picked and totally controlled by Hughes. The members of that board serve at his pleasure. Anyone on the board does anything he does not like, he has the power to remove them without an explanation or review.
I believe that now Acting Police Chief John Siko, is made from the same mold as was Dan Hughes.
Question for Roxanne: When you have a situation where you have a corrupt police department starting at the very top, who do you think gets promoted, honest or dishonest police officers? Would someone promoted from within in those circumstances be more interested in making it the best police department possible or would that person always be concerned to make sure any possible past misdeeds by that department never she the light of day? I will let you and the rest of the readers answer those questions.
#5 by Barry Levinson on June 12, 2017 - 11:01 am
Roxanne you ask me the most important question, which is what can the public do to clean up our city government including our police department.
The answer is very simple but unfortunately is something that the vast majority of Fullertonians have not done in the past. The answer is to get involved and pay attention to what our elected and appointed city officials are doing. This means going to or listening to our twice a month City Council meetings. If every citizen watched even 20% of those meetings you would be so much better informed. You can’t make things better when you do not know there is a problem in the first place. So Roxanne I ask that you and your husband make that commitment with regard to the City Council meetings held the 1st and 3rd Tuesdays of each month. They start at 6:30 PM and can be watched live on TV (on Channel 3 if you get Spectrum Cable). If you want to make your voices heard come in person to the meetings and speak out during public comments. You are allowed to speak on any subject impacting the City of Fullerton. If it is on the agenda you can speak when that agenda item comes up. If it is not on the agenda you have 3 minutes to speak during the public comments section which usually starts within the first hour of the meeting. You can come to speak and usually be back in your residence by 7:30 PM but I suggest that at least a few times a year you stay for the entire meeting. The apathy and the lack of knowledge of the public is what has gotten us to this sorry state of affairs. In order to really change things, it will take involvement and knowledge by the public.
The power is in Our Hands! The question is when will the people take the time and effort to make it happen. I truly hope that answer is Now for time is truly running out to save our beloved city of Fullerton.