BELDING, MI - The personnel
file for a longtime Belding Police officer fired after an off-duty fight
outside a Kent County bar shows the recent termination wasn't the city's first
attempt to end his employment.
Jason Cooper was fired in
October after a fight earlier that month outside Grattan Irish Pub, 11817 Old
Belding Road NE. Police Chief Dale Nelson conducted an internal investigation
into Cooper's conduct and determined Cooper's actions brought shame to himself
and the force, demanding his dismissal, according to documents obtained by
MLive and The Grand Rapids Press under the Freedom of Information Act.
A Kent County Sheriff's
Department investigation showed a man began to call Cooper racial slurs,
leading to a fight involving Cooper and up to six others outside the bar. A
witness told Belding Police that Cooper initially walked away from a seemingly
heated conversation with a man, but later ran across the parking lot and
grabbed the man by his shirt after he directed a slur at Cooper, records show.
Ashley Geldersma, a Clarksville
resident who was pregnant at the time, said she was hit in the side during the
melee and alleged the punch came from Cooper's direction. She filed a complaint
with the sheriff's department. Cooper told a deputy he didn't strike her.
Cooper earlier this year was
absolved of any wrongdoing after he shot and killed Bernard "Bud"
Rowley, of Sidney. The Ionia County prosecutor concluded Cooper had acted in
self-defense after Rowley in January shot at Cooper and a Michigan State Police
trooper during a traffic altercation. That incident is not reflected in
Cooper's personnel file.
City records show Cooper was
hired by the department in 1998. In 2000, he was terminated for an unjustified
police pursuit and allegedly providing false statements during an investigation
into the transport of a suspect. He returned to the job after federal
arbitration but was suspended for 90 days without pay, documents show.
In this year's firing, Nelson
wrote in Cooper's disciplinary record that the officer portrayed conduct
"unbecoming of a law enforcement officer" by allowing himself to lose
control and physically attack someone after ethnic slurs were made toward him
outside Grattan Irish Pub.
"Your failure to avert the
assault when you should, showed a continued lack of control and unprofessional
response," Nelson wrote. "Your actions have brought discredit to
yourself and the Belding Police Department."
Cooper allegedly didn't report
the incident to Nelson despite "ample" opportunities during two work
shifts following the incident, which Nelson said was Cooper's effort to conceal
his off-duty behavior, records show.
A Kent County Sheriff's deputy
told Nelson that Cooper spoke about the incident but declined to divulge
possible witnesses, write a statement or allow photographs of his injuries.
Cooper argued he didn't feel he needed to take those steps because he was told
the case "was not going anywhere," documents state.
Cooper's personnel file shows
high performance rankings in recent years but also details past problems, the
majority of which occurred in 1999 and 2000.
In 2000, the then-city manager
and police chief wrote that Cooper compromised the safety of others when he
pursued a truck that ran a stop sign. Two teenage girls sat in the bed of the
truck, which Cooper chased down a two-track road at night, traveling at high
speeds beyond city limits, documents state. The pursuit caused $2,000 damage to
the patrol vehicle.
Cooper was also accused of
providing evasive statements regarding the pursuit and another incident in
which he allegedly transported an arrest subject in his vehicle without
handcuffing the person.
Officials in 1999 said Cooper
failed to complete daily log and incident reports for numerous incidents such
as assault and battery, a missing child and a suspected drunken driver. Cooper
in a written reply to the then-chief wrote "I don't make up sh-- to make
my log look good, like some. You can tell by my mileage that I don't sit on my
a--. I drive around to find things, but sometimes you just can't."
City officials also claimed
Cooper falsified his application for employment by failing to list that he was
released from the Ionia County Sheriff's Department, his most recent employer
prior to the Belding Police Department, during a probationary period in the
late 1990s.
City Manager Meg Mullendore in
mid-November denied grievances filed after Cooper's recent termination.
