Year End: Officer charged with stealing from police fund



By MICHAEL P. RELLAHAN, mrellahan@dailylocal.com
Posted: 12/29/13, 6:24 PM EST |

The Chester County law enforcement community was shaken over the summer as news surfaced that a former Coatesville police detective, one of the most respected and admired in the profession, would be charged with siphoning funds from a charity account.
Even more, it became clear that the charity involved was the Coatesville Police Benevolent Association. In effect, Gerald Pawling was stealing money from his fellow officers.
In August, Pawling, who had worked some of the most high profile cases in the city’s recent history, was charged with theft and forgery, accused of stealing $46,000 from the association when he was its treasurer.
“This is a simple case about a good cop gone bad,” Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan proclaimed after his arrest. “Detective Gerald Pawling was a police officer for the Coatesville Police Department. He was respected, he was admired, he was trusted. Unfortunately he used those qualities as a smokescreen to steal from his fellow police officers.”
According to court documents, the investigation began after one of Pawling’s former colleagues, Coatesville Detective Kevin Campbell, assumed control of the police union’s finances earlier this year. As Campbell reviewed the union’s financial records, he discovered a series of discrepancies that suggested an unfortunate scenario: thefts from the inside.
After Campbell’s discovery, the investigation was brought to the District Attorney’s Office and the Chester County Detectives. A subsequent investigation determined that Pawling, a 17-year-veteran, repeatedly used his position as treasurer of the CPBA to write fraudulent checks made payable to himself and his wife, Stacey Pawling.
Pawling’s attorney, Daniel Bush of West Chester, said his client would face the accusations.
“At some point the process is going to play itself out and someone else will judge whether he did or did not do something wrong,” the veteran criminal defense attorney said. He emphasized, however, that Pawling’s record of almost two decades of service to the Coatesville community and its citizens still stands. “Nothing in these allegations minimizes that past.”
As of December, Pawling’s case was still awaiting trial in Common Pleas Court.