By Noelle Newton
An officer suspended for ten
days by the Austin Police Department, has just been awarded officer of the
year.
The Austin Police Association
President says he did what the department should have done in the first place.
Officer Jonathan Laborde is
appealing his discipline.
Until an outside source decides
on the matter, you can take a look at the video of the incident in question for
yourself.
In the APD dash camera video,
off-duty officer Jonathan Laborde with his badge in his left hand and his gun
in his right chases after a man who just ran through his church.
Laborde would later learn that
the man he was after, Matthew Rogers, had just attempted to steal from a
T-Mobile store. Police say Rogers struggled with an employee and then pulled a
knife on him.
The clip after that shows
Laborde tackling Rogers in the middle of a street.
A patrol officer can be heard
saying, "I can hear somebody helping us out. (siren) Thank God cause I've
been chasing this guy. He had a knife on him so I didn't want to get
stabbed."
On Saturday, Laborde was
recognized by the Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas as the Central
Texas Regional Officer of the Year.
"The department wouldn't
recognize his courage so we did," said Sgt. Wayne Vincent.
Sgt. Vincent nominated Laborde.
"He actually did what I
think every citizen would expect an off duty police officer to do," he
said.
Vincent's opinion of what took
place is much different from APDsupervisors who suspended Laborde for ten days.
A disciplinary memo states
Laborde posed an unreasonable threat to the public stating most responding
officers didn't know Laborde was an officer, but instead an individual running
after the suspect with a gun in his hand.
It is department policy to wait
for an on-duty officer to arrive before intervening.
Laborde is appealing the
suspension and Vincent is showing his support through this award.
"We did this to send a
message to our membership that despite what you might go through and the
criticisms you go through when you do the right thing you're doing it for the
public and you're doing it for the profession and we're proud of you for doing
so," he explains.
Laborde is waiting for a
hearing date.
APD is not commenting about
this incident again until that hearing takes place.
