A disgraced Texas police officer who was fired twice for his “vile” pranks is now fighting to get his job back for the second time.
This time, he was kicked out of the force for defecating in the women’s toilet. Not only that, he did not flush and even smeared the seat with a brown substance.
Matthew Luckhurst, a former bike patrol officer of the San Antonio Police Department, was first fired in October 2016 after giving a feces sandwich to a homeless person. But because of a technicality, he managed to win his job back.
An arbitrator said that an officer may not be punished for something that happened more than 180 days prior to the discipline. However, the same arbitrator did not excuse the act.
But the same year, Luckhurst got fired again after the department found out about the second prank at a women’s restroom.
This time, Luckhurst is taking full responsibility for the prank and reflected that “in hindsight, it was immature.”
In response to questioning by the city’s attorney, Luckhurst described the incident as “a joke” and insisted that he acted alone. The former officer also claimed that he had put small balls of a coffee product on the seat which must have melted to form the brown smear.
The city’s attorney also alleged that Luckhurst had harassed, degraded, and intimidated female officers with the prank.
San Antonio Police Officer Jessica Medrano testified that upon discovering the unflushed manure, she felt nauseous. The court also noted she was eight-and-a-half months pregnant at the time.
“I had a lot of nausea during my pregnancy. As soon as I smelt it I wanted to vomit. I was gagging,” said Medrano.
She felt “mad and disgusted” and vowed she would never work with Luckhurst again.
“It’s led to mistrust between the citizens of San Antonio and our department, that our officers have had to answer for his actions,” the officer said.
Police Chief William McManus was also called as a witness and said Luckhurst doesn’t deserve to return to the police department.
The chief stood by his decision to fire Luckhurst for the “vile and disgusting” prank that he had played that involved excrement.
Ben Sifuentes, Luckhurst’s attorney, countered by bringing up other bike patrol statements that seemed to suggest that other officers saw what happened as “just a joke.”
Regarding the incidents of harassment, the lawyer clarified that termination was not the discipline called for.
An example was an incident in 2016 involving an officer who inappropriately touched a 21-year-old female “police explorer” in one “ride-along.”
McManus gave the officer a 10-day suspension.
Sifuentes also pointed out an incident where a penis was engraved on the gun of a male officer at the behest of a San Antonio police captain.
Despite women on the force complaining about it, the captain was not disciplined, Sifuentes claimed.
Replaced!