In Town of Maynard v. Civil Service Commission, the superior court overturned the Civil Service Commission’s decision to modified the Town’s discipline of a police officer from employment termination to a twenty-two month suspension. In doing so, the court chastised the Commission for demonstrating “a complete lack of recognition” that the power to impose penalties belongs to the Town.
When reviewing discipline decisions, the Commission must decide whether reasonable justification exists for the disciplinary actions taken based on the facts as found by the Commission and the circumstances found to have existed when the appointing authority made its decision. While the Commission is entitled to modify discipline when its findings of fact differ significantly from those reported by the Town, in this case, the Commission agreed with the Town and found that the Town had just cause to discipline the officer for violating the applicable rules, regulations and procedures. Still, the Commission modified the Town’s decision to terminate the officer and turned it into a twenty-two month suspension, what the Commission felt was “an adequate disciplinary period to address his violations in the absence of analogous conduct and discipline.”
In a straightforward and somewhat blunt decision, the court held that the Commission’s decision to modify the penalty exceeded its authority and defied common sense. Because the Commission agreed that the officer had committed the violations alleged, the court found that its decision to disregard the Town’s chosen discipline ignored the limits on its authority and usurped the powers assigned by law to the Town. “It appears not to have occurred to the Commission that, as a matter of common sense, if misconduct is sufficiently serious to warrant the suspension of a police officer in a small police department for close to two years . . . it is sufficiently serious to warrant termination.”
