Gold Hill judge, city officials disagree over what he was told about the increased ticketing

GOLD HILL — Two city officials criticized Municipal Judge Don Leahan for dismissing citations in the name of justice, saying he was "misinformed" over why the city’s tickets surged more than 500 percent in two months.

Both Mayor Sherry Young and police Chief Dean Muchow deny the judge’s accusation that the city intended to help fund a third police officer with revenue generated by the citations, which leaped from $1,683 in September to November’s high of $10,550.

In the most recent issue of the Rogue River Press, Young said Leahan’s "attack" had "shocked" her. Muchow wrote Leahan a letter defending the tickets.

"Your conclusions are in error and the related statements are false," wrote Muchow. "Our department will continue to aggressively and fairly patrol for traffic safety."

Leahan — a 25-year veteran officer with the Los Angeles Police Department’s Narcotics Division — said he verified his information with the city and explained his position to Young before Monday’s court session, when he cleared about 35 cases by slashing fees and dismissing those citations he found questionable.

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"I understand Gold Hill needs funding," said Leahan. "But now they’re lying or denying what they told me. I talked to the mayor twice and she told me they were trying to fund a third officer. For her to deny that is self-serving, unprofessional and untrue."

Leahan said Young named reserve officer Chris Hansen as the third policeman the city hoped to hire.

Young did not return phone calls Friday.

Police liaison and Councilwoman Jan Fish disagreed with Young’s characterization in the Rogue River paper of Leahan’s actions as "totally inappropriate." The city has a long- standing problem with speeders, she said. But it is the chief’s inability to follow a budget that has placed the city in an embarrassing position — and the future of the department in peril, said Fish.

Excessive staff overtime has tapped out the police budget, she said. So did Muchow’s credit card purchases of gift certificates, alcohol and celebratory dinners made during the department’s remodel earlier this year, she added. And paying for gas, insurance and repair bills on six vehicles for a two-officer department doesn’t make sense, she said.

"I’m not happy with the course of events since the new chief has been here," Fish said. "The department is in trouble now."

Just prior to the ticketing spree, Muchow wrote in his September department report, "A way to finance this (third) officer, and also help pay for gas, citation books and other forms, would be through traffic and ordinance citations."

On Thursday, Muchow said he wrote the statement at the suggestion of a City Council member he declined to identify. He said two grants from the Oregon Police Chiefs Association allowed the city to pay reserve officers to patrol. Any correlation between increased citations and his report statement was "merely a coincidence," he said.

"The grants were a windfall," said Muchow. "Citations will be out there in relevant numbers in a mission to get better compliance."

Fish said the department should have followed the lead of other local municipalities such as Rogue River and Medford, which regularly send out press releases when compliance "stings" are in effect.

Muchow said there was no time to send out a press release as the department "scrambled to utilize (grant) funds."

Of the 81 tickets issued in September, 17 were written for violations occurring near schools. In October’s tally of 57 tickets, only two were written in the school zones.

Leahan said inexperienced reserve officers can easily confuse Muchow’s directive to enforce compliance with quotas.

"I am not anti-ticket," said Leahan, who said his five-year record on the bench reflects a high conviction rate. "But this prompts a police officer to write a ticket where a warning or some other action would be more appropriate."

Leahan vowed to continue defending motorists against over-aggressive ticketing by the police department — even if his actions anger some city officials, he said.

"Trying to fund a police department, or an officer, with tickets is an unauthorized tax on the public," said Leahan. "It is contrary to the intent of the Legislature. And I’m not going to stand for it."

Reach reporter Sanne Specht at 776-4497 or e-mail sspecht@mailtribune.com.