AURORA | A federal judge this week ordered former Aurora police chief Dan Oates to stand trial on accusations he demoted a longtime Aurora officer for disagreeing with him.
In a Feb. 22 order, Senior United States District Judge Wiley Y. Daniel reversed an earlier ruling tossing the case against Oates and the City of Aurora and said former Division Chief Ken Murphy’s case should instead head to trial. He scheduled the five-day trial for August.
“There is evidence that there was a direct causal link between Murphy’s speech, in which he publicly disagreed with Chief Oates, and Murphy’s subsequent demotion handed down by Chief Oates,” Daniel wrote.
Donald Sisson, Murphy’s lawyer, said he expects Oates will have to return to Colorado from his new job in Miami Beach, Florida, to testify at trial.
Murphy, who spent more than 30 years with APD before recently retiring, testified in May 2013 on behalf of former Lt. Paul Swanson, who was demoted from lieutenant down to patrol officer in 2011 amid allegations that he failed to show up for work as commander of the Metro Gang Task Force.
Swanson appealed his demotion to the city’s Civil Service Commission, which sided with the chief and upheld the penalty. Murphy testified that he didn’t think Swanson, who is his longtime friend, should have been demoted.
The testimony from Murphy, a longtime and popular fixture at APD, became a major issue in Swanson’s hearing.
In the lawsuit Sisson said Murphy’s testimony clearly irked the police chief.
Sisson said Oates told Murphy a few days after he testified that he would be demoted if he did not send out a department-wide email retracting his testimony. Murphy refused and said his testimony was the truth.
Oates said he was offering Murphy a “life line,” Sisson said, and had to demote Murphy when he refused to take it. Murphy’s lawsuit asks for back pay as well as damages for pain and suffering.
Sisson said Friday, Feb. 26, that Murphy is seeking “substantial” monetary damages, though he declined to disclose a specific figure.
Beyond the pay cut that came from the demotion, Sisson said the demotion also meant Murphy wasn’t in a command position in 2014 when Oates stepped down and thus didn’t have a shot at the department’s top job.
Aurora City Attorney Mike Hyman did not immediately return a call for comment.