With all the chatter about how bad an employee Warren Turner was, you would think someone would ask the obvious.
Why did it take so long?
I think its interesting that Turner has been a probation officer for nearly 20 years, a 4 term city council member, and that the DOC has just now caught on to the conflict. In other words why is it that Warren Turner is suddenly after nearly 7 years for business as usual, to decide that Turner was a bad hire.
Doesn't it trouble anyone that, "A" he was only recently called on the carpet for something that he has no doubt being doing for years, and "B" The DOC has elected this point in time to "enforce" what should have been common sense for years?
Who put the heat on DOC's Debra DeBruh, and DOC head Alvin Keller? Has anyone connected the dots? Anyone care to guess who in Meck/Char Gov/Co is Keller's bff?
And while I applaud the release of the "letter" I'd like to see Turner's entire employment file. Surely there are some high points in Turner's probation officer career.
More importantly how many of those who Turner supervised committed violent crimes while Turner was distracted with "City" business?
In the end Turner had no business being a probation officer, but someone blue skied his behavior, and with 7 years of looking the other way it seem pretty odd that suddenly this was not acceptable.
Something just doesn't add up. Either Warren Turner was really good at riping off State Government or the DOC is a managerial mess and only when someone in Charlotte's elite power circle called in some chips did they stop giving Turner a free pass.
Either way we need more answers.
Check out Jeff Taylor's The Meck Deck for another interesting point of view here.
5 comments:
I think the key nexus is the fact that the city turned over Turner's phone records to the state -- clearly a step he did not anticipate.
Occam's Razor leads us back to the city manager and city atty who have had to put up with Turner for years now. As some local govt watchers have spun to me, there was an unwillingness to escalate Turner's issues until there was a black mayor in place to avoid any whiff of a racial angle. This account does pass the smell test of being so very Charlotte.
I think it is safe to say that DOC would not have jumped had the city not forced the department's hand in a very public way with its own investigation. You recall that the UPoR in its hunt for "sexual harassment" very early on asked the DOC for a list of Turner's cases and was stiffed. DOC could not hide Turner from that point on.
And on the accounts from DOC on Turner misrepresenting his dealings with offenders I had a couple flashbacks: one to Lucky Osho and crew investigated by the FBI for public defender fraud and Nick Mackey's habit of not showing up in court to represent clients.
Why wasn't Turner allowed to resign, retire or even be re-assigned?
Anon 1:34,
You are kidding, right?
You can't be serious.
Has he resigned from CC?
look at the former DOC director for some answers, CP. local supervisors scared to do anything to Turner b/c he had friend(s) at the higher levels in the state system. new DOC director wasn't such a person and local supervisors were able to finally report him up the chain. also, ask other probation officers, asst public defenders, or asst district attorneys how many times a sup ct judge had to dismiss a probation violation against a felon because Turner failed to show up in court for the hearings on the violations that he filed.
We asked that same question - why did it take so long? - in this post on PunditHouse, along with another one: would the DOC ever have pulled the firing trigger, without impetus of the city's sexual harassment investigation.
My guess? Turner would still be chatting up city business on DOC time.
Post a Comment