Brookhaven places police chief on leave amid acrimony in the Delaware County borough

Brookhaven Borough officials have announced that they have placed their police chief on paid administrative leave pending an investigation of internal workplace complaints within the police department by an outside law firm.

It was the latest in a recent series of very public and acrimonious developments involving the police department and the council, particularly between Police Chief Michael L. Vice and Council President Terry Heller, who was arrested by a borough police officer but ultimately not charged with driving under the influence in March.

Heller claimed afterward in an interview with the Delaware County Daily Times that he was targeted by police and that the officer who stopped him had recently been turned down for a pay raise.

The police chief responded publicly by calling Heller allegations “baseless lies.”

Borough officials made their announcement about the police chief on Friday and included a letter dated Thursday from Christopher Eiserman, president of the Delaware County Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 27, the union representing Brookhaven’s police officers, calling for the mayor and borough council to “to take immediate action” against the police chief.

Eiserman called the police chief “spiteful, vindictive, and retaliatory to officers who are lawfully exercising their workplace rights.”

Vice, Heller, and the rest of the council and the mayor could not be reached for comment Monday.

The borough’s announcement last said Vice would be placed on paid administrative leave pending the completion of an “independent, internal investigation and performance review” of the police department “by a Philadelphia-based law firm highly qualified and experienced to perform such work.”

A law firm was not named in the announcement.

Officials in the borough of 8,200 said they were taking the action “after multiple police officers came forward to report upon the current climate and working conditions” within the department.

The announcement said borough officials were contacted by the police union regarding concerns about “the well-being of our police officers” and to “confirm that the borough “is fulfilling its obligation to provide a safe and healthy working environment for all law enforcement personnel.”

Borough officials said they “will work diligently to expedite an objective, fair, and impartial assessment of the police department, including the chief of police, with the investigative attorneys to be assigned to this matter.”

They said that borough residents “may rest assured that our dedicated police officers will continue to faithfully fulfill their core mission to protect and serve the Brookhaven community.”

Eiserman, the police union president, said in his letter that he was aware of a “current investigation into the alleged improprieties committed” by Vice and that “several Brookhaven Borough police officers have cooperated with the investigation and provided valuable testimony and insight into the current climate and working conditions within the police department.”

It was unclear if Eiserman was referring to the investigation by the law firm.

Eiserman mentioned some situations involving former and current officers but did not elaborate except to criticize the police chief.

“Brookhaven Borough, as an employer, has an obligation and a duty to provide a safe and healthy work environment while ensuring employees who assert their workplace rights suffer from no adverse actions,” Eiserman wrote.

There was no mention in either the borough announcement or the union letter of the council president’s arrest on March 8.

“I was hunted,” Heller said in an interview with the Daily Times published on March 11 after posting on Facebook his version of what happened. “I’ve got to get out ahead of it and tell the truth.”

Heller said the officer who stopped and arrested him had been denied a pay raise. He said he believed he was targeted for that, and for spending by the police department that Heller had questioned.

Vice said in a March 26 news release that Heller was the subject of a traffic stop when the officer “detected the odor of an alcoholic beverage on the vehicle operator’s breath and person.” Heller was given a field sobriety test, which Heller “did not satisfactorily complete” and was taken to a hospital for a blood test, and then released.

Vice said he asked the Delaware County District Attorney’s Office to conduct its own investigation, which found that the officer had probable cause to arrest Heller, but that the council president’s blood-alcohol test showed he had been “slightly under the legal limit.” The criminal case was closed and Heller would be issued summary traffic-code violations, Vice said.

“As I have stated, I fully support the traffic stop and the proper actions that were taken by our officer,” Vice said.

On March 27, an online petition was launched calling for Heller’s resignation. As of Monday, it had 550 signatures.

This month, Vice attended a council meeting — Heller was not present — and said that “the statements and allegations made by Mr. Heller on social media and to multiple news outlets are untrue. Baseless lies. His statements can never be undone. His statements will have long-lasting effects and the safety of our officers is a very serious concern to me,” The Spirit weekly newspaper reported.

A police sergeant also spoke out at the meeting against Heller, the newspaper reported.

On April 14, Vice wrote on Facebook that the borough council had ordered the police department to remove its Facebook account. Vice said public safety information would be handled by a central borough account.