Daugherty v. City & Co. of SF

Daugherty v. City & Co. of SF (CA1/3 A145863, filed 5/30/18, pub. ord. 6/22/18) the Public Safety Officers Procedural Bill of Rights Act

Under the Public Safety Officers Procedural Bill of Rights Act (POBRA) (Gov. Code, § 3300 et seq.), no punitive action may be taken against a public safety officer for any alleged act, omission, or other misconduct unless the investigation is completed within one year of “the public agency’s discovery by a person authorized to initiate an investigation of the allegation of an act, omission, or other misconduct,” subject to certain statutory exceptions.  (§ 3304, subd. (d)(1).)  One such exception provides that the one-year time period is tolled while the act, omission, or other alleged misconduct is also the “subject” of a pending criminal investigation or prosecution.  (Id., subd. (d)(2)(A).)

This case arises out of a criminal corruption investigation of officers in the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD).  The investigation began in 2011 and was led by the United States Attorney’s Office (USAO), with the assistance of select members of the criminal unit of SFPD’s Internal Affairs Division (IAD-Crim).  During the course of the investigation, search warrants of the cellphone records of former SFPD Sergeant Ian Furminger—the central figure in the corruption scheme—led to the discovery in about December 2012 of racist, sexist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic text messages between Furminger and nine SFPD officers.

The criminal case proceeded to trial and resulted in a verdict against Furminger and a codefendant for conspiracy to commit theft, conspiracy against civil rights and wire fraud.  Three days after the verdict, on December 8, 2014, the text messages were released by the USAO to the administrative unit of SFPD’s Internal Affairs Division (IAD-Admin).  After IAD-Admin completed its investigation of the text messages, the chief of police issued disciplinary charges against respondents in April 2015.

While the disciplinary proceedings were pending, respondent Rain O. Daugherty went to court and filed a petition for writ of mandate and complaint for extraordinary relief, seeking to rescind the disciplinary charges on the grounds that they were untimely.  The remaining respondents joined in Daugherty’s petition.  The trial court granted the writ petition and complaint, finding the one-year statute of limitations began to accrue in December 2012 when the misconduct was discovered, and thus, the investigation of respondents’ misconduct was not completed in a timely manner.

For the reasons discussed below, we conclude the one-year statute of limitations did not begin to run until the text messages were released by the USAO to IAD-Admin, because before then, the alleged misconduct was not and could not be discovered by the “person[s] authorized to initiate an investigation” for purposes of section 3304, subdivision (d)(1).  We alternatively conclude the one-year statute of limitations was tolled until the verdict in the criminal corruption case because the text messages were the “subject” of the criminal investigation within the meaning of section 3304, subdivision (d)(2)(A).  Thus, the April 2015 notices of discipline were timely.  Because the trial court’s contrary conclusions were based on errors of law or were not supported by substantial evidence, we reverse.

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