Fired After Assault Sentence : Sheriff’s Dispatcher Reinstated

A senior dispatcher for the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department who was fired after pleading guilty to assaulting his ex-wife was reinstated Wednesday when the county’s Civil Service Commission ruled that his crime created “no reasonable likelihood of impairment or disruption of public service.”

Daniel Haynes, a communications dispatcher for seven years, had earlier this year continued to work for the Sheriff’s Department while he was incarcerated at a work-furlough program. But after his firing in May, Haynes appealed the dismissal to the commission.

On a 3-1 vote, the commission ordered Haynes reinstated, with full back pay to the time of his discharge on May 4.

The dissenting vote was from commission President Carlton Hargrave, who said after the meeting that he believed Haynes should have been suspended rather than terminated.

“He is working with a law enforcement agency and his pleading guilty to a misdemeanor is job-related,” Hargrave said. “But there probably should have been a suspension, and then he should have been returned to work.”

According to testimony, Haynes, 39, appeared twice in court in January, once to plead guilty to battery and later to enter a plea of no contest to violating a court order to stay away from his former wife, Nancy Haynes.

180-Day Sentence

On March 6 he was sentenced to 180 days in a work-furlough center and ordered to pay a fine of $180 on the battery charge. He was given a three-year probation term for violating the court order.

He began serving the jail sentence April 7, which meant he was an incarcerated inmate while working for the Sheriff’s Department through his May termination.

But the Civil Service Commission, in issuing its report Wednesday on the case, saw no problem to public safety posed by Haynes’ criminal conviction and his work for a law enforcement agency.

Haynes “is very competent as a senior communications dispatcher and has, at all times, exhibited the ability to act calmly, act professionally, and handle stress while performing his duties,” the report said. Haynes “is well-liked and respected by his fellow employees and first- and second-line supervisors.”

The commission added that Haynes has not been a sworn peace officer, and that therefore there was no evidence that his guilty plea or sentence “could easily result in impairment or disruption of the public services provided by the Sheriff’s Department.”