Officer in Hit-Run Case Seeks Reinstatement

A fired South Pasadena police officer who pleaded no contest to a hit-and-run accident that shook the tiny department is asking a judge to allow him to return to work.

In a legal challenge filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, Scott Ziegler is seeking a court order to reinstate him. Ziegler alleges that an arbitrator ruled the city dismissed him without cause and that the city manager later ignored the arbitrator’s recommendation that he be allowed to go back to work.

City Manager Sean Joyce said in a statement that he fired the officer for leaving the scene of the September 1995 accident and for his responses during the subsequent investigation. “We hold [police officers] to higher standards of moral conduct, honesty and integrity,” Joyce said. “Based upon my review of the evidence, it is my opinion Mr. Ziegler’s actions . . . do not meet these standards.”

Ziegler’s firing came last October after The Times reported allegations that some police officers covered up the crash, which occurred when Ziegler was off duty. His name was left off a police report and prosecutors were not told of his conduct until the published reports. Ziegler was then charged with misdemeanor hit and run.

After the reports came to light, the police chief resigned and the FBI opened an investigation. The owner of the car Ziegler damaged received a $35,000 settlement from the city after she filed a civil rights lawsuit.