AURORA, Colo.—Former U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton is out of public office and out of patience with a local police officer she says won’t pay for a broken window caused by his golf ball.
Norton wrote a letter earlier this month to city officials in her hometown of Aurora, complaining that Officer Marc Sears refused to pay for a window he broke with an errant golf ball on June 17. She said Sears agreed to pay for the window but never paid the estimated $250, then threatened her with a harassment charge if she contacted him again.
Norton was Interior Secretary from 2001 to 2006 under former President George W. Bush.
According to The Aurora Sentinel, Norton did not ask for the city to compensate her but said she wanted a copy of her complaint in the officer’s file ( ).
“I am reluctant to write a complaint letter, but I find it offensive to be threatened with criminal harassment charges for trying to politely resolve a minor matter,” Norton wrote in the letter to Aurora police Chief Dan Oates.
Oates replied to Norton in a letter Nov. 16 and said there was nothing the department could do, though Sears’ commanding officer had spoken to him about the mishap.
Oates also said there was no sign of misconduct by Sears, so there would be no further investigation.
The newspaper said Norton didn’t respond to voicemail and email messages last week. Sears did not respond to a message left at his police department voicemail or a message left with his lawyer.
In Norton’s letter, she said Sears was golfing June 17 at Saddle Rock Golf Course when he hit a ball that broke a window at her house, which is next to the course.
Her husband spoke with Sears, who said he was a police officer and agreed to pay for the window. He gave Norton’s husband his phone number but refused to show his driver’s license or a badge, the letter said.
After Norton received an estimate of $256 to fix the window, she called Sears and later mailed him the estimate. Sears asked for time to look for a second estimate but didn’t respond for several weeks, the letter said.
When Norton contacted Sears again, he said his basement had flooded and diverted his attention. He later told Norton he could not pay for the window until he received a check from his insurance company to cover damage to the basement.
Norton then received an envelope from Sears. Instead of containing a check, the envelope contained a note from Sears that said: “I am not going to provide you with any payment to fix the window that was broken from the flight of my golf ball.”
Norton said Sears also threatened to pursue harassment charges if Norton or her husband contacted him again unless it was through the court system.
“This is hardly an appropriate response,” Norton wrote.
Norton said she didn’t want the police chief to intervene in Sears’ private debt or want the city to pay for the damage.
“I am writing because I would expect a city employee, in an incident at a city facility, to set an example of responsible behavior,” she said, adding that she would like a copy of the letter to be included in Sears’ personnel file.
Sears was fired in January after being arrested twice on DUI charges while driving off-duty in Parker. He was eventually convicted of DUI for the first arrest, and DUI charges in the second case were dropped.
Sears, who has been with the Aurora Police Department since 2004, appealed his firing to the Aurora Civil Service Commission and opted to have the hearing open to the public.
In June, after hearing testimony from Sears and several other officers, the commission overruled Chief Oates and reinstated Sears.
Because the charges in the second arrest could not be proven, the commission said Sears should be suspended for six months, not fired.
An Aurora police spokeswoman said this week Sears has since been returned to fulltime duty.
———
Information from: The Aurora Sentinel,
