Jail officer charged with assault, suspended
An Ulster County corrections officer has been suspended from his job after being charged with assaulting a woman, according to the Kingston Police Department and the county sheriff.
Tyrone Brodhead, 44, of Tubby Street, Kingston, was arrested by Kingston police about 4 p.m. Tuesday and charged with the misdemeanors of assault and criminal obstruction of breathing, and the violation of harassment. The charges stemmed from an altercation with a 27-yearold woman, police said.
Ulster County Sheriff Paul VanBlarcum said in a Tuesday afternoon posting on the Sheriff’s Office Facebook page that the incident occurred in Brodhead’s home and that Brodhead has been suspended for “up to 30 days, pending an internal investigation.”
VanBlarcum, who oversees the county’s corrections officers, said Brodhead also has been denied access to the Sheriff’s Office.
Brodhead was released from police custody and is due to appear in Kingston City Court at a later date.
In 2016, Brodhead, three other corrections officers and one former corrections officer filed a lawsuit that claimed they were discriminated against and subjected to a hostile work environment because they are black. The suit names the county as a defendant, along with VanBlarcum and jail Wardens Jon Becker and Louis T. Russo Sr., all of whom are white.
The 22-page lawsuit states, in part, that since taking office, VanBlarcum has given promotions only to white officers. At the time of the filing, not a single black employee in the Sheriff’s Office, which includes corrections officers, held a rank higher than the entry-level corrections officer position, the suit states.
Brodhead has been a corrections officer at the Ulster County Jail since 1999.
Among the allegations in the suit is that black officers are disciplined more harshly than their white counterparts. That includes a black officer who was scrutinized and penalized because of family issues, while a white lieutenant never faced repercussions on the job despite being the subject of several domestic violence calls, the suit alleges.
The suit also says the black officers were passed over for promotions, which instead were given to white officers who generally had less seniority. The suit also says the black officers were denied training they requested and were given few opportunities to participate in preferred assignments.