Mass resignation spurs question

SWAT team was in union negotiations over contract

Did they take a stand, or did they pull a stunt?

Last week’s decision by all 10 members of the Hallandale Police Department SWAT team to resign from their roles cost each about $3,000 per year, but it comes as the department and the city negotiate a new contract with the union to replace the one that expired more than 18 months ago.

The city’s vice mayor, Sabrina Javellana, has been critical of the department especially in the wake of the death of George

Floyd in Minnesota. She said Tuesday she felt vindicated when Hallandale Police Chief Sonia Quiñones halted scheduled talks with the SWAT team members, saying that a discussion about political messages and preparedness had degenerated into a labor dispute.

“That was not the intent of the meeting,” Quiñones said.

The SWAT team members were Sgt. Pietro Roccisano, Sgt. Gerardo Novoa, and officers Christopher Allen, James Bembanaste, Jaime Cerna, Jeusch Charles, Derisson Francis, David Gonzalez, Michael Haire, and Carmine Tufano. They turned in their resignations from the SWAT team last Friday, keeping their jobs with the department but leaving a unit that gave them boosts in prestige, pay, training and risks.

Those risks, they said in their resignation, weren’t worth the cost of being “minimally equipped” and insulted by the decision of the command staff to take a knee in solidarity with protesters who openly called for the reopening of an investigation that already cleared the SWAT team of wrongdoing in a 2014 fatal shooting of a civilian, Howard Bowe.

Quiñones agreed to meet with the SWAT team members Monday, only to call it off when the members showed up with a union lawyer and shunned dialogue, insisting on saying nothing that wasn’t already in their letter, the chief said.

Efforts to reach Roccisano, who is also the police union president, were unsuccessful Monday and Tuesday.

“It was a stunt after all,” said Javellana, the vice mayor. “If they had legitimate concerns about equipment and readiness, they could have discussed that with the chief before resigning. But that wouldn’t have served their purpose.”

Mayor Joy Cooper disagreed, saying it wouldn’t make sense for the officers to give up a pay hike and training opportunities to help the union bargain for higher pay and better training and equipment. But she wasn’t surprised to see the union seize on the resignations after the fact to bolster their bargaining positions.

“I would be surprised if they didn’t, to be honest,” said Cooper.