Police union leader blasts department for tarnishing officer's reputation

PROVIDENCE — A police officer erroneously linked to tire and rim thefts has suffered “irreparable harm” to his reputation, despite efforts to exonerate him, the head of the police officers’ union said Thursday.

Michael Imondi, president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 3, said the department mishandled the circumstances surrounding the investigation of Officer James Lewis, and he blasted the anonymous leaks about the case that Imondi believes came from somewhere in the department itself.

A day after media reports based on unnamed sources said Lewis was being investigated in connection with the thefts, the public safety commissioner said Lewis had no such connections.

“You’re innocent until proven guilty,” Imondi said. “In this case, the officer was proven innocent, and yet they wanted to throw his name out there, soil his reputation, soil his name, and ruin him as a police officer without any facts or evidence. It’s pretty bad, in my mind. We’re going to take issue with it.”

Imondi added that Lewis, a five-year veteran, is “very unhappy. He can’t believe it happened to him, and the way it happened. They mishandled this thing from the word go.”

Imondi said he believes the anonymous leaks about the internal-affairs investigation into Lewis came from the Providence Police Department, although he did not know exactly where. The union is considering possible legal action against the city stemming from the incident and from what he sees as the violation of the Law Enforcement Officers' Bill of Rights, Imondi said.

The unfounded suspicions about Lewis first arose from an investigation into $80,000 worth of stolen tires and rims that were recently found in East Providence. Police in East Providence were searching the phone of a suspect in that case and found car registration information that originally came from a Providence police officer.

But on Tuesday night, the Providence Police Department learned of the innocent explanation showing that Lewis was not involved in any criminal activity — in fact, he was only trying to help someone.

This is what the police department had learned by Wednesday: A woman Lewis had been mentoring in her efforts to become a police officer had gotten in a car crash. The woman and the other driver agreed to settle the matter privately. The woman asked Lewis to look up information about the other car to make sure it was properly registered and insured; Lewis did so, which, the public safety commissioner said, was appropriate.

The woman then forwarded the information from Lewis to a person who was going to do the repairs — who ended up being a suspect in the tire and rim thefts.

But Lewis did not share information with a known criminal, nor was he involved in any criminal conspiracy, police concluded Wednesday, a day after media reports said he was being investigated for running registration information for non-police matters, possibly in connection with the tire and rim thefts.

Commissioner Steven M. Paré said Wednesday that it was a "common practice" to share the information that Lewis forwarded to the woman he was mentoring, "and within the legitimacy of the work of a law enforcement officer." 

Paré added Thursday that he would welcome the opportunity to work with Imondi to identify people who may have leaked the information to the media.

“I, too, agree that it is disgraceful if any member of the Providence Police Department, sworn or civilian, deliberately and maliciously leaked information that tarnished the image of a fellow police officer,” Paré said. “I can assure you that it didn’t come from the colonel’s office or the commissioner’s office — and that we did everything to protect this officer and immediately corrected the news coverage once we learned that he was not involved whatsoever.”

Asked about Lewis’ current status, Paré said: “He’ll be back for duty as quickly as we can.”