Members of the public filed nearly 300 complaints against the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office and Chattanooga Police Department over the course of 19 months.
Through an open records request, the Chattanooga Times Free Press obtained a list of all the citizen complaints made against both agencies from January 2024 through August of this year, in addition to some of the investigation details about those of the complaints that were sustained.
“When a complaint is sustained, an internal investigation has determined that a preponderance of the evidence supports the claim — meaning it is more likely than not that the behavior leading up to the complaint actually occurred,” said Rick Dierenfeldt, head of the Criminal Justice Department at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
The Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office received 195 citizen allegations of misconduct, while the Chattanooga Police Department received 101 complaints.
For example, one county school resource deputy intentionally tripped a student who was running to the bus in January, and the student reportedly fell and hurt his knee, according to a sustained citizen complaint report. In a separate incident, one Chattanooga officer who responded to a death pushed one of the family members at the scene.