Officer Mikel Thomas
Officer Mark NiethammerTwo police officers caught on video drag racing their patrol cars down a dead-end Chattanooga street in July were punished with one-day suspensions, internal affairs records show.
Officers Mikel Thomas and Mark Niethammer served their unpaid suspensions in December, one on Christmas Eve and one on Christmas Day, records show. The two officers turned themselves in to internal affairs personnel shortly after a video of two patrol cars racing on Crutchfield Street hit the media circuit in July.
Chattanooga police officers can earn additional money by working over the holidays. Suspended officers also are not allowed to work extra jobs during their suspension.
A bystander filmed the video around 8:40 p.m. on July 10, police said. In the video, which was posted to YouTube and Facebook, two patrol cars pull up next to each other, stop and then take off rapidly down the street, away from the camera.
The man behind the camera narrates the 35-second clip.
"Look at these two cops," he says. "Look like they're going to try to drag race each other down the road here. Parking right beside each other. They might be getting ready to - yep, there they go. Tax dollars going to the good folks. They all both suck. Idiots."
In interviews with internal affairs investigators, both Thomas and Niethammer said that they were "goofing off" and both at first hesitated to characterize their actions as a "race" - but when pressed by the internal affairs investigator, both officers eventually conceded that they were racing.
The officers said they often pull into Crutchfield Street to file reports. They were not responding to a call for help when they raced away, records showed.
They estimated they reached speeds of 50 or 55 mph, and said they did not place any bets on the race. Both officers said they regretted the incident.
"I apologize," Thomas told the internal affairs investigator. "It looked stupid. It was idiotic. You never know who is watching, especially in our line of work."
"I'm sorry," Niethammer said in a separate internal affairs interview. "I embarrassed myself, my team, the chiefs, the city, the department. I am remorseful that this happened."
Thomas and Niethammer declined to speak with the Times Free Press for this story.
Chief Fred Fletcher sustained one count of "conformance to law," a policy violation, against each officer.
The one-day unpaid suspension Fletcher opted for is lighter than other punishments he has handed out. In January, Fletcher suspended Officer Alex Olson for the maximum 30 days without pay after Olson fired his gun at a moving vehicle during a traffic stop. Olson at first appealed the decision, arguing it was too harsh, but later dropped that appeal.
Fletcher also fired two officers in April - as many officers as had been fired at the department in all of 2012, 2013 and 2014 combined.
Fletcher wrote in a letter to Niethammer and Thomas that he considered the fact they turned themselves in and admitted to their actions as he determined the punishment.
"I have strongly considered your actions following this incident to be positive in making this determination," Fletcher wrote in the Dec. 10 letter.
Both Niethammer and Thomas were hired at the police department in 2013.
Contact staff writer Shelly Bradbury at 423-757-6525 or sbradbury@timesfreepress.com with tips or story ideas. Follow @ShellyBradbury.