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Show Fired cop $ final plea before council couri By PAUL CHALLIS News Editor BOUNTIFUL Scott Vaughan, a fired Bountiful police officer, will appeal his termination to the Bountiful Boun-tiful City Council on Wednesday. Vaughan's hearing, the final step in the employee's legal process that started nearly three months ago, was scheduled to be held at 5 p.m. in the city hall chambers. The council has set aside two hours to hear from witnesses and to review the long appeals process that started near the end of December. Vaughan was terminated for "insubordination" in mid-December by Chief Larry Higgins of the Bountiful Police Department Higgins said Vaughan's firing was not directly related to an incident involving the former policeman and the theft of a neighbor's cable television line last summer. Charges had been filed against Vaughan by TCI Cablevision after his neighbor accused him of stealing cable television from his house. He was fined and given a suspended jail sentence on Dec. 24 in Clearfield Circuit Cir-cuit Court after pleading "no contest" to a Class B misdemeanor for the theft of cable television. Higgins added that the theft of cable incident occurred oc-curred in July 1990, and the termination on Dec. 12 was a result of other incidents that have occurred since that time. The chief would not elaborate. Vaughan was handed a 180-day suspended jail sentence by the court for the cable theft and placed on probation for one year. He was fined $1,125 of which the court suspended $500. Higgins said an investigation found that the officer had been hooking up his neighbor's cable line to his own home in his neighbor's absence. Vaughan decided to appeal the termination decision. Assistant Bountiful City Attorney Russell L. Man an said city ordinances allow Vaughan to be terminated with pay until the appeals procedure is complete, a process pro-cess which could take a couple of months. The appeal began with Vaughan's immediate supervisor super-visor (Higgins) and was reviewed by Lt. Don Collard. A review by City Manager Tom Hardy was the next step in the process, and he upheld the termination by the police department On Jan. 23, the council approved the creation of the Governing Board of Appeals. The board was set up to decide the fate of employees from Bountiful City who have appealed firings or transfers to other departments within city governmental staff. Mayor Robert Linnell and Councilman Robert Gramoll were appointed to the newly formed body as were three employees of the city, including Cliff Michaehs, Tom Ross and Ellen Hill. In the past fired or displaced employees have not gone beyond the upper levels of management from department heads to the City Manager. Linnell reported that the decision in the appeals board after an "all day hearing" was to uphold the termination of Officer Vaughan, by a vote of 5-0. Vaughan informed city officials of his decision to appeal the latest ruling on being Tired from his job on March 5. Members of council were given the information from the hearing (a book with several hundred pages) to review for the hearing on Wednesday. After the city appeals have been exhausted, and Vaughan is not satisfied, he may file suit in the district court, Higgins said. |