EDMOND FOP NOT IN LAWSUIT

EDMOND -- The Edmond Fraternal Order of Police did not object to
disbanding the special investigation unit, which led to four officers
suing Police Chief Bob Ricks and the city, union president Chris Cook
said. "We signed off on a memorandum of understanding," he said. "As
it pertains to the lawsuit, the FOP is not a party to it, we don't
endorse it and it has nothing to do with the FOP as a lodge or
collective bargaining body."

The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Oklahoma County District Court,
alleges Ricks circumvented the Fraternal Order of Police's collective
bargaining agreement by disbanding the unit to discipline the officers
for complaining about a superior.

Attorney Scott Adams said his clients, officers Chris Caplinger, Trint
C. Tripp, Daniel Butcher and Bobby Hunter, are seeking an injunction
against the disbanding of the unit and more than $10,000 each for damages.

Ricks said he disbanded the unit because the officers were focused
solely on low-level drug busts of users while ignoring the
interception of drugs that pass through the city.

"I looked at the unit and found out that they were operating at a very
low level of the nature of the problems they were dealing with," he
said. "They had very few significant cases and I had to make a
decision on the best way to use taxpayers' dollars."

He said the best use was a mechanism to look at the highest levels of
drug trafficking.

Adams disagrees.

"Basically, what we have here is four highly trained and decorated
narcotics officers being punished for filing a grievance," he said.
"It was swept under the rug, and Bob Ricks is trying to ship everyone
back to patrol duty without due process."

Adams said the reason Edmond doesn't have "major-league drug dealers"
is because of the officers' work.

"It should scare every single person living in Edmond," Adams said of
Ricks's decision to disband the drug unit.

"It's a billboard poster for any drug dealer to move to Edmond and
start slinging drugs."

Ricks said the department will be stronger, not weaker, because the
duties of the unit will be placed with Edmond's detectives. "Right now
we have 11 detectives, and we'll be going up to 15 soon," he said.
"They can conduct drug investigations and drug interdiction
investigations."

Ricks said the city's problem is that many drugs are moving through,
but that officers don't know how to spot them.

"On Monday, seven of our officers are going to be trained in
interdiction by the Department of Public Safety," he said.

In the petition, the officers allege that a superior created a hostile
work environment by prohibiting certain officers within the special
investigation unit from functioning independently in any shape, manner
or form.

Ricks said there were pending personnel inquiries stemming from the
complaint and that he can't comment on it while the matter is under
review.