HARTFORD, Conn. — The leadership of the Connecticut State Police Union is fighting back against what, they say, is a false narrative and a faulty audit. This comes after a think tank found hundreds of troopers may have falsified thousands of traffic tickets.
At least 17 of those troopers have been exonerated of wrongdoing because the state police assigned the same badge number to more than one person. But this investigation is far from over. At least six agencies including the Federal Department of Justice are combing through state police records that date back to 2014.
“We will never apologize for vigorously defending and zealously advocating for our troopers,” remarked Andy Matthews, the past President of the Connecticut State Police Union during the years the audit examined.
These state police union leaders stepped to the microphone to address the traffic ticket scandal that’s gained national attention. They blamed everyone from top agency brass.
“The responsibility of the command staff of the state police failed miserably,” said Matthews.
To the media and politicians.
“What’s happened over the years is that politics have saturated everything,” said Matthews.
Matthews also blamed the Racial Profiling Prohibition Project. They were the auditors who uncovered the scandal. Matthews claims they never asked troopers what could have justified the discrepancies.
“A third of our agency still to this day does not have technology in their assigned cars,” said Matthews. “If you don’t have a terminal in your car you can’t enter the information yourself. You are calling it in on the phone or radio and it’s the dispatcher’s responsibility to enter the information into the system.”
Ken Barone conducted the audit and says he did communicate with the state police.
“We go and say look, do you want to submit a written response? We will include it, unedited right in the report. You have that right. They didn’t take us up on that,” said Baron. “We do not have a policy of taking our work to unions or to other constituency groups.”
Barone said the audit, which found as many as 300 troopers may have falsified as many as 26,000 tickets in order to skew race data, was carefully conducted over nine months. He stands behind the study and says he only has one regret.
“I wish that the things the state police are trying to rectify now, which we are happy with and are happy to work with them, could have been worked on earlier,” said Barone.
So far, four troopers have been disciplined for the intentional falsification of tickets and while Barone claims only 17 troopers have been exonerated, union leaders say that number is actually 27. They claim troopers are being vilified and are even receiving death threats on social media.
Matt Caron is a reporter at FOX61 News. He can be reached at mcaron@fox61.com. Follow him on Facebook, X and Instagram.
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