The disciplinary action will not be made public until the board makes a formal ruling.
NORWAY – Suspended Police Chief Tim Richards and the public will have to wait until next Thursday to find out whether he still has a job.

“I’ve told (selectmen) not to talk to the press until they go through me,” said attorney John Loyd of Brunswick, who has been representing selectmen since Richards appealed a disciplinary action taken several weeks ago by Town Manager David Holt.

The nature of the disciplinary action will not be made public until Thursday, April 15, when selectmen formally rule on the appeal. That meeting will be held at 7 p.m. at the town hall.

Richards, 44, was suspended with pay March 4 after a judge in 9th District Court in Bridgton agreed to continue, for a year, a temporary protection from abuse order filed against him Feb. 18 by former Norway Patrolman Cynthia M. Mitchell, 41, of Harrison. She alleged Richards assaulted her in August 2002, when their relationship began, and harassed her early this year when she ended it.

With Loyd present, selectmen held a hearing Wednesday that was closed to the public at Richards’ request. The board heard testimony by Holt on the results of his investigation into Richards’ conduct with respect to Mitchell, who was on the police force from August 1999 to December 2002.

Richards was present but not represented by an attorney.

“This is his right of appeal,” Loyd said. “It’s clear there has been a disciplinary action which is being appealed.”

After hearing evidence Wednesday, selectmen reconvened Thursday with Loyd, who had prepared a three- or four-page “preliminary findings of fact” in the case. Selectmen were asked to rule on each of the findings, which will be made public Thursday.

Chairman of the Board of Selectmen Bill Damon and fellow Selectmen Les Flanders, Russell Newcomb, George Tibbetts Jr. and Robert Walker will each receive a copy of the written findings, and make modifications if necessary prior to Thursday’s meeting, Loyd said.

Damon said after Thursday’s executive session that the board had reached a decision, and there were no outstanding issues remaining about the town’s position.

“Lay boards are not used to being judges,” said Loyd, explaining the apparent confusion about the need for written findings before making an employee matter a public record.

The applicable statute under the state’s Freedom of Access Law, Title 1, Chapter 13, does not address what length of time is appropriate to await a written ruling after selectmen have heard an appeal of a personnel decision by a town manager.

What the law does say is that “Every agency shall make a written record of every decision involving the dismissal or the refusal to renew the contract of any public official, employee or appointee.”

The written findings need to be “sufficient to appraise the individual concerned and any interested member of the public of the basis for the decision. The decision can be anything from overturning the town manager’s decision to affirming it,” Loyd said.

Richards, who lives on Bradley Pond Road in Lovell, was arrested June 6, 2001, on a charge that he assaulted his former wife, Patricia, during an argument at the New Suncook School parking lot in Lovell where she was picking up their youngest son. The day of the incident Richards was being served with a protection from abuse order obtained by her for a previous incident, police said. The order was handed to him during his arrest at Molly Ockett Middle School in Fryeburg where the couple’s other son was playing baseball.

The domestic assault case was heard in Franklin County Superior Court in Farmington and filed Feb. 5, 2002, with no further action to be taken providing Richards had no more incidents for six months.

Richards joined the department in July 1995 and became acting chief in July 1998 after Alan Afflerbach retired. He was named chief in January 1999. The Bar Harbor native served in Rye, N.H., for nine years before coming to Norway.
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