San Diego Police Department releases report on ex-police officer Anthony Hair who locked himself in the back seat of a patrol car

SAN DIEGO (FOX 5/KUSI) — San Diego Police recently released the results of an internal investigation into an incident last year in which an officer locked himself in the back seat of a patrol car with a woman he was trying to take to a county jail.

The report, which included body-worn camera footage and transcripts of witness interviews, found that then-Officer Anthony Hair violated a number of policies and laws in connection with the events that occurred on August 15, 2023 with the detained woman.

Hair, who had been with SDPD for two years at the time of the incident, resigned from his post on Sept. 14, 2023, the report said – one day before his scheduled interview by the Internal Affairs investigator investigating the incident.

In a statement, SDPD Lt. Dan Meyer said the department “takes all allegations and misconduct seriously.”

“This incident was fully investigated by the department’s Professional Standards Unit (PSU),” he continued. “The individual is no longer employed by the San Diego Police Department.”

The report contains detailed information on the timing of events

According to the report, the incident began around 8 p.m. when Hair, along with several other officers, arrived at the intersection of Denver Street and Clairemont Avenue in Bay Park to assist in the arrest of several people for suspected car theft.

The officer was assigned to transport one of the arrestees, the unnamed woman who had been taken into custody on a warrant. At approximately 1:10 a.m., Hair left the SDPD’s Northern Division field office and went to the Las Colinas Women’s Detention Center to transport her to jail.

About twenty minutes after the two left the Northern Division, Hair reportedly locked himself in the rear cage of his patrol car, just two blocks from arriving in Las Colinas.

He sat in the back seat with the inmate for more than an hour before a supervisor arrived and opened the door at around 2:40 p.m. While he was sitting in the back seat, his body-worn camera was not actively filming.

Hair claimed throughout the first phase of the investigation – with which he cooperated until his resignation – that he was checking on the woman to see if she might be having a medical emergency when the car door accidentally slammed shut, locking him inside.

In interviews, the woman reiterated this and said in conversations with investigators that nothing sexual had occurred between them. However, the report noted that traces of what was believed to be semen were found on his belt.

The woman, who was reportedly under the influence of an unspecified drug she had taken earlier in the day, was taken to a hospital after being examined by medical personnel at Las Colinas for what the investigator described as an “unrelated health issue.”

Body-worn camera records conversations

During the transport of the woman, Hair’s body-worn camera recorded several moments in which lewd comments were made.

As she was being taken to SDPD headquarters before heading to the Northern Division substation, Hair’s camera recorded a conversation in which the woman asked him if he was married.

Woman: “Are you married?”

Hair: “Why do you ask?”

Woman: “(inaudible) … You’re not that bad. What harm does it do me if I cheat the system, you know what I mean? That’s how I look at shit.”

Shortly afterwards, a loud noise was heard in the back seat, presumably because she was unbuckling her seatbelt. The camera then picks up a moaning sound from the back seat.

Another lewd exchange can be heard in Hair’s recording of her drive between the Northern Division substation and the location where the officer was locked in his car, the report said.

Woman: “Are you single?”

Hair: “Yes. But you’re not.”

(incomprehensible conversation)

Woman: “I’m downstairs to fuck.”

Hair: “Don’t say that now. No, I said don’t say that now because everything is being recorded.”

At that point in the transport, his patrol car’s GPS recorded speeds of over 90 miles per hour while driving, the report said.

As they approached Las Colinas, Hair could be heard talking to the woman in the back seat. As he turned right at a light near Las Colinas, he turned off the recording. GPS tracking showed him turning on the north side of Cottonwood Avenue.

He made several more turns before his patrol car stopped in the middle of Cottonwood Avenue in Santee at around 1:34 a.m.

Left out of the car

According to the report, Hair called another officer shortly before 2 a.m. and asked if he had a master key to the patrol cars. The officer noticed that Hair’s voice sounded “panicked” when he called.

“I asked why he was asking and what he needed. Officer Hair then asked me if I could meet with him,” the officer recalled in a statement issued during the investigation. “I asked him why he needed me and he said he would tell me when I got there. He said he was really embarrassed.”

The officer and his then partner then drove towards Hair. A few minutes later, the officer said he called Hair back to ask again what was going on.

“Officer Hair said he was really embarrassed, but his 10-16 year old was having a medical emergency and he went back to check her pulse,” the officer explained, adding that Hair told him, “When I went to check her pulse, I got in the back seat and the door closed behind me.”

They ultimately decided not to drive to Hair’s location, but instead informed a sergeant, who then opened the door and let him out.

In the body camera video taken by the sergeant who released him, Hair was seen using the magnetic mount for the camera, but the camera itself is missing.

In his testimony, Hair claimed that the camera “somehow became detached from the mount” when he left the driver’s seat – a claim that the internal investigation report says is “not possible” due to the timing and the fact that the force needed to remove the camera during that movement would also have dislodged the magnetic mount.

The results of the internal investigation report

The report concluded that Hair violated at least seven service regulations and several state laws during the incident, but did not address whether anything happened between the two while he was locked in the back.

The violations included failing to document the entire transport of prisoners, failing to notify emergency services when he suspected a prisoner was having a medical emergency, unnecessarily exceeding the speed limit, and knowingly making “demonstrably false statements” in his police report and in statements to investigators.

“Officer Hair’s actions demonstrated a significant lack of understanding and competency with respect to departmental directives and his role as a sworn peace officer in general,” the report states. “If Officer Hair had followed the numerous departmental procedures, which he did not, the criminal charge (of sexual assault) and investigation may have been moot.”