City in Georgia warns of service outages, fires police chief and suspends police

The city simply told officers that it was investigating the police force “to ensure the integrity and accountability of our entire department,” according to a suspension letter obtained by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. In a Facebook post, the city referred the public to “recent events and emerging concerns” about police conduct, without naming them.

But records obtained by the AJC shed new light on the origins of the unrest. The episode appears to have begun earlier this month when an anonymous email landed in the inbox of Warm Springs City Hall.

The sender, who signed the message simply “Concerned Citizen,” said that the officers regularly travel to Atlanta in patrol cars to do well-paying part-time jobs.

“Chief (Emilio) Quintana personally uses his patrol vehicle for these part-time jobs as he is scheduled many evenings each month,” the June 5 email states.

An hour later, Quintana was called into a meeting with Mayor Robyn Pynenburg, where, she wrote in a memo in his personnel file, he admitted that this was true.

Personnel records show that Warm Springs fired Quintana within a week of receiving the anonymous email.

In a termination letter, the mayor accused the police chief of using a city vehicle and impersonating a police officer in a manner he was not authorized to do. (Records show Quintana, who could not be reached for comment, has appealed the decision.)

And within days, Warm Springs suspended all but one officer, a city news release said. The only officer remaining is a recently hired officer named Aisha Al-Khalifa, who has been named interim chief, the city said. POST records show Al-Khalifa was hired as a sergeant in November.

The letter, obtained by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, said the officers were suspended but not disciplined. The city does not believe the officers broke the law, but they can no longer identify themselves as Warm Springs police officers, it said. In bold red letters, they were ordered to immediately surrender their badges and weapons.

Two officials told the AJC they were blindsided by the restructuring and still don’t know why they were suspended. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared retaliation.

Many of them worked part-time and some only worked occasional shifts to maintain their arrest powers and work in the private security industry, the two officials said.

In fact, the number of part-time officers was so high that the Meriwether County Sheriff’s Office, which covers Warm Springs, downplayed the impact of the suspensions on its operations.

“Even with those other people down there, we were still handling a lot of calls in that jurisdiction,” said Chief Deputy Byron Hadley. “Many days, no one was down there.”

It’s unclear what city laws or policies these side jobs may have violated. City Manager Dena Moore said Warm Springs officials had no comment on the police department, citing the advice of their attorney.

Still, a Warm Springs police officer called for a GBI investigation into the allegations of criminal misconduct, GBI spokeswoman Nelly Miles said.

The case is not yet closed, says GBI. This increases the risks for the city’s restructuring.

AJC data specialist Jennifer Peebles contributed to this story.

Send us your news tips

If you have tips about the Warm Springs Police Department or other police agencies in Georgia, please email AJC investigative reporter Thad Moore at [email protected].