Springfield Police Commissioners decide to suspend Gregg Bigda indefinitely without pay

“I am extremely disappointed in the actions of the Board of Police Commissioners regarding Mr. Bigda’s status,” Sarno said in a statement on Facebook. “He was stripped of his license and should have been fired without questions asked.”

Devon W. Grierson, first assistant city attorney for the city of Springfield, said commission members decided to suspend Bigda indefinitely from the agency rather than fire him because Bigda appealed his disqualification in Hampden Superior Court.

If Bigda is successful in his appeal, it will be “more complicated to reinstate him,” Grierson said.

His attorney, Donald C. Keavany Jr., could not immediately be reached for comment.

Bigda has been out of the police force since 2018 after he was charged in federal court with using excessive force during the arrest of two Latino teenagers suspected of stealing an undercover police vehicle.

In this incident in February 2016, a Springfield police officer idled his vehicle in front of a restaurant, whereupon a group of teenagers allegedly got in and went for a joyride into the town of Palmer.

When Bigda learned of the theft, he pursued the youths and arrested two of them. The Globe reported that Bigda He allegedly broke a boy’s nose and said, “Welcome to the white man’s world.” Bigda was charged with excessive use of force and suspended for 60 days for his behavior.

In January, retired Judge Charles J. Hely, who served as a hearing officer for the Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission, recommended that the commission “deny Officer Bigda’s application for recertification.”

“The February 27, 2016 video recording of Officer Bigda’s conduct in the cells at the Palmer Police Station cannot be disputed,” Hely wrote in his recommendation to the state commission. “Officer Bigda’s threats and abusive behavior toward the fifteen and sixteen year old boys were shocking and inexplicable.”

Three weeks later, Bigda “criminally entered his ex-girlfriend’s home twice,” and the police officers who responded to the call “both reported that he was drunk,” Hely wrote.

According to a report in the daily newspaper “The Globe,” Bigda spent several hours with the teenagers in a cell at the Palmer police station. Video cameras showed Bigda verbally abusing one of the teenagers and threatening to take them both back to the Springfield police station.

“When we reach that (expletive) (city) border, I’m going to beat your body bloody,” he told one of the teens. “If something happens to you with me, it never happened. If I don’t write it in the report, it never (expletive) happened. Do you want this to be the worst day of your life?”

After Bigda was charged in federal court for allegedly using excessive force, The jury acquitted him of all charges in 2021.

In a unanimous decision in April of this year, eight members of the POST Commission affirmed previous decisions and rejected Bigda’s request for recertification.

This report uses material from previous Globe stories.

Emily Sweeney can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her @emilysweeney and on Instagram @emilysweeney22.