[Previously, at WEJB/NSU on this individual:
“More Mexican Corruption and Mayhem: Off-Duty Hispanic AA Cop-from-Hell Ernesto Fierro, with a History of Trouble, Killed Elderly White Driver Bill Livezey, but is Up for Nothing Worse than Agg Assault.”
Former troubled DPD cop now wears badge for DA
By Tanya Eiserer
teiserer@dallasnews.com
1:56 pm on August 26, 2008
Dallas Morning News
This is one of those can-you-believe-it-stories that I wish I’d heard about a long time ago:
The other day someone mentioned to me that an ex-DPD officer with a checkered driving past was now working with the Dallas County District Attorney’s office as an investigator. Initially, I thought this had to be a new gig, but it turns out that the DA’s office under Bill Hill had quietly hired Ernesto Fierro in 2005.
What makes it interesting is that Ernesto Fierro, now 39, had been involved in multiple on-duty accidents in which he was alleged to have left the scene. The last questionable accident occurred in 2005, and he resigned while under investigation in connection with the incident. The DA’s office hired him seven days later.
In his short career, which began in 1997, Officer Fierro wracked up quite a disciplinary history.
In 2000, he was disciplined for violating the department’s off-duty employment policy and working an extra job the same day he called in sick.
The next year, internal investigators concluded Officer Fierro fled a minor fender-bender near Royal Lane and Interstate 35E. Minutes later, Officer Fierro hit a truck and a wooden pole on Harry Hines Boulevard near Cullum Lane, police said.
In the first accident, automated vehicle locator tracking information showed that Officer Fierro had been in the area where the fender bender occurred and that he was recorded as traveling at speeds in excess of 100 mph. The driver of the car involved in the fender bender also picked him out of a lineup, but declined to proceed with prosecution.
He received a written reprimand over the second accident after investigators deemed it preventable.
Officer Fierro, blaming the injuries he suffered in the second accident, told investigators that he had no memory of being in the area where the minor accident occurred nor traveling at speeds over 100 mph.
He was fired in May 2001. He was subsequently reinstated in October 2001 by Assistant City Manager Ramon Miguez. The department’s disciplinary action was reduced to a 20-day suspension. He also received back pay.
In 2005, he got a one-day suspension after internal investigators concluded he again left the scene of an accident. He told investigators that he barely bumped the vehicle, that he was responding to the request of another officer for help, and that when he returned to find the vehicle, it wasn’t there.
That same year, Officer Fierro’s squad car was struck when he pulled his squad car into the path of a fleeing vehicle. A short time later, he was accused of using another officer’s name badge number to generate a theft report in which he was listed as the victim.
Officer Fierro resigned on November 7, 2005, while these investigators were going on. Internal investigators subsequently concluded that he violated the department’s chase policy and filed a false report.
Normally, resigning under investigation would have meant that Mr. Fierro would not have been able to keep his peace officer’s license, which would have prevented him from keeping his job with the DA’s office. But he appealed and state officials allowed him to keep his license.
I asked DA spokeswoman Jamille Bradfield about Mr. Fierro and she said, “He is able to drive a DA’s investigator’s car. We have had no issues or incidents.”
Officer Fierro could not be reached for comment.
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