Lt. Marhulik's new rank remains on track

By Ed Runyan

The safety-service director and civil service commission disagree on whether the panel can block the promotion.

WARREN — The Warren Civil Service Commission has refused a request from the city’s safety- service director to disqualify a police officer for promotion because of racial slurs he uttered to black residents in August.

Commission members James Fredericka and the Rev. Frank Hearns said they don’t believe the rules allow the commission to change course now that it has certified Lt. Joseph Marhulik as the next Warren police officer eligible for promotion to captain.

The commission voted against blocking the promotion by a 3-0 vote Wednesday. “I don’t think our rules provide for that. I think we’re past that,” Fredericka said. “I don’t think the city can ask us to put the toothpaste back in the tube.”

Safety-Service Director Doug Franklin asked the commission early this month to rule Marhulik ineligible for the promotion because of incidents that took place Aug. 16 while Marhulik was off- duty but driving his unmarked police car in and around low-income apartment complexes.

“It is my opinion that Lt. Joseph Marhulik’s actions ... disqualified him from appointment to captain,” Franklin said in the letter.

Marhulik admits calling two men on bicycles a derogatory term for a black person. A security guard at the Stonegate Apartments also called police regarding Marhulik that night for talking to residents while appearing to be intoxicated and wearing his service revolver.

Marhulik was suspended without pay for two weeks for the incidents, a suspension he served by using vacation time.

Franklin said Wednesday that Marhulik’s promotion will remain on hold while he receives additional clarification from the city’s law department. The law department advised him earlier that the commission could block Marhulik’s promotion, he said.

Fredericka, who is an attorney, asked that same law department for its advice on what to do regarding Franklin’s request and came to the opposite conclusion about what to do about Marhulik.

Fredericka said if Franklin wanted to prohibit Marhulik from being promoted to captain, he had that opportunity when Marhulik was being punished for the offense.

For instance, Franklin could have demoted Marhulik, which would have made him ineligible for promotion to captain, he said.

Franklin said that is not true, however. He has authority only to change the punishment for an officer who appeals the punishment he gets from his supervisor in the police department, in this case Chief Tim Bowers. Marhulik did not appeal his punishment.

The three members of the civil service commission are appointed by the mayor.

runyan@vindy.com