“Officers Ronnie Jones, George Downing, Shawn Harris, Richard Beckers, Jacqueline McGowan and Walter Washington each had very different explanations as to why there might have been cocaine detected in their hair follicles, yet all were summarily fired in the last decade. The board’s ruling reinstates them to their jobs with back pay dating to October 2010. Reasons for the presence of cocaine given by officers included a recent prescription of lidocaine, living near a crackhead, keeping drug evidence in the same pocket as food and accidental physical contact after mistaking the drug for powder from a doughnut.”
