Officer resigns after videos surface of unauthorized party in village building

COAL GROVE, Ohio (WSAZ) - A now former part-time Coal Grove police officer is no longer on the force after videos surfaced appearing to show him partying with alcohol with several other people at the building that houses the mayor’s court and the police station.

The police chief also says drugs were involved but didn’t specify which.

Village officials say a person who’s remaining anonymous contacted them Saturday, Jan. 21 saying they had video of the part-time officer partying with people in the building.

A statement from the village says the videos are believed to have been recorded either December 23 or 24, and they show the officer, who was off-duty at the time, with at least five unknown people who are not village employees, in the conference room of the Roush Building, which is owned by the village.

“It was devastating,” Coal Grove Police Chief Bill Murphy said. “When these videos came out, I’m embarrassed, angry, it’s just completely devastating.”

The statement says Murphy and the village solicitor investigated and determined the officer violated multiple village policies, including conduct unbecoming of a law enforcement officer and possessing alcohol on village property. The officer was immediately placed on unpaid leave.

The chief says the officer was brought into the police department Saturday night to be questioned, but he was uncooperative and said he wanted to resign.

“He has resigned in lieu of termination,” the chief said.

“We take this very serious,” Murphy said. “It will not be tolerated here at the Village of Coal Grove. We handled it I believe swiftly and effectively as soon as we were notified, and we need to move on.”

When asked what message he’d want to send to residents following this, council member Andy Holmes said, “This is just a human resource issue. We had an employee not follow policy in terms of coming into the Jae Roush Justice Center. It’s been dealt with. The gentleman wasn’t on the clock at the time, he wasn’t in uniform, and it’s been dealt with.”

Murphy took over as chief less than a year ago, after the previous chief and every member of the Coal Grove Police Department quit in January of 2022.

After Thursday night’s council meeting, Murphy talked with WSAZ about the challenge of filling positions.

“Lawrence County does not have a police academy,” Murphy said. “The closest academy to us right now is Scioto County. As soon as they’re graduating from that academy, they’re either going straight to the sheriff’s office or a bigger place than what Coal Grove or some of these small villages are.”

“I think this is reflective across the country when not a lot of young kids are getting into this field of work,” Holmes said, “so the pool of people who apply for these positions is getting smaller and smaller. The options we have and the resumes we look at are few and far between, as opposed to 10 or 20 years ago when there were a lot of people who’d apply for these types of positions and qualify.”

Chief Murphy says the officer had previously served with another department, and he’d just completed his 6-month probationary period in Coal Grove.

No criminal charges have been filed. The chief says the investigation is ongoing, and it’s possible charges could be filed later.

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