The Durham police officers said they would take the mentally unstable man to the hospital. He was suicidal and needed to see a doctor.Instead, the officers interrogated him in an attempt to find some dirt on a female sergeant who had lodged complaints about a senior officer’s abusive and misogynistic behaviour, according to allegations filed in an internal police complaint.The group of officers then told the suicidal man — the female officer’s ex-husband — that he “better be ‘solid’ and not tell anyone about what had happened,” the complaint alleges.The “horrific and corrupt set of circumstances,” as Sgt. Nicole Whiteway describes the incident in her July 2017 complaint, are part of what she calls a campaign of harassment against her by a Durham police inspector and other officers.Whiteway, a 22-year veteran with 16 years at the Durham force, first complained to Durham police about Insp. Nick Lisi in 2016, alleging that the high-ranking officer had harassed her and colleagues, publicly ridiculing his subordinates’ personal lives and physical attributes.She alleges that Lisi made derogatory comments about her ex-husband’s mental health and derided her for seeking an accommodated schedule to care for her young son, who has a life-threatening health condition.Lisi told the Star the allegations against him are untrue. “The information you have is erroneous and incorrect,” he said.According to a memo signed by a Durham deputy chief, an external investigator had substantiated some of the allegations contained in Whiteway’s first complaint while dismissing others as embellished, false or malicious. The memo said the investigator’s specific findings are confidential, and they have not been publicly released.Durham police said it would dock Lisi 160 hours pay, according to the memo. Durham police sources say Lisi has refused to accept the penalty, and the matter is expected to ...
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