Jury to decide if recalled sheriff’s behavior will cost Benton Co. millions

Benton County may need to pay millions to six current and former sheriff’s deputies for how their boss treated them.

A trial is scheduled to start Monday in Walla Walla County Superior Court stemming from former Sheriff Jerry Hatcher’s alleged abuse of his deputies.

A judge’s Friday decision means the trial will focus on Hatcher’s behavior, not whether other county leaders did enough to stop him. It’s a decision that could weaken the county’s defense in a lawsuit that initially asked for $22 million in damages.

The mix of current and former deputies and command staff involved in the trial, include Steve Caughey, Todd Carlson, Mat Clarke, Jason Erickson, Jon Law and Erik Magnuson.

They claim Hatcher subjected them “atrocious behavior” that included “hours-long interrogations, open belittling, insults, unfounded referrals to investigate unlawful activity and threats of physical violence,” the deputies’ attorney said.

They argue that the “tyrannical behavior” of their former boss forced many of the deputies to retire, take demotions or transfer away to get away from him.

The deputies eventually were forced to take matters into their own hands and led a recall effort that eventually led to Hatcher being removed from office.

Major pretrial shift

The lawsuit, filed in 2022, had asserted that Benton County should have done more to protect the deputies, and the county responded that they tried to curtail Hatcher as much as they were legally allowed to.

But a pretrial decision by Walla Walla Judge Brandon L. Johnson limited the focus of the trial to Hatcher’s behavior.

This came after a Friday morning hearing where attorneys argued about potential testimony from a former Washington State Supreme Court justice and the former Benton County prosecutor.

The hearing was filled with accusations of blackmail, claims of unethical behavior, and arguments about whether there was another legal method to remove Hatcher from power.

The attorney representing the county, Andrew Cooley, denied the claims of blackmail and unethical behavior.

After coming back from lunch, Johnson ruled that the evidence should focus on Hatcher’s behavior.

“This is not a suit against the county commissioners. It’s not a suit against the prosecutor. It’s not a suit against the coroner,” Johnson said. “It’s a suit against the county, but it’s really a suit against Jerry Hatcher himself for his actions.”

While it wasn’t what they had planned, one of the attorneys representing the deputies, James B. Meade, told Johnson that the decision doesn’t alter their case. They still plan to show that the county is liable for Hatcher’s behavior.

Cooley pointed out that before deciding that the county is liable the jury has to find that Hatcher was performing his official duties.

It’s unclear how Johnson’s decision will impact the county’s strategy as they head into trial.

“I won’t have a defense,” Cooley said during the hearing as they were discussing the change. “I’m sure I’ll be able to cross-examine the plaintiff’s witnesses on what happened to them. I’ll be able to put on whatever I can about (how Hatcher’s actions were) outside his official duties. “

Did the county do enough?

Much of Friday’s hearings focused on whether the prosecutor and commissioners did everything they should have to protect the deputies from Hatcher.

The county’s attorney, Cooley, argued the county took steps to limit Hatcher’s power, including removing the jail from his control, cutting his budget and conducting whistleblower investigations.

But the deputies’ attorneys shot back that they believe the county could have taken additional steps. In particular, they planned to have retired state Supreme Court Justice Phil Talmadge testify that the county should have gone to court to try and remove Hatcher from power.

The attorneys pointed to two laws — one a statute that allows a coroner to take over for a sheriff, and the other a law that requires police agencies to create policies around domestic violence.

The attorneys also alleged that Hatcher blackmailed then Prosecutor Andy Miller with information about two previous romantic relationships and suggested that is why he didn’t pursue Hatcher in court.

The attorneys said they had proof from depositions that showed this.

Cooley argued that there was no blackmail, and that the jury shouldn’t be asked to make decisions on whether the county could have successfully removed Hatcher.

Miller told the Herald that he took steps to try and stop Hatcher, including telling him not to take action against employees and refusing to place deputies on the “Brady” list.

The potential impeachment disclosure list, more commonly known as the “Brady” list contains witnesses whose integrity and trustworthiness could be questioned if they were called to testify that is normally kept by the prosecutors.

“In contrast, I did put Sheriff Hatcher on the Brady, or PID list. ... That action understandably upset Sheriff Hatcher. It is considered somewhat of a death knell to a law enforcement officer’s career,” Miller told the Herald. “If I was being blackmailed, I would not have done any of the above.”

Hatcher’s actions

Hatcher was appointed by Benton County commissioners in 2017 to take over from Steve Keane, who retired with little more than a year remaining in his term. He was then elected in 2017 to serve the remainder of Keane’s term and again in 2018 for a full term.

Problems with the sheriff allegedly started early in the first full term, court documents said. This is when Hatcher’s wife, Monica, came forward with allegations that he had strangled her and made a threat during a fight about an extramarital affair in December 2017.

She later said her husband forced her to recant her abuse statements by writing a four-page email to a detective saying she is “confused about quite a lot of things” and cannot in good faith swear to what happened two years ago.

The deputies’ attorneys said during Friday’s hearing that Magnuson was called in to help Monica Hatcher when she decided to force him to leave their shared home. This led to threats by the sheriff.

The accusations of domestic violence and witness tampering became public when Monica Hatcher filed for divorce in 2019.

“When he got put in a corner of domestic violence and witness tampering (allegations) and all that stuff, that made him a caged animal that basically had to retaliate against everybody who wouldn’t support his potential cover up or be loyal to him,” Meade said.

While Jerry Hatcher was charged with fourth-degree assault and witness tampering in October 2019 by a special attorney, the charges were dismissed without prejudice before he was arraigned.

He was required to turn over his guns as part of a protection order issued in the divorce case.

Then, in January 2020, Monica Hatcher discovered 14,000 rounds of Benton County-owned ammunition in the home that they had previously shared, court documents said.

Caughey took possession of the ammunition as evidence, but Hatcher ordered him to distribute it, court documents said. The deputy refused, believing it would amount to evidence tampering.

Hatcher would later pressure Caughey and Law to say “they do not know” whether Hatcher stole the ammunition.

Carlson, who was put in charge of the sheriff’s office ammunition, was also pressured to lie during investigations.

Whistleblower Complaints

By the end of January, Magnuson had filed a whistleblower complaint against the sheriff. A day later the Benton County Deputies Guild issued a letter of no confidence in the sheriff.

“Sheriff Hatcher blamed the plaintiffs for the no confidence letter,” the deputies’ attorneys said in their complaint. “He told them that he thought it was one of them that had pushed the situation and that this person should resign. Sheriff Hatcher stated his belief that either Plaintiff Magnuson or Plaintiff Erickson were behind the no confidence letter.”

Hatcher allegedly pushed Caughey to reveal who filed the whistleblower complaint, leading to a “heated exchange.” He also tried to get Law to turn over the person who made the complaint.

The complaint was investigated in 2020, and it was determined that Jerry Hatcher had harassed and retaliated against Magnuson for engaging in union activities and for participating in a whistleblower investigation.

Erickson filed a complaint with the auditor’s office in February after he stepped down from his position as lieutenant and became a sergeant again.

Hatcher threatened to fire Erickson over the complaint, according to the complaint.

Over the course of 2020 and 2021, as recall efforts started, Hatcher opened internal affairs investigations or used other means to allegedly retaliate against the six deputies. He did his because they participated in investigations of him or because they refused to follow his orders, their attorneys said.

He threatened to use the deputies’ cooperation with the whistleblower investigations as a reason to put them on the “Brady” list.

“Placement on the Brady list ... has the practical effect of preventing that officers from becoming employed as a police officer in any other jurisdiction,” the deputies’ attorneys said in the complaint.

Caughey and Carlson resigned ahead of their planned retirement because of the sheriff’s actions.

Hatcher was successfully recalled out of office in August 2021. After his removal, the deputies filed the lawsuit in federal court before it was moved to Walla Walla Superior Court.