DALLAS — The prosecutor’s office investigating the death of a black teenager who was shot by a Dallas-area police officer had once filed a complaint over that officer’s aggressive behavior, according to records obtained Thursday by The Associated Press.
Personnel records from the Balch Springs Police Department show former officer Roy Oliver was suspended for 16 hours in December 2013 after the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office filed a complaint about his conduct when he was serving as a witness in a drunken-driving case. That office is now investigating the shooting Saturday night in which Oliver, who is white, fired a rifle at a car full of teenagers leaving a party, striking and killing 15-year-old Jordan Edwards.
Messages left with a spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office, a police spokesman and a lawyer for Oliver were not immediately returned Thursday.
The personnel records also included periodic evaluations that noted at least one instance when Oliver was reprimanded for being “disrespectful to a civilian on a call.” That evaluation, dated January 27, 2017, called the reprimand an isolated incident and urged Oliver to be mindful of his leadership role in the department.
The complaint from the prosecutor’s office said the office had a hard time getting Oliver to attend the trial, he was angry he had to be there, he used vulgar language that caused an assistant district attorney to send a female intern out of the room, and he used profanity during his testimony.
“In an email from one of the prosecutors he states you were a ‘scary person to have in our workroom,’” then-Balch Springs Police Chief Ed Morris wrote in the suspension findings.
Oliver joined the Balch Springs department in 2011 after being an officer with the Dalworthington Gardens Police Department for almost a year. A statement from Dalworthington Gardens officials late Wednesday included some details of that and previous intermittent employment as a dispatcher and public works employee between 1999 and 2004.
The statement said he received an award for “meritorious conduct” as a dispatcher and there were no documented complaints or disciplinary action in either his work as a public safety officer or dispatcher. Between his employment as a dispatcher and officer in the Dallas suburb, he was in the U.S. Army, rising to the rank of sergeant while serving two tours in Iraq and earning various commendations. He served for two years in the Texas National Guard reserves through 2012.