Despite his strong words, Huber looked anything but the picture of confidence and robustness. Bedraggled and with gray circles of fatigue under his eyes, he seemed desperate to the point of distraction. But by the beginning of this past week, he still showed no willingness to resign and said he was preparing the groundwork for legal action against various people, among them his critics within the department and city administrators.
Carlton, meanwhile, wasn't saying whether he was going to retain the chief or fire him. At the manager's disposal were a range of options, including termination, suspension, a buyout of Huber's contract, modification of the existing contract, or the impaneling of an independent commission to investigate all allegations. "Whatever decision I make, I must make it soon," Carlton said this past week during an interview, "because there's chaos within the administration and the police department. There's tension in the community, and they'd like to know their police department has settled down."
But as far as the city's attorneys were concerned, the longer the delay the better. "From a strictly legal point of view, we see no need for any deadlines," explained City Attorney Laurence Feingold. "Delay allows us the luxury of having total due process and affording everybody a fair opportunity to be heard. But I'm not the manager, and there may be managerial reasons why he feels like he has to act."
This past week the EEOC released its voluminous file regarding the investigation into Lt. Steven Robbins's discrimination and retaliation complaints. Given the uproar caused by the earlier announcement of the EEOC's findings (despite their preliminary nature), expectations were extraordinarily high.
But what could have been a bullet fatal to Huber's career appeared to be only a blank.
Amid reams and reams of personnel files and interoffice memoranda from both sides in the dispute was the core: Robbins's allegations and the city's responses. But there were no notes from the investigator (who was not an attorney), no detailed conclusion, and no indication of how he determined he had "reasonable cause" to believe Robbins. The file did include unsigned statements taken from two of Robbins's colleagues -- who have also been two of Huber's staunchest critics -- alleging racist and retaliatory behavior. But again the documents included no definitive proof, no proverbial smoking gun.
For his part, Carlton wouldn't comment on the legal implications of the EEOC file because of the pending threat of litigation from Robbins. Huber, on the other hand, was thrilled, even though the EEOC file hadn't cleared him of the charges any more than it had indicted him. "I haven't stopped laughing yet," he chortled this past Thursday. "I think it's funny that it's still the same detractors." The entire imbroglio, he said, had stemmed from his decision back in 1991 to demote or reassign some key officers in the command staff, actions his bosses had permitted at the time. "And I'm the one getting fucked for it!" he exclaimed. "I hope the city has the intestinal fortitude to go to court and win [the Robbins] case."
As for his own fate, Huber asserted that the EEOC file had dramatically changed the complexion of his situation. "How could it bear any other way but favorably?" he crowed. "I don't expect to be fired, I expect to be cleared! It's all bullshit!
