Que te chin***? It is insane that no one notice until the local TV station got hold of it-I could almost understand his fraud falling through the cracks in a big city department-but not some place in Rhode Island-my guess is that he had inside help...
Yeah, according to the TV report, the department where the detective spent 22 years on sick leave has just over 30 officers—total. So, it’s not like the NYPD or Chicago police where he could have been “lost” in the shuffle of thousands of officers. And under Rhode Island law, they had to keep the job open as long as he was on sick leave, so other cops had to cover his duties as well.
What I can’t figure out: with proper treatment, staph infections eventually clear up, even among patients who require hospitalization. Are we to believe this guy had a staph infection for the last 20 years (and is still alive). Surely an infection of that magnitude should have killed him long ago, despite massive doses of antibiotics.
You are correct; someone was helping this guy perpetuate this fraud for more than 20 years. Another possibility: the “sick” detective had major dirt on other officers in the department, so they bought him off with a 20-year, taxpayer-funded vacation and now, an equally lucrative retirement.