A police officer who fed a homeless man a sandwich full of faeces has kept his job.
San Antonio officer Matthew Luckhurst won an appeal against his dismissal on a technicality.
Luckhurst picked up some dog poo, placed it onto a piece of bread before placing the 'sandwich' in a Styrofoam container of a 'half-eaten meal' provided by a local religious group for the San Antonio homeless.
He then placed it next to a sleeping homeless man who would ultimately wake, pick up the container looking at the contents, and possibly eating them.
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The officer won back his job on appeal after a date discrepancy led an arbitrator to overturn his dismissal enabling him to get off on a technicality.
It was successfully argued the incident fell outside the window for allowing him to be indefinitely suspended, and an arbitrator agreed with him earlier this month, KSAT reported.
'The indefinite suspension is overturned due to the violation of the 180-days prohibition,' the arbitrator wrote in his decision based on the rule that Luckhurst's discipline fell outside of the time limit on punishing his behavior.
It was noted that while the suspension was overturned, that punishment was deemed reasonable based on the fact Luckhurst's actions were 'grossly inappropriate' regarding the fecal sandwich being placed in a container close to a homeless person.
Another officer reported he told Luckhurst, a five-year veteran, he could not just leave the container next to the homeless person, and told him to go back and dispose of it.
The officer said he watched Luckhurst bike back and assumed that he threw it away, but it's not confirmed that he did.
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Luckhurst was notified of his dismissal on October 28 of that year which fell within the 180-day window if the incident happened in May as originally believed, but the officer reviewed his medical records that would challenge the assumption.
According to his records, the officer had suffered an injury during a martial arts class that left him on light duty between April 6 and June 14, 2016, and would not have been able to ride his bicycle in May.
Witness and hearsay testimony in the record also provided vague or contradictory dates regarding the incident.
While he won this particular appeal, the former officer has another faeces-related claim he needs to address from 2016.
Luckhurst was given a second indefinite suspension in December 2016 over an allegation he and another male officer had defecated in a toilet assigned to women in the bike patrol office.
'The toilet was left unflushed by both officers intentionally,' the suspension document states.
