Hamburg residents ‘disappointed’ with $1.4M judgment

By Eric Green
HAMBURG — A lawsuit brought by a former borough police officer has left some residents fuming about paying the $1.4 million judgment.
Thirty minutes into Monday evening’s (July 17) mayor and council meeting, Jill Pergola, a 27-year Hamburg resident, rose and took her place at the table before Mayor Paul Marino and other members of the council.
“I have to say, I am horribly disappointed in the behavior of the police department …” Pergola said. “The behavior that have occurred in that department is unacceptable.”
Pergola was referring, at least in part, to incidents that have happened since the hiring of Wayne Yahm, police director, in 2012. Yahm was appointed civilian director of the department, a controversial move since some felt the department should have continued under Jan Wright, then acting police chief. As a civilian director, Yahm does not carry a firearm, nor is he allowed to work with his officers directly in the field. He collects only a salary from the borough and does not receive a pension or health benefits.
However, for an action ostensibly designed to save the borough money, Pergola said the hiring of Yahm has had the opposite effect. “The fact that we chose to put someone in place that was supposed to save us money has now turned around to bite us in the butt,” Pergola said.
Daniel Farruggio, former police officer, resigned from the police force in 2013.
He later filed a lawsuit against the borough, which described his departure as a “constructive dismissal,” an involuntary resignation brought about by a hostile work environment.
That environment was allegedly generated by Yahm and Sgt. David McNulty, after Farruggio refused to take part in a ticket-fixing incident.
A jury agreed that Farruggio had suffered abuse and subsequently awarded him a judgment of $1.4 million. “And if you think that we are going to pick up that bill for the insanity that occurred in that police department,” Pergola said referring to the lawsuit, “I refuse to have my money taken out to pay for it.”
“We did not initiate that,” Mayor Marino responded. “That’s two separate issues. If you want to talk about the director position, that’s separate from this here. Jan Wright was the chief when all this stuff occurred.” It was not clear what the mayor referred to since Farruggio resigned under Yahm’s tenure.
The mayor later defended the borough’s decision to hire Yahm as police director.
“It has worked, but when you have people, ex-employees working against us, we’re at such a disadvantage. Everybody in this room should be appalled that we have a union president who’s trying to be the mayor of Hamburg. There’s 22 other towns in this state that have that job (police director). Why isn’t anybody else having any problems? Why? Because this particular union doesn’t want it.”
Hamburg’s police officers are represented by the Fraternal Order of Police, Lodge 57.
The mayor agreed, however, that paying off Farruggio’s lawsuit could genuinely hurt the borough.
“If we have to take a $1.4 million hit, that’s huge,” Marino said.
“It’ll kill this town,” Pergola responded. “I mean, it’s a ghost town now.”
The borough has decided to appeal the outcome of the lawsuit, and the mayor and council later went into executive session to discuss confidential aspects of the case.
During the public portion of the meeting, Pergola also raised the possibility of consolidating Hamburg’s police services with another municipality.
“Nothing is off the table,” Marino soaid.
Police Director Yahm declined to comment on any of the issues discussed during the meeting.