City Manager Makes New Policy After Hiring Mishap

Fredericksburg City Manager Beverly Cameron said that he will insert a new policy into the city's employee handbook soon that will require supervisors or the police department to tell him whenever they know a city employee has been charged with or convicted of a crime.

This policy change is the result of Cameron's review of how

"I think that's going to take care of a lot of situations where upper management may not have known previously about these run-ins with the law," Cameron said.

In June, Cox was charged with 10 counts of felony child pornography possession and felony manufacturing marijuana. Police also recovered two 9mm guns from the home but there is no indication that Cox owned them, according to a search warrant filed in Fredericksburg Circuit Court. The city terminated Cox's employment two days after he was charged in June.

When Cox was hired as a part-time Fredericksburg Parks and Recreation employee to cut grass in August 2008, no one with the city knew he had a prior felony conviction from 2006 for breaking into cars because the city does not conduct background checks on all employees. Cameron said he is not going to change that policy, even though Stafford and Spotsylvania counties do background checks on all employees.

About 10 days ago, Cameron responded to an email from Fredericksburg Patch, saying:

"The City conducts pre-employment background checks (i.e., criminal record and credit reports) on selected applicants based on the position sought. DMV driving records are checked for all employees, both pre-employment and during employment (annually). Reference checks are conducted by hiring departments on all prospective employees.  All applicants for employment are required to complete a standard job application. The application requires candidates to voluntarily and truthfully disclose any and all past criminal conduct."

Cameron would not say on the record if Cox truthfully checked on his application that he was a convicted felon.

Fredericksburg Circuit Court records show that Cox pleaded guilty in July 2006 to breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony, grand larceny, petit larceny and felony failure to appear. He was sentenced to 10 years with nine years and two months suspended for the breaking and entering, five years for the larcenies with all suspended and two years for the failure to appear with all suspended.

After three months on the job with the city in November 2008, Cox was given a job as a part-time parking garage attendant.

On Dec. 26, 2008, Cox was involved in an air-rifle shooting incident that resulted in his second felony conviction on May 24, 2010. Cox was in jail for 30 days for this charge before he was convicted, and his direct supervisors knew about the jail time, Cameron said.

"Did the city know he was incarcerated? We must have," Cameron said. "I didn't know it personally, but obviously his direct supervisors must have known about it. He served 30 days in jail, then he came back to work. But at that point he had not been convicted."

Cameron said being charged with a crime is not something that leads to an automatic dismissal from city employment and that likely any situation would be explored on a case-by-case basis. Cameron said he does not believe anyone conducted a background check after supervisors found out about Cox's 2008 charges and they decided to keep him on the payroll "because he was a good employee." Cameron said during the 15-month period from Cox's 2008 charges and the conviction, he continued to work satisfactorily.

"Now, where the problem comes in is in July 2010, he was promoted to the position of parking garage supervisor," Cameron said. "That's going from part-time to full-time and that's where the city, in my opinion, made an error in judgment, and those are the kinds of things we can't let happen again. I am not sure we would have fired him, but we shouldn't have promoted him." 

"I am not changing the background check policy per se. I think it is an open question if we continue to refine it and research whether we are doing the best thing we can do," Cameron said.