A veteran of that Racine County police department quit in 2023 before the completion of an investigation into his conduct. The Badger Project sued after the department denied its requests for that investigation. 

By Annie Pulley, THE BADGER PROJECT

The Badger Project is suing a police department in Racine County after it twice refused to release records relating to an officer who resigned amidst an internal investigation before briefly going on to work for another department.

Officer Richard Von Drasek worked at the Village of Wind Point Police Department from 2015 to 2023. He “resigned prior to the completion of an internal investigation,” according to a state Department of Justice database that tracks negative separations from law enforcement. After resigning, Von Drasek worked briefly for the Burlington Police Department.

The Badger Project routinely reports on wandering officers, or police and jailers forced out of one law enforcement job for accusations of misconduct who are rehired at another. The number of wandering officers in Wisconsin rose by 50% from 2021 to 2024, an investigation by The Badger Project found. Studies suggest that wandering officers are more prone to misconduct and discipline at their new jobs.

“Carrying a badge and a gun is a privilege, not a right,” Tom Kamenick, The Badger Project’s attorney, said in an email. “Courts agree that police officers give up much of their privacy rights in exchange for the authority that society lends them. Oversight of how that authority is used – and misused – is vital for a functioning society.”

The police department in March refused to release documents relating to his separation from the department, citing a records request that was “vague and overbroad.”

Wind Point Police Chief Tommy Sharrett wrote in his denial that disclosure could hinder the efficacy of the department’s internal investigations; negatively affect the public by inhibiting an officer’s ability to enforce the law; compromise the employment data of public employees; decrease the department’s ability to attract quality law enforcement personnel; and hurt the “good name, reputation, honor or integrity of the public employee” in question.

“I am not aware of the public interest that would be served by providing the documents at issue to you at this time, aside from the general presumption of openness,” Sharrett wrote in his denial letter.

The department’s response contradicts Wisconsin’s open records law, Kamenick argues in the lawsuit filed at the Racine County Circuit Court.

Wisconsin statute says “all persons are entitled to the greatest possible information regarding the affairs of government and the official acts of those officers and employees who represent them.” Denials are generally “contrary to the public interest, and only in an exceptional case may access be denied.” Wisconsin law presumes “complete public access to government records.”

Kamenick, the founder and president of the Wisconsin Transparency Project, who has represented The Badger Project in multiple similar cases, argues in the lawsuit that the police department’s reasoning is “not legally sufficient to outweigh the strong public policy favoring disclosure.”

The Badger Project is a nonpartisan, citizen-supported journalism nonprofit in Wisconsin.