Forest Co K9 deputy who was forced out after investigation back in policing

Adam Boney quit the Forest County Sheriff’s Office after accusations, which he said were false, that he refused to assist a deputy on a potentially dangerous call. He now works for a small police department in the same county.

By Annie Pulley, THE BADGER PROJECT

A deputy for the Forest County Sheriff’s Office resigned amid an investigation into his conduct, which included an incident where he was accused of refusing to back up a female deputy during a welfare check on a man known to dislike women and law enforcement. 

“I never told the female deputy ‘No, I will not provide you backup,’” Adam Boney, the former deputy and K9 handler, wrote in an email to The Badger Project.

At the conclusion of the investigation, Sheriff Jeffery Marvin decided to begin Boney’s termination process. The deputy instead resigned in December 2024 after eight years there. His final hourly wage was about $30 an hour.

A year later, the Town of Wabeno Police Department in Forest County hired him as a part-time officer. That department works closely with the Forest County Sheriff’s Office. If a part-time officer cannot respond to a call within the township, the sheriff’s office usually will.

The town’s police department did not respond to multiple messages from The Badger Project. 

“I don’t feel very confident that I will receive the backup I need from Deputy Boney, and I hate to even ask him for help when I need it,” Tracy Priebe, the deputy at the heart of the probe into Boney’s conduct, wrote in her report. 

Boney told The Badger Project he didn’t know why she felt that way and that he had provided her with backup in other incidents prior to this and would have had no problem doing so again.

After Priebe tried to contact Boney a number of times on Dec. 2, 2024, to ask for help, they eventually met in the office, according to investigation documents The Badger Project got in a records request. Priebe told him she needed to follow up on two calls from the night before: one for a missing juvenile making threats to himself and law enforcement and another for a welfare check on a suicidal man, who Priebe said had previously threatened law enforcement and dislikes women, according to her report.

Priebe wrote that Boney told her that “he is not going to come” because the man won’t answer the door if he’s there. She also reported Boney saying he is “not going to look for that kid,” in reference to the missing juvenile.

“I never told that female deputy that I would not provide her backup,” Boney wrote in his email to The Badger Project. “The call was to conduct a welfare check on an individual that I have arrested in the past, and that individual has a strong dislike towards me. The number one goal of a welfare check is to make contact with the individual first. I believed that if the individual saw me at his residence, he would not have answered the door.” 

He said he told all of this to Priebe and said there were other deputies with a better rapport with that man that could have helped her.

But Priebe wrote that Boney made her justify why she wanted his help.

“Priebe asked Boney for backup at Tristan’s house, and Boney flat-out stated ‘no,’” a sheriff’s office secretary who overheard the conversation between Boney and Priebe told investigators. The secretary described the interaction as rude and disrespectful.

When he was interviewed as part of the internal investigation, Boney said he should have told Priebe he would go along but remain just seconds away on the highway.

Priebe eventually made contact with the suicidal man alone. Boney did end up checking one known address for the missing juvenile, Priebe wrote in her statement. She and a different deputy she asked to help found another address for the juvenile.

In Boney’s interview with the sheriff, he said he’d never do anything to endanger one of his coworkers. In another email he sent to The Badger Project, he said he was unaware Priebe ended up performing the welfare check alone.

In the investigation, the sheriff noted a pattern of issues with Boney’s behavior, including another incident where Boney was suspended for comments he made about killing a dispatcher. Boney said he was just venting about the dispatcher to a coworker. The sheriff also referenced a comment Boney made about a photo Priebe took that he called “pathetic.” Multiple employees made complaints about Boney’s behavior, the sheriff noted in his report.

He submitted his resignation letter on Dec. 26, 2024.

The Badger Project is an independent news nonprofit in Wisconsin.