Police Overtime Fraud: Why It Keeps Happening
Police overtime fraud is embarrassing. The cover-up that follows is a crime.
Not exactly master criminals
In most of these cases, the dollar amounts are tiny compared to the long-term financial penalty. Another striking revelation, none of these law enforcement officers are going to be joining Professor Moriarty, Lex Luthor or even Danny Ocean in the master criminal hall of fame. Are there stories where someone made a poor choice out of punishing hardship and the temptation was just too great? Not that we have seen so far.
The most profound observation is that these crimes are being committed for peanuts by cops who are prosperous by all standards. A New Orleans police sergeant has a base salary of $83,000 with an unmarked take home out-of-parish vehicle? An Orlando master police officer earning six figures? Of the cops that get themselves in trouble, none of the rewards are where you could set yourself up for life in a new country and live like royalty.
Also, the ignorance of everyone getting caught while committing this fraud annoys me. This type of crime has been going on in all careers forever but if you are a law enforcement officer, your arrest, trial and firing are going to be in the news.
In 2022, NBC reported on 54 California Highway Patrol officers being charged in an overtime fraud that took place between 2016 and March of 2018 with a grand total of $225,000 loss, which sounds like a lot until you find out the average would be about $4,200 and then knowing that in reality, many got more and many got less, those who got less than $4,200 were double cheated. However, the point being that officers are regularly getting caught ought to have some deterrence effect.
It’s not easy to lose a police pension, but in many states, committing financial fraud against your police employer is a great way to get rid of it. First responders and their families likely know the generosity of some extra duty details. I know construction contractors and movie production companies do. Many have a minimum time if you show up, so if you are working traffic for a 5K run and there is a tornado warning, the officer still gets paid the three or four hours minimum in the agreement.
Some agencies have venues that necessitate a coordinator who schedules regular coverage for a private employer. Depending on the assignments, these can be prone to abuse. Perhaps a shopping district, that requests additional extra-duty patrol, in an area that already has a visible police presence, may not notice that the officer and vehicle, that they are paying for, is not there at all. The officer, her or his vehicle, and GPS enabled radio and body camera, are sitting at home, while the money rolls in. This was a real case in Orlando where the officer remained at his residence outside the county. The list of charges was limited by data retention so while nobody knows how long this abuse existed, it was for longer than what he was arrested and charged with.
Most media reports follow a pattern. Most law enforcement agencies do it right. Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office Florida detected fraud and arrested three cops including a former officer, and two were fired. Nassau County Florida fired and arrested a deputy for fraudulently claiming hours she didn’t work over two years amounting to $4,478.63. Again and again, these sums just don’t add up.
The Big Easy’s big problem
Reporters in New Orleans have been following overtime abuses with the New Orleans Police Department for several years and what makes this story unique is that it seems it is the same cast of characters year after year. Sergeant Henry Burke’s payroll records reflect that he worked 4529 hours, more than 12 hours per day on every single one of the 365 days of the year, bumping his base salary of $87,254 to $282,200. Burke was arrested on February 4, 2026 and charged with ten felony counts. Here’s the other dimension to the story: the ADP Payroll company account for Sergeant Alfred Russell added multiple in or out punches days after the shifts occurred. Investigation has revealed chronic password sharing of payroll authorization accounts.
Senior Police Officer Brandon Coleman, documented as being on the clock and on the job assignment while being photographed at home, had over 1700 payroll reviews and edits, with every edit linked to the user ID of Sgt. Kevin Thompson, and Thompson had 1385 payroll edits done by Coleman’s user ID. This illustrates that Coleman has administrative rights over Thompson’s payroll timecard and vice versa.
The abuse continues with Sergeant Bianca Boone whose base $83,024 salary swelled to $239,045 while reportedly working 4200 hours of scheduled shifts, overtime and details.
She is being investigated, as is Sergeant Rene Benjamin for working 602 shifts over 363 days. NOPD payroll records show Benjamin working 444 days and 14 months without a day off in the recent past. There was an FBI investigation with an unknown resolution. In 2020, Benjamin is documented as having worked 360 days.
In April 2026, the investigative reporter, who has been working on this for years, spoke with NOPD Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick. He asks her about Benjamin who has worked 363 calendar days, and she treats it like an ambush.
“That is something I would say, I don’t know how healthy you are going to be trying to do that – I don’t know anything about that, I appreciate that you are trying to get to the truth of the matter and ‘you’re also doing the gotcha’ so I don’t know anything about this situation.”
In that, Chief Kirkpatrick fails to address what a police chief ought to know in a department of less than 1,000 officers where 50 are earning more than $200,000 as overtime has doubled since 2022 from $13.1M to $26.8M in 2025.
The chief who covered it up
Mount Dora is situated in Florida between Orlando to the southeast and The Villages to the northwest. It is an ideal place to raise children with high performing schools and a reputation as a center of culture. Why, in the beautiful area of chains of lakes and rolling hills would one of the most egregious abuses of authority take place? For years, the law enforcement profession has faced both fair and unfair accusations of abuse of power and corruption. The Mount Dora Police Department is an agency of less than 80 employees and less than 50 sworn staff.
Cover-Up in Mount Dora? When Felonies Get Buried and Whistleblowers Get Blamed, The Credibility of the Badge Suffers
Just off US 441, which stretches from US 41 in Miami, Florida 939 miles to US 25W in Rocky Top, Tennessee, about 45 minutes north of Orlando - is the City of Mount Dora. It is a unique jewel in Central Florida. When you get there, you know you are not in Orlando anymore. There isn’t another city in Lake County that rivals or replicates the distinctive c…
In August of 2025, I wrote
“…in October 2023 where Mount Dora Lieutenant Barry Strykowski was accused of stealing time by falsifying records and misuse of his city issued vehicle. This included claiming to be in service on extra duty jobs, and invoicing for that time worked, while they planted a GPS on his vehicle which revealed not only that he wasn’t at work but at times beyond geographic range the agency vehicle uses policy permits. Sometimes he was working but double dipping, claiming to fulfill two obligations. But these accusations were not just policy violations, some of the actions, where they developed probable cause, were serious felonies.”
The accusations against Strykowski are settled facts. He claimed to be working, and was getting paid for working, while he and his vehicle were in Orange or Duval counties. In at least one case, he was getting paid twice for the same time worked. He cheated the city and contractors that hired cops for extra duty.
Following an investigation that produced a 22-page report outlining only the known theft by fraud committed by Strykowski, he had applied to another police agency and was in the final stages of the hiring process.
Officers who change jobs prior to discipline are a stain on the profession called gypsy cops. Their illegal behavior is recognized by one agency, only for them to lily pad to another agency. While it is a well-documented problem in law enforcement, there are safeguards that work if police executives follow the rules. That failed to happen in this case.
Mount Dora Police Chief Michael Gibson explained to the ABC affiliate WFTV in Orlando that upon the conclusion of the internal investigation, he used his discretion to negotiate a voluntary resignation from Strykowski with a whitewashed record. Initially the Florida Department of Law Enforcement separation form reflected that, truthfully, Strykowski ‘resigned while under investigation and pending discipline.’ Then that form was changed stating it was a ‘voluntary separation not involving misconduct.’ That record manipulation is the mechanism that creates gypsy cops.
A Mount Dora captain received a call from the agency doing the background on Strykowski to hire him, which being out of the loop on the lieutenant’s investigation, stated under oath that he checked with Chief Gibson:
“I saw the Chief. I said Chief Oakland is calling. They want to find out if there’s any discipline on Barry Strykowski. He said, no discipline, just like that. No discipline and no pending inquiries. That’s what he said. I said, can I write that down? He said, yeah. And then he made those other comments. What’s the connection? Or what? You know, what there? That’s it. Can I send him that? He said yes.”
Captain Victor Uvalle replied via e-mail to the phone query with the response from Chief Gibson. A nine-word e-mail. “No open cases and no discipline on Lt. Barry Strykowski.”
Life went on for months until a whistleblower let the news know that Strykowski was getting promoted to sergeant, while still under new-hire probation at his new agency. Gibson, confronted by facts, stated that his resignation was his discipline. He argues to the news that since the City of Mount Dora was the victim, that he had the discretion to forward or not-forward the crime to rightful prosecution. Gibson suspends Uvalle with pay for months, and then fires him for four sustained counts of truthfulness related to the nine-word e-mail that Gibson had Uvalle send to the hiring agency.
Leadership is the answer
My father told me, locks keep honest people honest. A co-worker in my earliest work experience told another co-worker as he put his wallet in his pocket, it’s not that I don’t trust you, I just want to keep on trusting you.
We can’t blame leadership for all the criminal mistakes of sworn officers. No one can do any public safety profession, dispatch, corrections, rescue, fire, and law enforcement without an above average risk tolerance. Bill Bratton had it right when, to paraphrase, that we must hire from the human race. But leadership must respond and decisively when we see the obvious gaps.
Superintendent Kirkpatrick doesn’t understand that intangibles like public trust will never be achieved without acknowledging that detecting obvious abuses like nearly 50 cops making over $200,000 via overtime is a primary function of her role.
Chief Gibson is unlikely to ‘use his discretion’ to let a shoplifter go who stole $5,000 from a local art storefront, so why would the theft to the city, where often the instrumentality was a city unmarked police vehicle, be any different? Without a whistleblower, Gibson’s backdoor agreement and FDLE separation form manipulation would have gone unnoticed. Records show Gibson has done it again as recently as March of this year where another FDLE separation form needed to be changed from ‘failure to perform tasks satisfactorily’ to ‘administrative separation not involving misconduct.’
This is the call for the true leaders to stand up. They will be easy to spot. They’ll listen, they’ll show caring, and they’ll show all the fake losers the road. The true leaders will do the right thing regardless of the cost. They have the clarity and vision that will call people to follow them.
I’d like to know from you what you think is worse: the massive fraud in New Orleans or the leadership decisions in Mount Dora. Let me know in the comments.
Please keep all peace officers in your prayers.
Roland Clee served a major Florida police department as a Community Service Officer for more than 26 years. His career included uniformed patrol, training, media relations, intelligence, criminal investigations, and chief’s staff. He writes the American Peace Officer newsletter, speaks at public safety, recruiting and leadership conferences and helps local governments and public safety agencies through his business, CommandStaffConsulting.com.
His work is frequently featured on LawOfficer.com, the only law enforcement owned major media presence in the public safety realm.
For media interviews and podcast appearances, click here: http://bit.ly/40pT3NS
References
https://www.boston.com/news/crime/2020/09/02/boston-police-arrested-overtime-fraud/
https://www.fox8live.com/2026/02/19/nopd-overtime-investigation-reveals-thousands-timesheet-edits/
https://www.wftv.com/news/local/orlando-officer-arrested-clocking-couch/GGBBHEVWSRHG3EZ6NB6QW22III/
The rampant corruption and fraud in government has become more obviously pervasive and terrible of late. We always knew it existed and were aware of the optics that the miscreants protected each other from accountability. To the point here, in my perspective, lawlessness and corruption by police, prosecutors, and judges ranks several levels worse than that of regular Citizens, and even than sundry other government bad actors.
This is called evil in the real world, and should reliably be met with much more stringent accountability and judgment.
How can this behavior be known about and buried by the very people that hold people's freedom and safety in their despicably crooked and ludicrous hands. People should be contesting every single report, ticket, warrant, and conviction that such dishonest malfeasants had anything to do with. The sheer gall and anti-social psychopathy is beyond measure.
Yep, I know people that haven’t taken 1 hour off since being promoted to upper command. Working years without any time off. Or, some taking every other day off while being on vacation in another country. Not sure how that works. I’m accountable for every hour by logging on my computer and being fully viewable on gps mapping. Most command disable thier gps or don’t even bother logging on duty. Some don’t even work full shifts. When you bring it up to the higher ups it falls on deaf ears. I’m refused to be caught up in this nonsense of cheating the system. We arrest people for theft. How on earth can we be stealing? How these people live with themselves is beyond me.