Police Sergeant Settles Age Discrimination Case for $267,500

Bruce Sepanak comes from a proud family of police officers and was a police officer himself for over 40 years, the last 20 years at the University of Michigan Flint. He had an impeccable record of service to U of M-Flint and the community. U of M-Flint Police Director Hall apparently wanted to get rid of some of the older male sergeants and told co-Defendant Lieutenant Smith exactly that, according to witness Todd Coles, another police officer. Director Hall and co-Defendant Heather Bromley intensely questioned Bruce Sepanak about his plans to retire, which Bruce Sepanak likened to being questioned by the Gestapo. It was that intense. Once Bruce Sepanak was fired, he was replaced by a younger police officer, approximately 20 years younger than Bruce Sepanak.

U of M-Flint officers were scheduled for a mandatory firearms training day. The training was "Active Shooter/Attacker" response. Prior to the active shooter scenarios, 15 U of M-Flint officer participants were instructed to conduct multiple "pat-down searches" as required on each other. The pat downs searches are safety checks to identify and remove potential weapons prior to the scenario training. Each officer was patted down approximately fifteen times as instructed.

How did Defendants get rid of Bruce Sepanak who had no disciplines whatsoever? During the above-described training, Defendant Heather Bromley concocted a false story by claiming that, during a pat-down session, surrounded by other police officer, Bruce Sepanak put the palms of his hands flush against Defendant Heather Bromley’s buttocks, squeezed and giggled them in what she described was a criminal sexual assault. However, the first problem Defendant Bromley had was that Bruce Sepanak was always standing up, not crouching down and what she described was physically impossible to accomplish.

The second problem Defendant Bromley had was that her own co-Defendant Lt. Smith was standing a few feet away from Defendant Bromley and Bruce Sepanak and was an eyewitness to the event. Co-Defendant Smith testified under oath that it was a "non-event”, and that "nothing improper happened” and if it had, he would have stopped it and reported it, none of which happened.

Another problem Defendant Bromley had was that she failed to immediately report the alleged sexual assault on the Clery/Crime Log. If Bruce Sepanak had sexually assaulted her as she claimed, Defendant Bromley was mandated to report such an assault on the Clery/Crime log in order to warn the public of what was going on at the University. While Defendant Bromley testified during her deposition that she logged the assault on the Clery/Crime log, the University’s Communications Officer testified that Defendant Bromley did not log the alleged assault in the Clery/Crime log. Ironically, Defendant Bromley was also the bookkeeper of the Clery/Crime log so she knew about her legal obligations to report such an assault, yet she failed to do so. And, after it was confirmed through litigation that Defendant Bromley failed to follow her obligation to report the alleged sexual assault and had essentially lied about it, she is still employed at U of M Flint, while Bruce Sepanak has no job and still has to fight to get his MCOLES certification back.

While denying all liability, Defendants paid Bruce Sepanak $ 267,500, just before the Jury Trial was supposed to start.