Aurora Police Investigating Officer Over Unwelcome Advance; Victim Says Invasion Of Privacy Left Her 'Livid'
AURORA, Colo. (CBS4)- An Aurora woman who witnessed a crime last Friday and gave officers her personal information for use in the investigation, says one of the officers turned around and used the information to contact her for a possible date.
"I was shocked and pretty livid," said Rachel Jones, 27.
She had witnessed a case of vandalism last Friday at her apartment complex. When two officers came to her door, she provided her personal information including her phone number.
The next afternoon, she received this text message: "Hi there, this is the Officer from yesterday you spoke to(handsome one with the beard). You seemed really cool and very attractive. I was wondering if you were single? I apologize if this seems inappropriate and will promptly go away if that's what you'd like."
Jones immediately blocked the number and filed a complaint with the Aurora Police Department.
"I felt like my privacy had been invaded. I just knew immediately that this was incredibly wrong, and there was no doubt in my mind that this was not normal and not supposed to be happening," Jones told CBS4.
Aurora police say they are looking into what happened. Department spokesperson Matthew Wells-Longshore said, "We are currently investigating this allegation. The investigation will determine if it was indeed one of our officers who sent this message and if any policies were violated."
However Wells-Longshore himself texted Jones and apologized for the officer's actions.
"She provided details that it is most likely one of our officers, which is the reason I apologized," wrote Wells-Longshore.
CBS4 tracked the cellphone that sent the text to Jones. It lists to an Aurora police officer who joined the force in 2017 and is currently on patrol. However the officer did not respond to a phone call or electronic messages from CBS4 seeking comment on what occurred.
"It's wrong," said Jones. "Straight up against the code of conduct, if not illegal, to use personal information like that to contact women. It's just completely wrong."
Jones said she hopes the officer is disciplined appropriately but doesn't hold out much hope that will occur.
"I don't expect anything to actually happen. But I hope that this shows people that these kinds of things are kind of normal, that they happen to women and I just hope a lot of other men and women recognize that it's not okay."
