YOUNGSTOWN — A judge upheld an arbitrator’s decision that Youngstown must reinstate Brian Flynn, fired as a police lieutenant in December 2022 after being accused of dereliction of duty, with back pay and interest.

In her Thursday decision, Mahoning County Common Pleas Court Judge Maureen Sweeney wrote: “The court finds that there is a rational nexus between the collective bargaining agreement and the arbitration award. The collective bargaining agreement requires the employer to have just cause to discipline an employee. The arbitrator determined that the employer did not have just cause to terminate Lt. Flynn and modified the termination to a two-week suspension.”

Sweeney added: “There is no limitation on the arbitrator’s authority to modify the discipline. Since the award draws its essence from the labor agreement and is not unlawful, arbitrary or capricious, the court hereby confirms the arbitration award.”

Sweeney sided with Flynn’s attorney, Kay Cremeans, an attorney with the Fraternal Order of Police, Ohio Labor Council, who asked for the dismissal of the city’s motion to modify and vacate the arbitrator’s decision.

Sweeney wrote: “The employer’s attempt to retry the case is rejected. The employer’s motion to modify or vacate the award is denied.”

Sweeney wrote that “judicial review for vacating an arbitration award is limited,” and “this court recognizes the presumed validity of an arbitration award.”

Cremeans said: “We’re very pleased with the outcome of the decision. We’re looking forward to his reinstatement.”

A city statement, provided Friday by spokesman Andy Resnick, reads: “We are obviously disappointed with the court’s decision on this matter and will be evaluating all options to appeal the ruling.”

The case, filed March 26 by the city, sought to overturn the Dec. 26 binding decision by arbitrator Jerry B. Sellman that the city should have suspended Flynn for two weeks without pay “in light of certain mitigating circumstances and the employer’s progressive disciplinary procedures” rather than fire him.

Sellman ordered Flynn be reinstated with no loss in seniority or benefits and with back pay though that amount should be offset by any compensation he’s received since his firing. Flynn was hired in September 2023 by the village of Poland as a police officer.

In her April 8 filing, Cremeans also asked for interest on Flynn’s lost back pay, which Sweeney granted.

Sellman determined Flynn “did engage in conduct that constituted neglect of duty, conduct unbecoming, incompetence and violations of standards of conduct for supervisors, managers and administrators,” but the city shouldn’t have fired him.

Flynn was charged with 14 misdemeanor counts of dereliction of duty, but the charges were dismissed.

In Cremeans’ response to the lawsuit, she wrote: “In an obvious last-ditch Hail Mary, the employer attempts to convince the court that the arbitrator award violated public policy. Like all the other arguments espoused by the employer, this argument must simply be rejected.”

Flynn was fired Dec. 2, 2022, after an investigation of allegations that he failed to assign detectives to about 40 referrals from the Ohio Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force involving alleged child abuse and child pornography cases.

Flynn was the head of the Family Investigative Services Unit, now called the Special Victims Unit, and a Youngstown police officer since 1998.

Before his firing, Flynn was on paid administrative leave for more than 20 months.

A criminal investigation was conducted by Detective Brian Breeden of the Summit County Sheriff’s Office at the request of Jeff Limbian, then the Youngstown law director. Breeden turned over his investigation to the Youngstown Law Department, which filed the 14 misdemeanor counts in October 2022 in city municipal court.

In Cremeans’ request to dismiss, she wrote Flynn “was not aware that he would be receiving tips for which he was responsible for investigating,” and he did not have equipment he requested to investigate the state task force cases. Also, Flynn believed an officer in his unit was handling the tips from the state task force, Cremeans wrote.

She wrote that police Chief Carl Davis drafted a letter on Aug. 2, 2021, suspending Flynn for two weeks, but it was never given to the officer.

Paul Siegferth, who was Flynn’s attorney in the Youngstown Municipal Court case, filed a motion to dismiss contending the city prosecutor’s office failed to prove at a May 2023 hearing that no information from the police department’s internal affairs investigation was used in the criminal investigation of Flynn.

Breeden testified during a May 2023 hearing that he didn’t consider any of the internal affairs information in his investigation, but Siegferth argued the city failed to prove it didn’t use it.

Visiting Judge Mark Frost agreed and dismissed the case a month later.

A U.S. Supreme Court ruling — Garrity v. New Jersey — prohibits the use in a criminal matter of any “compelled statement” taken from a public employee during an internal affairs investigation.

The 7th District Court of Appeals in March 2024 ruled against the city, which appealed Frost’s decision, saying the judge’s ruling “in this case was the proper remedy.”

Sellman wrote in his decision that there is no dispute that Flynn “intentionally failed to act upon or follow-through on” the referrals from the Ohio Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.

He wrote: “The arbitrator does not find from the evidence that (Flynn) purposefully flouted his duties to enforce the law. He clearly made incorrect assumptions and his reliance on those assumptions resulted in his violation of” city police rules.

In one case, Sellman wrote, a juvenile was sexually abused for more than 18 months before a county sheriff intervened and the perpetrator was arrested. Another case, Sellman wrote, involved six victims with the suspect sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Sellman wrote considering Flynn’s 26-year career and “his unfounded, yet mistaken, belief that others were handling” the cybertips as well as the lack of oversight from the state agency, he should be suspended without pay for two weeks, which was the initial decision of the city before filing criminal charges.

Sellman wrote the city’s contract with the police ranking officers union calls for progressive discipline.

Deputy Law Director Adam Buente, who represented the city in the case, wrote in the March 26 appeal that policy doesn’t apply if the conduct is serious.

Cremeans responded: “It can be surmised from the arbitrator’s ultimate findings and determination that he found this not to be a serious offense.”