Six current and former D.C. police employees are facing fraud charges after prosecutors say they collectively received more than $441,000 in overtime pay that they did not earn.
Those charged include a former sergeant, a former senior officer and a former lieutenant, as well as two current officers and one civilian employee, all of whom were assigned to the city’s 5th District. They are accused of falsifying overtime claims, forging approvals from supervisors and manipulating official records.
The charges come on the heels of a District audit that found overtime “has been and continues to be a costly and chronic phenomenon among the District’s public safety agencies.”
The Office of the Attorney General in D.C. said on Tuesday that the charges stemmed from an investigation started by the D.C. police department after its internal affairs division identified irregularities in “unusually high volumes” of claimed overtime hours, including submissions for time when employees were not actually working or unable to perform their assigned duties.
“These six officers abused their positions of power, exploiting the District and the residents they took an oath to serve and protect,” Attorney General Brian Schwalb (D) said in a statement. “No one is above the law, especially those trusted with enforcing it.”
Prosecutors say that former sergeant Frantz Fulcher fraudulently received $174,915.39; officer Dorrie Smith Cleere fraudulently received $87,397.65; officer Thomas Krmenec fraudulently received $89,478; former senior police officer Bernadette Richardson fraudulently received $43,351.68; former lieutenant Peter Sheldon fraudulently received $18,272.72 and civilian employee Johnnie Dyer fraudulently received $27,721.59.
Those totals accounted for overtime claims in 2024 alone, prosecutors said.
Each defendant was charged with first-degree fraud, first-degree theft, forgery and “uttering,” a charge related to improper use of forged documents.
The D.C. police department declined to comment, citing an ongoing investigation.
The cases originated in the attorney general’s fraud and public corruption section, but, due to the office’s limited jurisdiction as laid out by the Home Rule Act, local prosecutors had to partner with the U.S. attorney’s office to bring the charges.
“Every day, we rely on law enforcement to uphold the public’s trust. These [D.C. police] members betrayed that trust by scheming to collect unearned, undeserved income, costing the taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars,” said U.S. Attorney Jeanne Pirro.
Schwalb’s office said Tuesday afternoon that arrest warrants were signed and “in the process of being executed.”
Like many cities, overtime pay has become a systemic issue in the District, as the city’s public safety agencies suffer from recruitment and retention problems.
Last month, an auditor’s report titled “D.C. Public Safety: Too much overtime, too few staff?” found that the District spent almost $220 million last fiscal year on overtime between the police department, fire and EMS, the citywide call center and the department of corrections.
Overtime accounted for about one-third of all hours worked by D.C. police personnel in fiscal year 2025, during which the city spent about $134 million on police overtime pay, the report said.
The D.C. police department has about 3,150 police officers, and Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) has called in recent years to increase that number to 4,000.
The police department doesn’t have a minimum number of patrol officers, so deployments across the District vary based on operations, according to the audit. While that type of discretion allows police supervisors flexibility in assigning officers, it also “limits real-time overtime spending controls,” the audit found.
At least two D.C. police members have been charged with overtime fraud in recent years over accusations of stealing far less money.
Medgar Webster, a former officer and former vice chairman of the D.C. police union, pleaded guilty in May 2023 to one count of first-degree felony fraud after prosecutors accused him of stealing more than $33,845 in overtime pay. Webster was ordered to pay restitution in that amount and was released on probation.
Less than a year later, in January 2024, officials arrested Marc Davis on fraud and other charges. Prosecutors had accused Davis of earning more than $46,000 in fraudulent overtime pay, but a jury found him not guilty in October of that year, according to court records.
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