WOODSTOCK — The attorney for an ousted police chief argued against the legality of his demotion to patrol officer at a Tuesday court hearing. The town’s attorney insisted that the chief’s behavior had violated policy repeatedly, and warranted the action by the town.
Now, Judge Kerry McDonald-Cady is tasked with deciding whether to reverse, affirm or modify the Woodstock Village Board of Trustees’ decision to demote Joe Swanson, whose employment saga with the town has dragged on for over a year and a half.
Present Tuesday at Woodstock Civil Court on the town’s side were attorney John Klesch and municipal manager Eric Duffy, who first recommended Swanson be removed as chief.
As at prior hearings in the case, Swanson was accompanied by his attorney Linda Fraas. There were approximately 20 members of the public in the gallery.
Fraas argued that there was no basis for the village to demote Swanson per his contract, nor is there just cause to terminate him.
In October 2024, Duffy placed Swanson on administrative leave and the town hired a private investigator to look into the chief’s conduct, which accumulated a slew of complaints from within the department over his availability and informality. Swanson appealed, and the Village Trustees held a marathon 14-hour hearing in March 2025, ultimately siding with Duffy.
But a judge reversed the Board’s decision, ruling trustees erred when they decided they didn’t need to demonstrate legal cause for Duffy’s action since it was a demotion and not a termination.
The ruling put the case back to square one, and the trustees held another hearing earlier this year. As before, they backed Duffy’s decision to demote Swanson but this time the process included findings of cause.
All of which brought the parties back to court this week, so a judge could once again weigh in on the legality of Woodstock’s actions.
On Tuesday, Fraas argued that Swanson has a contractual right to his position as police chief, and that his demotion to the lowest ranking essentially means that any Woodstock employee’s contract is invalid.
“That would be like demoting manager Duffy to administrative assistant,” Fraas said.
Klesch noted that this legal review of a personnel decision does not require the court to find that a reasonable person “would” make the same decision in the trustees shoes, but rather that a reasonable person “could” come to the same conclusion based on the evidence.
Klesch claimed that Woodstock acted appropriately based on the findings of an internal investigation.
Fraas reminded those in attendance of an argument brought up in the first hearing that Swanson wore mismatched socks and had a messy desk, which she said doesn’t warrant termination.
Klesch pushed back.
“It’s a lot more than that. It’s that he was constantly disheveled,” Klesch said of Swanson’s appearance.
He added that Swanson’s habit of meeting the public out of uniform, wearing unclean shoes and wearing baseball caps on duty did not adequately model professionalism. Klesch also argued that Swanson’s whereabouts were “chronically” unknown throughout his time in the role, and that he asked dispatchers to log him in as “on duty” while at home.
Fraas argued that these complaints had been retroactive and by request as opposed to naturally raised.
“These were all people that had worked with him for a year, had never expressed to him any kind of issues that they wanted to leave or that morale was low,” said Fraas.
Fraas noted that Swanson received no prior notification of failure to perform, or of policy violations prior to his demotion. She argued that the trustees acknowledged there was no “one particular act” that warranted dismissal, and that instead, Duffy based his decision on the totality of complaints.
“They started out with one imperative: To remove Mr. Swanson,” said Fraas. “And then they tried to make the facts fit it.”
Klesch argued that while Fraas disagreed with the trustees’ decision, she had not met the standard of challenging evidence.
McDonald-Cady said at the end of the hearing that she hoped to issue a written decision within the typical 90-day period.
Outside the courthouse, Fraas said she believes the Village will “stop at nothing” to remove Swanson, even if the court rules in his favor based on Tuesday’s hearing.
In a Wednesday email, Klesch wrote that he hoped his remarks were helpful to McDonald-Cady, and looked forward to receiving a decision.
