February 18, 2016

The Denison police chief has been reprimanded for inappropriate images on his work computer — including some with racial overtones about Hispanics, according to the town’s new mayor.

Denison was 42-percent Hispanic in 2010, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

“I verbally chastised him and put a letter of reprimand in his file,” Mayor Dan Leinen told the Daily Times Herald on Wednesday, as a handful of people stood outside City Hall asking for harsher punishment for Chief John Emswiler. “I did what I was supposed to do. I followed protocol.

“They are protesting that I didn’t immediately fire him.”

Among the protesters was former Police Officer Ray Ohl, who was fired recently for unspecified reasons.

Ohl held a sign that said: “This is no place to laugh at race.”

Leinen said someone — he declined to name the person — gave city leaders copies of the images alleged to have been on Emswiler’s computer. One, Leinen said, depicted Emswiler putting a sash on a young Latina during the city’s Cinco de Mayo celebration, and it had writing on it that said: “And he really loves the Hispanics.”

Emswiler declined to comment about the photos for this article because the issue involves police officers — whom he didn’t name — who are the subjects of disciplinary proceedings.

Ohl did not respond to a request to comment for this article.

“We have two individuals who are backed into a corner and are trying to take the chief down with them,” Mayor Leinen said.

“It’s a non-issue that they’re trying to make into a big issue.”

Another officer, Bradley Wendt, was charged in December with several hunting violations for poaching deer.

A Sioux City-based television station reported that Ohl and Wendt are the officers who provided the images.

“We don’t know how these pictures came about,” Leinen said. “They were Photoshopped, and we can’t prove who Photoshopped them.”

Chief Emswiler declined to tell the Times Herald whether he manipulated the images or whether someone else did and sent them to him.

“I can’t talk about it while disciplinary matters are pending,” he said.