Criminal charges lodged against Hartford ex-officer accused of lying to get warrant and faking stats

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — A former Hartford police officer accused by his own department of lying to get an arrest warrant and inflating his traffic enforcement states has been criminally charged with perjury, forgery and computer crime.

Michael R. Fallon, whose late father was the chief of Connecticut State Capitol Police, turned himself in Tuesday at the department, Lt. Aaron Boisvert, a police spokesperson, said Thursday. He was released on a promise to appear in court next Wednesday, according to court records.

A message was left at a phone number for Fallon found in public records. Court records do not list a lawyer for him, a court clerk said.

Police Chief Jason Thody has said Fallon, 28, admitted to falsifying records and an internal affairs investigation substantiated the allegations against him. Fallon resigned in March before the investigation was complete, avoiding potential discipline, records show. Thody said the department has notified the state agency that decertifies police officers about Fallon.

Fallon applied for an arrest warrant last year for a man he claimed fled a traffic stop, according to records. A judge approved the warrant in March 2022, but the man was never arrested and the judge later invalidated it after police officials told him that Fallon lied in the application.

The internal affairs investigation report also accused Fallon of overreporting nearly 200 traffic stops that couldn’t be verified and claiming 31 more traffic citations than he actually issued. It said Fallon admitted to falsifying his stats, saying he did not want to disappoint his supervisors.

The charges come as investigators are looking into a report that dozens of Connecticut State Police troopers may have submitted false traffic citation data. The state police union is disputing the report, saying data entry errors could be to blame and many officers already have been cleared of any wrongdoing.