Two Cops Fired for Ignoring Robbery to Play Pokemon Go

A recent judgement revealed that two Los Angeles police officers were fired for ignoring an in-progress robbery call to play Pokemon Go. Earlier this week, a three judge panel on California’s Court of Appeals upheld the firing of two Los Angeles police officers after they contended that they were improperly fired due to the use of an in-car recording during disciplinary actions. While that doesn’t seem like a very exciting bit of news, the appeal publicized that the two officers were fired because an investigation determined that the pair ignored an in-process robbery call to capture a Snorlax in Pokemon Go. 

The judgement states that the police officers were alleged to have played Pokemon Go for nearly 20 minutes after ignoring a request for backup on a robbery in progress call. The officers then reportedly chose not to respond to a request for backup and instead spent the time driving around a neighborhood capturing various Pokemon. An disciplinary hearing used a recording taken from inside the pair’s patrol car that captured the duo discussing an attempted capture of a Togetic. Keep in mind that this occurred back in 2017, back when Togetic and Snorlax were still considered rare Pokemon within the game. 

The judgement also notes that when confronted with the evidence from the recording, the pair denied that they were playing Pokemon Go and later argued that Pokemon Go wasn’t a game. Per the judgement, the pair also claimed that the recording showed them “capturing an image” of a Pokemon on a then-active tracking app to share with other players and that their activity was just an attempt to participate in a social media event. 

Ultimately, the pair were charged with multiple counts of on-duty misconduct, including “Playing Pokemon Go while on patrol in their police vehicle and then making false statements to an internal affairs detective during the subsequent complaint investigation. The pair were found guilty by a board of rights of most of the counts and were subsequently fired from the department. The pair unsuccessfully argued that the use of an in-car recording was against the law, which is how the circumstances of their firing came to light.  

You can read the full lawsuit here.